The deadline for reporting the gender pay gap arrives at midnight on 4 April. Any woman working in an organisation with more than 250 employees can enter their company name into the government’s website to see the difference in pay between men and women, and find out what proportion of the highest-paid staff members are women. It doesn’t matter if you work in a high street fashion chain (eg Coast, where the median hourly pay rate for women is 40% lower than for men), for a train company (bonuses paid to women at West Coast Trains are 64% smaller than those paid to men) or at Goldman Sachs (where women’s bonuses are 67% lower than men’s) – you’re almost certainly getting less money. At JP Morgan, only 9% of the best-paid employees are women.
What should you do if you are a woman working at one of the worst-performing companies? Is this the week to ask for a pay rise? Should you go on strike? Or are there smarter ways to deal with the fury that these figures will likely unleash?
How terrible is your company? Look at the data
Most organisations are just very bad; some are shockingly bad. Study the data to search for warning signs. Are there more women than men in lower-grade jobs? Does that proportion flip as you go up the pay-scale so that there more men than women in high-paid roles? What is the bonus gap like?
The gender pay gap in trade-union-organised workplaces is smaller than in those where there is no union
Remember, this isn’t about equal pay for equal work – a large gender pay gap doesn’t necessarily mean your bosses are breaking the law and a small gap doesn’t mean there isn’t pay discrimination. The government’s pay gap website shows what the average difference in earnings is across each organisation. Particularly telling is the section where companies reveal what percentage of the best- and worst-paid members of staff are women – this should give a clear insight into how committed the organisation is towards promoting women.
“Bonuses and performance-related pay are red flags – in firms where it is predominantly men in the senior management roles, big bonuses traditionally go to men,” says Scarlet Harris, women’s policy officer at the TUC. “Men are deciding who gets the bonus and they decide what achievement and good performance looks like in a company; an old boy network can guide those decisions, as well as prejudices about who is the right person to award the bonus to. This could also be influenced by presenteeism; if a woman has caring issues they might be brilliant at their job but leaving to pick up children.”
Join a union
“This is the first thing women who work in firms with a large pay gap should do,” says Diana Holland, assistant general secretary at Unite. “The gender pay gap in trade-union-organised workplaces is smaller than in those where there is no union.” Join a union whether or not your employer recognises one, she advises. “Unions can still support and advise you.”
If there’s no union, get together with other women and document concerns about pay. Make a plan for the best way to raise this with the most senior people in the company. “These are really difficult conversations, which you might not want to have individually,” says Holland. “Realistically, most women in the lowest pay grades aren’t going to be able to knock on the door of the head of human resources or the CEO and say: ‘You’ve got a problem with your pay gap, what are you going to do about it?’ Strength in numbers is a good way to go,” Harris says.
