Eight ways to understand
your organisation’s
gender pay gap
Contents
Do people get ‘stuck’ at certain levels within your organisation?���������������.5
Is there gender imbalance in your promotions?�����������������������������������������������.6
Are women more likely to be recruited into lower paid roles
in your organisation?���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������.7
Do men and women leave your organisation at different rates? ���������������.9
Do particular aspects of pay (such as starting salaries and bonuses)
differ by gender?��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������.10
Do men and women receive different performance scores
on average?�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������.11
Are you doing all that you can to support part‑time employees
to progress?�����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������.13
Are you supporting both men and women to take on
caring responsibilities?��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������.14
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 3
Eight ways to understand your
organisation’s gender pay gap
The gender pay gap (GPG) data that you have
reported provides a basic understanding of what
the gender pay balance looks like within your
organisation. However, to be able to target resources
effectively to improve your GPG, it is essential to know
more about the specific causes of any imbalance.
In this guide, you will find eight key questions to
ask that will help you to identify different potential
causes of the GPG. You will need some additional
data to be able to be able to answer these questions,
but you may already collect this data as part of your
human resources processes.
As 77% of organisations reporting in 2017/18
have a gender pay gap in favour of men, this
guidance mostly refers to actions to support
women. However, the majority of actions could
equally be used to support men where the
GPG is in favour of women.
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1. Do people get ‘stuck’ at certain levels within
your organisation?
The quartile breakdowns required Proportion of women by quartiles
under GPG reporting show the
Top quartile (highest paid)
proportion of women and men at
different pay levels. This approach
allows different organisations to be
Women
compared. However, it does not take
into account your particular
organisational structure.
Lower quartile (lowest paid)
You should examine the gender balance in your organisation
using your own seniority structure, and ideally also your job
types and departments.
Gender balance by your seniority structure
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 5
2. Is there gender imbalance in your promotions?
To avoid gender imbalances higher up in your organisation, men and
women need to apply for promotion in proportions that match the
composition of men and women at grades below. For example, in a
particular grade you might have 60% women and 40% men. In that
case, the pool of candidates who apply for promotion from that grade
to a more senior grade should also be 60% women and 40% men. If, for
example, only 20% of the applicants were women, the gender imbalance
would be more likely to worsen at the higher grade, meaning fewer
women in senior roles and a bigger GPG.
To identify whether this is an issue in your organisation,
look at the proportion of women from a given grade or role
applying for promotions, making it through to any assessment
stage or shortlist, and being selected for promotion. Is this
proportion lower than you would expect, given the proportion
of women at that grade or in that role?
If you have internal recruitment processes (such as those
where employees apply to open vacancies), look at these
processes separately to see if there are any imbalances as
candidates progress through the stages.
Applicant pool Applicants Assessment Selected
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If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Examine your promotion processes to establish at what stage
women are falling out
• Are women not applying for promotion at all? If so, why? Can
you improve this, for example by offering flexible working at
higher grades?
• Are women not making it through short-listing processes or
assessment rounds? If so, why? Are your promotion processes
clear and transparent so that bias cannot creep in and affect
them? Are senior staff and hiring managers held accountable
for hiring decisions by someone whose responsibility it is to
monitor equality and diversity, such as a diversity officer, as
well as by your leadership team?
3. Are women more likely to be recruited into
lower paid roles in your organisation?
If women tend to enter your organisation at more junior levels, or
if women are less likely to be hired when they apply to join your
organisation at higher levels, this will impact your GPG.
You can do the following to work out if this is a problem in your
organisation:
• Look at the proportion of women applying for positions and
see if there are gender imbalances at different grades/levels.
• For each grade/level, consider the proportion of women:
– applying for positions
– making it through to any assessment stage or shortlist
– being selected
– accepting roles
Is the proportion of women decreasing throughout this process?
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 7
Hiring Women
If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Examine your recruitment routes – how transparent are
the processes?
• Understand how the potential applicant pool in your field
or industry compares to your applicants. For example,
if 45% of people with appropriate qualifications and
experience in your industry are women, but only 25%
of your applicants are women, why might this be?
• To go the extra mile, you could look at ways to widen
your potential applicant pool by re-thinking structural
issues that can have a larger effect in preventing women
from doing particular jobs. For example, do these jobs
allow flexible working, so that people with caring
responsibilities can do them? Can you help more women
to get the required qualifications? If you use recruitment
agencies, ask them to provide you with long-lists which
include a certain minimum number of women. However,
do take legal advice if you are considering positive action
to benefit women (or men), to ensure that there is no
unlawful discrimination.
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4. Do men and women leave your organisation
at different rates?
If women are leaving your organisation more quickly than men,
this could contribute to your GPG, especially if this is occurring in
more highly-paid positions.
To understand how this works, look at the percentage of women
and men leaving your organisation each year, by seniority level.
Make sure to look at the proportion of women leaving relative
to the proportion of women in that grade. For example, you
might find that 20% of the women in a particular grade left
over the last year, whereas only 10% of men in that grade left
over the last year.
Exit rates Women Men
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 9
If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Staff surveys can be invaluable in identifying differences
in engagement, aspirations to progress or feelings of
belonging, which may impact retention – analyse results
by gender, and consider adding additional questions
to help you get to the root of issues. Also, information
from exit interviews – if delivered independently and
in confidence – are likely to be useful.
• Check whether there are structural issues that may
influence people’s perceptions of how successful
they can be at your organisation. For example, if
senior positions are not offered with flexible working
arrangements, people with caring responsibilities may
not feel they can apply. This could result in talented
people feeling that they cannot develop and succeed
within your organisation, causing them to leave.
5. Do particular aspects of pay (such as starting
salaries and bonuses) differ by gender?
As part of GPG reporting, you need to report information about the
proportion of men and women receiving bonuses. Under the Equality
Act 2010, employers must also ensure they are providing equal
compensation for equal work. Analysing information about equal pay
and bonuses can help you identify whether particular aspects of pay
might be contributing to your GPG.
For instance, you should examine whether men and women
doing comparable work receive different bonuses, pay for
unsociable hours, or overtime.
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Another aspect of pay that can contribute to the GPG is women having
lower starting salaries than men doing similar jobs. This may be a
problem for you if you allow negotiation of starting salaries, as some
research has found that women are less likely to negotiate their pay
than men, and that when women do negotiate their pay, they can be
judged more harshly than men for doing so. These things mean that
women’s starting salaries might end up being lower than that of men
doing the same job.
To check whether this is a problem in your organisation,
compare starting salaries by gender within comparable roles.
If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Introduce clear and fair processes for setting salaries and
be transparent about these processes. Where possible,
communicate salary ranges, and indicate whether salaries are
negotiable or not. This will provide a clear signal to all parties
involved about whether or not it is acceptable to ask for more.
This can put women and men on a more even footing.
• Review how the different aspects of pay are allocated
with your organisation – are these processes clear and
transparent? Are people being held accountable when
allocating them?
6. Do men and women receive different
performance scores on average?
Performance management scores can give you an indication of
whether women and men are performing differently or being assessed
differently. If there is a difference between performance scores, this can
impact progression.
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 11
To check whether this is a problem:
• Look at the difference between the performance scores
of men and women. If possible, break them down by grade
and job, particularly if performance management approaches
vary between these groups.
• If your organisation asks employees to provide a
self‑assessment of their performance, examine it separately
to look for imbalances. Some research suggests that women
tend to rate themselves lower than men and that men are
overconfident in their self-ratings.
If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Encourage managers to monitor the following things:
–A
re men and women being given equal opportunities
to prove themselves? For example, are they being
assigned different types of projects that might not
equally contribute to making someone promotable?
–A
re men and women being given equal resources for
their development? For example, do they have access
to similar training budgets?
–A
re men and women being given equal professional
support? For example, do they have equal frequency
and quality of performance feedback or career
conversations?
• If you find that there are gender imbalances arising from
self-assessments, consider removing self-assessments
from the performance management processes. If you
are unable to do this, ensure that managers do not see
their employee’s self-assessment before assigning a
final performance score. This makes sure their score isn’t
influenced by the employee’s self-assessment score.
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7. Are you doing all that you can to support
part‑time employees to progress?
More women than men work part-time because most caring
responsibilities within the home are still taken on by women.
Ensuring that part-time employees are well supported and are given
opportunities to progress means that well-qualified, experienced
women (and men who also take on caring responsibilities) are better
able to keep participating in the workforce.
To assess how part-time workers progress within your
organisation:
• Look at the number of part-time workers by grade and
occupation –it may be the case, for example, that senior roles
are not being made accessible to part-time employees.
• Many of the issues already raised in this guide can also be
considered specifically for part-time workers. For example,
you could look at differences in performance scores and
promotion rates between part-time and full-time employees.
If you find a gender imbalance here:
• Consider offering more senior positions on a part-time
or flexible basis, including job shares.
• Support managers to understand how roles can be done
flexibly. This might involve having a resourcing meeting
to work out what arrangements might be possible, or giving
managers advice and guidance on what flexible working
might look like in practice in their team.
• When advertising jobs, advertise them as flexible by default
(unless there is a strong business reason why this is not
possible for a given job). This attracts a wider range of
eligible talent.
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 13
• Check whether part-time employees have equal access
to training and development opportunities. For example,
are training opportunities offered at times that suit their
needs? Are managers having career conversations with
them and not making assumptions about their career
aspirations?
8. Are you supporting both men and women
to take on caring responsibilities?
Being able to care for others should be a choice open to both men
and women, and is a core issue when it comes to gender equality. It is
therefore worth reviewing your policies and considering your workplace
culture to ensure that employees are supported to take on caring roles
and responsibilities if they choose to.
To assess how well you are doing on this:
• Look at the uptake of flexible working, Shared Parental
Leave and paternity leave, including by gender. If there is low
take-up of these policies by men, this suggests that men and
women in your organisation are working in quite different
ways, which could contribute to your gender pay gap.
• Use your staff survey to assess your organisational culture
and look for differences between genders. For example:
– Do employees feel supported to take up flexible working?
– Do employees feel that working flexibly (or part-time)
is a barrier to progression?
– Do employees know what flexible working and parental
leave options are available to them?
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If you find that this is a problem for you:
• Raise awareness about your Shared Parental Leave, paternity
leave and flexible working offer by disseminating clear
guidance, or launching a campaign.
• Consider enhancing pay for those on paternity leave and
Shared Parental Leave to encourage male employees to play
a role in childcare.
• Advertise all jobs as flexible by default, unless there is a
strong business case otherwise.
Finally…
Once you have identified where any issues might lie, our Actions to
Close the gender pay gap guidance provides more information to help
you to develop a robust, evidence-based Action Plan and ensure you are
doing all you can to reduce your organisation’s GPG. These can be found
on the gender pay gap Viewing Service.
Gender Pay Gap information for employers 15
