Takeaways From Women's History Month 2023: Close the Wage Gap

As another Women’s History Month comes to a close, we are reflecting on the inspiring women from the past and present who work steadily, every day, to improve the lives and increase the opportunities available for women. The rest of the year, and until next Women’s History Month, Visier will remain committed to improving equity between all genders, especially in light of  the disappointing news that the pay gap between men and women widened in 2022 for the first time in five years. We have much work to do, and we’ll do it the best way we know how: with data as a foundation. 

Equal Pay Day in the United States was on March 14th, 2023, and sadly, the evidence revealed that the wage gap between men and women is stagnating and widening, despite the progress that was made in the last few years. PwC reported recently, in their ‘Women in Work Index’, that it would take 63 years to close the gender pay gap and 33 years for women’s participation in the workforce to approach men’s current participation rate. Numbers like this continue to disappoint women in the workforce, and make it more difficult for women to gain equity within their organization.

Women leaving the workforce at higher rates

In addition to the widening of the wage gap between men and women, we’re also seeing a trend of “over 50% of women leaving jobs in the tech industry by the mid-point of their careers, which is more than double the rate of men.” Young women, women in management and women of color are more likely to leave their jobs now than ever before, but this trend hasn’t received much attention in the tech industry or the media. 

Intersectionality is an important piece of the puzzle when reviewing this data—women with historically underrepresented identities are most at risk for leaving their jobs because of a lack of support, more barriers to their career advancement, and experiencing an uptick in microaggressions. These documented barriers should be dealt with internally, but remain unaddressed.

Where does Visier sit in this equation? 

In 2021, Visier set a goal of increasing the percentage of women in management positions by 6%. We ended 2021 with a 10% increase in women in management and we also celebrated 45% of our new hires in 2021 being women. In 2022, we saw 38% of our new hires being women, and a small increase (1%) of women in management. Progress is progress, and we will take the small wins, but our company-wide journey to gender parity in management by 2025 is slowing down. With this updated information, we’ve adjusted our internal gender parity goals to “40/40,” by January 31st, 2024 we aim to have 40% of leadership roles and 40% of all employees who identify as women.

How are we going to go about achieving that goal?

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) remains an important part of a workplace, with many organizations publicly publishing their commitment to DEIB. Now, the onus is on those organizations speaking loudly about their commitment to DEIB to show up for the women colleagues with whom they work every day.

DEIB programs are an important part of Visier’s culture, and we continue to maintain an active D&I Advisory board to ensure we are moving in the direction of gender parity. 

In continuing to support that growth, here are some of the programs and initiatives that the D&I Advisory Board launched and supported in 2022, and will continue to support in 2023:

• Safe zone to foster direct conversations, including confidential and anonymous ways to escalate concerns

• A “D&I in the Workplace" course

• A course on how to be an inclusive interviewer

• Community Calls to celebrate Black History Month and National Day for Truth & Reconciliation

• Anti-Bullying, Harassment and Discrimination Policy, including training

• A “Managing Bias” course

• Promotion Impact Review

• And an Annual Pay Equity Review