Even as a small percentage of women reach the top in Indian companies, the pay gap between men and women at the level is at 15%, according to a new study.
The study ‘The Glass Ceiling: Research Report on Leadership Gender Balance in NSE 200 Companies’ carried out by the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, has revealed that while the overall percentage of women directors in the companies has increased by 16 percent in recent times, just about five percent women are in the top management and another seven percent among senior executives.
The pay gap between genders is stark, as the study has found that on average women senior executives earn ‘INR 85 for every INR 100 that men senior executives earn.’
The average compensation paid to women senior executives is INR 1.91 crore, and the average compensation paid to men senior executives is INR 2.24 crore.
The study includes data from 109 companies with a sample of 4,146 senior executives for the year 2021 (after excluding 15 public sector companies from the data).
The objectives of the study are to help improve gender balance among top management and senior executives in Indian companies, apart from facilitating the career progression of women in senior management.
The study has cited a range of reasons for the lower representation of women overall. These include personal reasons like primary caregiving needs and self-limiting beliefs alongside organizational factors like gendered leadership, lack of sponsorship, micro-expression of discrimination, lack of opportunities, and negative attitudes towards women managers.
Sponsorship holds the key for women’s career advancement, as indicated by the Best Companies for Women in India (BCWI), an annual gender analytics exercise carried out by Avtar and Seramount. As per the 2021 BCWI, 66% of the companies on the BCWI list offered career sponsorship for women—up from 45% in 2016.
