What really happens when women #ask4more?
When curious, conscientious researchers encounter new data, they can ask existing questions in new ways. This is exactly the case for researchers Benjamin Artz, Amanda Goodall, and Andrew J. Oswalt. Their recent Harvard Business Review article, “Research: Women Ask for Raises as Often as Men, but Are Less Likely to Get Them,” suggests several ways in which women’s wage-negotiating behavior may be different than we used to think. Below, I summarize some of their key findings and implications for leaders.
Here’s what we thought we knew: labor economists estimate that women earn 10-20% less than their male counterparts and women are less likely to negotiate their salaries in order to close that gap. Most of the time, this activity – or lack thereof – is attributed to the fact that women do not want to jeopardize workplace relationships or opportunities by doing things that might cause them to be perceived as difficult or aggressive.
While these findings emerged from earlier research carried out by accomplished scientists and economists, a few flaws endured in the research. Most earlier research involved surveys which asked respondents how they would behave in hypothetical situations or lab experiments which placed participants in artificial employment and negotiating positions. The study by Artz, Goodall, and Oswalt makes several improvements on earlier research. Their new dataset is large and includes 4,600 randomly selected employees in 800 workplaces. Those 4,600 employees are matched to and clustered within the workplaces. The study takes place in Australia so the random sample is also diverse, and spans a range of genders, ethnic and racial backgrounds, cultural distinctives, incomes, industries, firm size, number of hours worked, and education levels. Perhaps most importantly, the study asked participants about actual “asking” behavior (negotiating wage) and “getting” outcomes (a resultant increase in wage) and collected information about the askers’ motivation. The key takeaway here is that, while previous research may be valid and useful, new data offers researchers the chance to better understand what we thought we knew.
Findings from this study do in fact offer us something new. That is, women in this study reported asking for wage increases just as often as men. However, they received wage increases only about 15% percent of the time, while men received wage increases about 20% of the time. Over a career, these differences are substantial. Artz, Goodall, and Oswalt then investigated long held beliefs about why these differences in asking and getting behavior persist. They found:
Women and men report reticence to negotiate wages at exactly the same rate. Fourteen percent of both women and men reported NOT asking for a wage increase for fear of jeopardizing workplace relationships.
There is no difference among asking behavior between highly educated men and women, or between men and women with limited education.
Among men and women, older or longer-tenured employees ask for pay raises more often.
Firm size, education level, shorter job tenure, and dependent children do not appear to change the rate at which women ask for wage increases.
While these findings may be disheartening, there are two encouraging conclusions. First, there is no discernible difference between younger men and women in getting raises. The researchers report this as a “hopeful explanation” and suggest this as evidence that industries and companies have in fact begun to change the way they distribute pay. A second optimistic finding is that, when the rules of wage negotiations are ambiguous and appear arbitrary, “females are more likely than males to signal their willingness to work for a lower wage rate.” The opposite, then, may also be true: where parameters for negotiations are transparent and accessible, women may ask (and get) with more frequency.
Consider what this means for leaders, and especially for those who have some discretion over how employees are paid and promoted. Primarily, it is your job to demystify the ‘rules’ of wage (and promotion) negotiations: consider your communication with employees about how often they occur, under what circumstances, by what process individuals ask for raises, and what criteria are in place for awarding raises or promotions. Is this information readily available and easy to understand (in multiple languages if necessary)? Are employees able to ask questions about the process and receive clear answers without possibility of retribution? This may seem like a small step, but as the study’s authors conclude: “The bottom line is that the patterns we have found are consistent with the idea that women’s requests for advancement are treated differently from men’s requests. Asking does not mean getting — at least if you are a female.” When we know better, we hope to do better. This study provides more information about exactly how to move forward so that all employees are equitably treated, paid, and promoted.
-Lauren