some studies have found that the gender pay gap is quite significant in many industries. For India, job search platform Monster has estimated that women are strongly underpaid with the overall gender pay gap at 25% in 2016.
In India, the gender pay gap story holds true. However, the reasons for this gap could reveal a very different story. The gender pay gap is primarily a manifestation of the underlying diversity challenges that organisations currently face.
On a positive note some companies are taking steps to resolve this. Adobe Systems announced a pay parity policy to close the gender wage gap across its India and global operations; in a move to fully eliminate the gender wage gap by early next year.
Employees in Adobe’s Indian offices compromise over a quarter of the organisation’s global strength. This move is aimed at abolishing the gender pay disparity in the technology industry, and is in line with the company’s commitment towards building Adobe India as a diverse and inclusive workplace for all.
Adobe is moving away from the practice of looking at historic compensation. Other leading companies also acknowledged the problem and expressed that more initiatives were required to bring gender parity in companies and focus on the issue. In IT companies in India, there is no disparity at the entry level, but disparities begin at later stages of the career. Many experts point out that the situation is better in the IT industry compared to other industries.