A tech giant has just fixed its equal pay problem, for $3m

12 Nov 2015

Marc Benioff, founder and CEO of Salesforce. Photo via Wikimedia Commons

Following a company-wide review, Salesforce has spent $3m to adjust its salary sheet, providing equal pay to women and men throughout the company.

Marc Benioff, founder of Salesforce, was speaking at a Fortune event recently and revealed the company-wide review followed complaints from senior female employees earlier in the year.

A few months ago, Cindy Robbins and Leyla Seka spoke out about what they felt was an improper pay structure, something that Benioff said created “a difficult moment as a leader”.

Benioff was initially skeptical of the claims, but decided to look into it and, to his surprise, changes needed to be made.

“We believe very strongly in equality,” said Benioff. “Equal rights for employees, and equal pay for women is critical.

“We looked at every single one of our female employee salaries and adjusted it against all of our male employee salaries.

“We did approximately $3m in adjustments, so now we can say we pay the same. Equality is our core value. We fight for that.”

The company has even gone so far as setting out a strategic plan to best tackle any remaining inequality in the company and, given the stark figures surrounding both pay and promotions throughout the tech industry, that’s quite the move.

Of course, to think this issue is solved is wrong, with just one-fifth of all Salesforce executives being women, however, plans are in place to address this, reflecting a global, industry-wide shift in attitude.

Women Invent is Silicon Republic’s campaign to champion the role of women in science, technology, engineering and maths. It has been running since March 2013, and is kindly supported by Intel, Open Eir (formerly Eircom Wholesale), Fidelity Investments, Accenture and CoderDojo.

Gordon Hunt was a journalist with Silicon Republic

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