Gender Pay Gap Report 2017

In compliance with the UK Government’s statutory requirements on gender pay, the GSMA is required to publish data for our employing entities with over 250 staff in the UK. This data has been filed with the UK Government and the following provides further commentary on that information.

The GSMA represents the interests of mobile operators worldwide, uniting nearly 800 operators with more than 300 companies in the broader mobile ecosystem, as well as producing industry-leading events and conferences. To deliver on the expectations of our members, the GSMA employs a broad and varied group of professionals with a wide range of differing skills and experience.

Globally the GSMA population is marginally weighted towards female employees. However, a greater proportion of senior positions are held by male employees. With more men in senior positions, this has an impact on our mean and median gender pay gap for hourly rates and bonuses.

The below data represents staff employed only by our UK GSM Association entity in line with statutory reporting requirements.

Gender pay** and bonus* gap

*FY17 bonus includes short and long-term incentive payments and commissions

**These numbers supersede any previous numbers published.

The gap in hourly rate and bonus pay is due to the GSMA having more men than women in senior positions, and more women than men in entry/intermediate level positions. We are committed to ensuring that women and men are paid fairly in comparative roles and have the same opportunity for performance bonuses. We use external benchmarking data related to the relevant industry and specific job role content and take targeted action by reviewing pay for all staff on a bi-annual basis.

Employees receiving bonus in FY17

Employees become eligible for performance bonus after completing three months’ service; more men than women receiving a bonus in FY17 was reflective of having a higher number of women than men join the GSMA in the same period.

Pay quartiles

Proportion of men and women in each quarter of the payroll, each quartile contains 79 employees

Mean by quartile	13.7%	4.1%	6.5%	-1.1%
Median by quartile	7.8%	5.1%	10.2%	2.5%

A Mean and Median pay gap still exists within each quartile; this is due to different jobs and responsibilities attracting different salaries depending on market rates e.g. CEO vs CFO both of which would be in the top quartile.

Positive action being taken

• Although the representation of women in the technology industry is lower than men, the GSMA has a strong track record for attracting, retaining and promoting female talent. During FY17:
  • 58% of all promotions went to female staff
  • 55% of new starters were women
  • 94% of women returned from maternity leave

• We ensure we have representation of men and women on shortlists for all senior roles and run job descriptions through gender bias decoding software.

• We have invested in training and coaching programmes to ensure we are developing non-gender biased talent of the future.

• We have active support for employees returning to work following parental leave, allowing for flexible working and check-ins with HR.

• In February 2017 we launched an industry wide initiative ‘Women 4 Tech’ to address gender diversity in the mobile industry. It is designed to increase female leadership in the digital age and supports UN Sustainable Development Goal #5: To achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. This is now a major programme showcased at each of our three main events.

• For a number of years we have encouraged young women to take advantage of learning opportunities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) areas through participation in initiatives such as the ITU’s ‘Girls in ICT Day’.

Louise Easterbrook
Chief Financial Officer, GSMA

Click here to view Gender Pay Gap Report 2019
Click here to view Gender Pay Gap Report 2018