Case Studies in Pay Equity

Adobe


To be their most creative and productive, employees need to feel respected and valued. That includes assurance that they are paid fairly, regardless of their gender or color. At Adobe, we announced achievement of global pay parity in October 2018.

 The three steps we implemented to reach pay parity were:
             1.          Reviewing our job families to determine whether they accurately reflected the roles employees were performing
             2.          Establishing new job families and levels within job families
             3.          Realigning employees to the job families and levels that best reflected their work.

After first achieving gender pay parity in our offices in the U.S. and India, effectively addressing 80 percent of our employee base, we set our sights on the remaining 20 percent. Spanning nearly 40 countries, often with very small employee populations, our solution to this challenge was to look at our workforce by market segments: Fast-moving and Mature, as defined by the volatility of market compensation rates. As a core element of our gender pay parity initiative, we analyzed our employees within job families across these two market segments.

In October 2018, we announced achievement of our goal of global gender pay parity. Our findings revealed that all our global pay adjustments, including those previously made in the U.S. and India, impacted less than 5% of our employees and accounted for less than 0.2% of our global payroll costs.

“We’re proud to continue creating a culture that fairly rewards and recognizes the contributions of all our employees across the globe,” said Donna Morris, Adobe’s Chief Human Resources Officer and Executive Vice President of Employee Experience. “Adobe is leading the industry by demonstrating that what is good for employees is good for business, and we hope this inspires other companies to embrace this type of equality.”​




Caesars Entertainment


Caesars Entertainment is proud to support making equal pay a reality in the U.S. In a recent review of compensation at Caesars, we reported that that 99% of women at the company’s corporate headquarters and 98% of women who work in non-union roles at the company’s domestic properties had no meaningful differences in average pay when compared to men in the same positions. These numbers are demonstrative of Caesars progressive workplace that values all employees and promotes an open and inclusive culture, and our greater commitment to ensure equity for all employees. #EqualPayDay”

Learn more here.​




Deloitte


Deloitte has always been at the forefront of fostering an inclusive culture, and our pay practices are no exception. We believe all professionals should be equitably compensated for the unique contributions they make, and do not condone any form of pay discrimination as it is harmful to our employees, our businesses, and our society. 

Pay equity cannot and should not be viewed as a “one-time fix” for an organization no matter what size, scale, or complexity. We believe the topic of pay equity requires constant attention, and there are several leading practices and measures we take to promote fairness and equitable treatment of all our professionals.

For example, we are able to leverage sophisticated data analytics to help us remove the potential for bias in decision-making across our organization, including better understanding and controlling for the wide range of unique variables that may impact an individual’s compensation.  Do local market pressures influence compensation?  Is there a premium to pay for “hot skills?” How do specialized certifications or degrees influence compensation?  These are the types of questions advanced analytics capabilities help us to better understand.

Other leading practices we follow include:

Benchmarking: We engage annually in extensive external benchmarking of salaries in the markets in which we compete to better control for equity in our hiring practices.

Data and digital: As described above, we employ advanced analytics tools year-round as we analyze trends and anomalies in our performance management practices.

Updated application process: We no longer ask employment candidates for their compensation history on our job application. This can address the broader issue of historical pay disparities while we evaluate candidates and set compensation based on their skillset, education, and experience they bring.

Salary bands: We establish salary bands to strive for consistency and equity in our hiring practices and across the lifecycle of a professional. 

Education & training: We incorporate practices for pay fairness such as understanding business-specific compensation variables and guidance around established salary bands into our annual compensation processes as part of our ongoing education and training.

Year-round focus and accountability: We conduct multiple leadership reviews to proactively identify and address potential disparities, further reinforcing our commitment to fair and equitable pay.

Fostering an inclusive and development culture: We invest in educating our leaders and professionals around the traits of being an inclusive leader and to raise levels of awareness around unconscious bias, which has numerous implications in our daily lives and in the workplace throughout the talent lifecycle, beyond just pay equity.




Starbucks


Starbucks has achieved 100 percent pay equity for women and men and people of all races performing similar work in the United States. We are committed to achieving and maintaining 100 percent gender equity in pay for all partners in Starbucks company-operated markets globally.


Leveraging our experience working to achieve pay equity in the U.S., and with the support of equal rights champion Billie Jean King and her Leadership Initiative (BJKLI) and leading national women’s organizations, the National Partnership for Women & Families (National Partnership) and the American Association of University Women (AAUW) we have established best practices under the EPE Principles to help address known, systemic barriers to pay equity in the U.S.

Equal Footing: from the start and throughout your career
We do not ask candidates about their salary history. Starting pay should be based on the candidate’s skills, abilities and experience, not on a prior salary from another employer.
We remove any caps on promotional increases. If you are promoted at Starbucks, your salary will not depend on what you made before.
We provide a position’s pay range upon a candidate’s request.

Transparency
We will publish our pay equity progress annually, along with updates on the efforts we’re taking to achieve and maintain pay equity globally.
We use an offer standards calculator to determine starting pay range for all Store Managers and District Managers.
We do not retaliate or discriminate against employees for asking about or discussing wages.

Accountability
We set a goal to achieve and maintain 100% gender pay equity globally and maintain 100% pay equity in the United States.
We conduct comprehensive compensation analyses to further the goal of equity for our partners. We look at base pay, bonus, stock, and other rewards.
We analyze all rewards decisions before they are final.
We address any unexplained differences in pay between women and men performing similar work when we discover discrepancies.




VMware


As the software company that's powering the world’s largest businesses, we have the opportunity—and the responsibility—to lead by example. We understand that our products, operations and people collectively have an impact on the world, and we strive to generate positive global impact through all that we do. At VMware, we believe in the power of human difference. Harnessing that power means equal pay for equal work. To that end, we focus on three areas:

1. Hiring Practices
We believe having inclusive and equitable hiring practices is critical to our success.  As such, globally we:
- Screen job descriptions to remove terminology that may trigger bias;
- Avoid asking candidates pay history and instead inquire about pay expectations globally;
- Provide pay range data to candidates when they request it;
- Ensure a diverse cross-section of professionals on interview panels; and
- Extend new hire offers that are based on the role requirements and not prior employer compensation practices.

2. Training and Communications
A common thread in our training and communications to our manager population is emphasizing the importance of fostering a diverse and inclusive organization and checking biases. We provide:
- Unconscious Bias education live, virtual and on-demand to all employees;
- Regionally-specific training for candidate-facing HR roles;
- Pay related trainings, Q&A sessions and communications, at least three times a year, stressing the underlying themes of equitable pay and checking bias; and 
- Pay transparency trainings.

3. Equitable Pay Analyses
Equitable Pay is the basis of VMware’s compensation philosophy.  Our most recent data analysis, prepared by a third party, shows that at VMware, women earn 99 percent of their male counterparts' salary globally and racial and ethnic minority employees earn 100 percent of their white counterparts in the U.S.  We are committed to pay equity and equal opportunity across gender and racial lines.  As such we:
- Analyze all available pay components (base, on-target earnings, bonus allocations, spotlight awards, annual refresh grants) globally;
- Analyze and participate in country-specific reporting;
- Conduct an intersectionality analysis in the U.S. of the annual pay, promotion and refresh grant cycle;
- Analyze the promotion rates and related increases during the annual planning cycle; and
- Review new hire pay packages to identify disparities by job role .

Once we have the compensation data from the above, we take action to fix pay discrepancies our analysis reveals.


Equal pay for equal work is a priority at VMware. We continue to test research against practical application and evolve our programs, tools and policies to drive change both in our organization and across the broader technology industry. We’ve learned there isn’t a quick fix to create a diverse and inclusive workplace, but we’re dedicated to the journey and remain transparent and accountable for our actions. For more information please visit VMware’s Diversity and Inclusion site.