As part of its commitment to address the gender pay gap, the Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA) has once again disclosed its own gender pay gap figures, refreshed its industry resources, and showcased employee research conducted ahead of the statutory reporting deadline.
The PRCA’s median gender pay gap figure stands at 20.7%. According to the PR and Communications Census 2018, the current gender median pay gap in the industry is 21%. Women made up 62.5% of quartile 1 (the highest paid employees); 37.5% of quartile 2; 85.7% of quartile 3; and 100% of quartile 4 (the lowest paid employees). The PRCA discloses its figures annually on a voluntary basis.
The PRCA has launched a gender pay gap toolkit (here) which includes research, blogs, publications, key figures, and other useful content to encourage voluntary, meaningful disclosure – including our Communicating the Gender Pay Gap (here) report.
Research conducted in Q1 2019 by Opinium for PRCA and Lansons found that nearly half of employees (46%) ranked no gender pay gap in their top three benefits. The only benefit more popular was flexible working (62%). Overall, employees ranked no gender pay gap as the second most important factor in their job (16%). This comes after flexible working (26%) but ahead of agile working (13%), work performance bonuses (13%), and matched pension contributions (9%).
Asked if they agreed with the statement “my company is doing all it can to address the issue of the gender pay gap”, 32% agreed. 31% said there was no gender pay gap where they worked, 19% neither agreed nor disagreed, and 9% disagreed.
Among those who agreed that their company was working to address the gender pay gap, over a quarter (28%) believed the main reason was to attract new talent and new graduates. Relevant to the PR and communications industry, just under a quarter (24%) cited organisational concerns around negative media coverage and impact as the reason their employer was addressing the gender pay gap. A similar number (26%) said it was being addressed due to employees’ complaints.
The research was completed between 4th – 7th January, 2019, and 2,000 nationally representative working adults were surveyed.
Francis Ingham MPRCA, Director General, PRCA, said: “As we’ve always said: we practice what we preach, and the PRCA’s own gender pay figures present us with a challenge of our own. But the starting point in addressing that challenge is to be transparent.
“Each year is an education, and each time we disclose our figures is a reminder that small organisations can learn a lot about themselves if they put the time and effort into collating, comparing, and disclosing their figures.
“We have made available free resources so that any organisation can calculate and then disclose their gender pay gap. We could encourage all PR agencies and in-house teams to use those resources and to do the right thing.”
