Caitlin Clark & Pay Disparity: 6 Takeaways for HR

No one has put a brighter spotlight on pay disparity than Caitlin Clark.

If you don’t know who that is — and how she’s dominated headlines on everything from college basketball and teamwork to community impact and pay disparity — here’s your quick tutorial: Clark broke pretty much every NCAA basketball record — female and male — and along the way made her school, sport and self as popular as Taylor Swift this football season.

Now the HR kicker: As the first overall pick in the WNBA draft, she’ll make about $80,000 a year. The first round draft pick in the NBA last year made $10 million as his first-year salary!

Spotlight on Pay Disparity

Now, don’t worry: Clark won’t suffer. She has a $25 million side gig with Nike. But her W-2 puts a spotlight on pay disparity across industries, geographies and underrepresented populations.

“Despite increased awareness of pay parity in modern societies, the gender pay gap persists in the U.S., largely driven by occupational segregation and the lack of female representation in senior leadership positions,” says James Neave, Head of Data Science at Adzuna: “Our data shows that gender pay gap is particularly prevalent among traditionally male-dominated industries, such as science (13.1%), engineering (9.5%) and IT (7%).”

And it goes beyond starting salaries. Thirty-eight percent of men were promoted with pay raises last year, while just 32% of women were, according to research from HiBob. Similarly, 17% of men got increases in benefits, while just 8% of women did.

But you can help fix this.

“HR professionals and company leaders can create a safe environment that supports the growth of women by making sure women are treated fairly, and that there are good role models at their companies of women in leadership.,” says Annie Rosencrans, People & Culture Director at HiBob.

Comparing Apples to Apples?

Now for any cynics — like my husband! — who say we aren’t comparing apples to apples when we talk about the NBA and WNBA, we acknowledge that.

“In the case of professional sports like NBA and WNBA, on top of these reasons, factors like viewership, revenue and sponsorship discrepancies between NBA and WNBA could play a significant role in the differences in pay between male and female athletes,” says Neave.

Still, Clark’s popularity and salary could be the most highlighted example of the pay gap these days. So let’s use the information as a way to do better at creating more transparency, fairness and opportunities.

Here are six takeaways from the Caitlin Clark pay disparity story — and keys to lessen or eliminate it.

Introduce Equal Pay Audits

Both Neave and Rosencrans suggest regular equal pay audits.

“This is important both for equity within the organization, and to ensure the company is remaining competitive with the external market,” says Rosencrans. “Payroll tech can provide a seamless way for HR teams to regularly assess employee compensation and ensure pay equity across employees holding the same role, experience, tenure, and job level.”

Then, as Neave says, “address any potential disparities in compensation based on gender, ethnicity or other bias-driven factors.”

Set a Benchmark for Each Role

Regularly do market research so you can set a pay benchmark for each role.

This is helpful because you “minimize potential bias by being explicit about expectations on experience, skills and performance,” says Neave.

Rosencrans says there’s another benefit to this approach: “With salary transparency laws now enacted in many regions, businesses can get a better understanding of what their competitors are paying and make sure they are matching or exceeding those salary bands.” 

Another emerging benefit for setting new benchmarks is you can figure out if current requirements for certain roles are still necessary — such as a degree for career advancement. Growing trends include hiring and advancing based more on skills and less on education.

Check Access to Advancement

While you might know your compensation is fair and equitable because it lines up on paper, there’s something else that can hinder pay equality: access to advancement.

Like pay audits, you’ll want to also regularly review whether female employees have equal access to career progression and learning opportunities as your male employees.

You might need to become more proactive about helping female employees explore career advancement.

“Be transparent about steps for career progression. Outline the steps and skills required for advancement for each position,” says Neave. “Make sure they are skills-based and the job descriptions reflect the role.”

Formalize Opportunities for Women

Help women help themselves move ahead in their careers and compensation through formal opportunities. But let them choose to participate or not.

You might try programs specifically created to help women advance — such as mentorship programs, leadership development programs and networking opportunities.

And you can get more women in the door — and on the road to advancing — if you invite senior female managers onto interview panels during the hiring process or promotion discussion. 

Offer Women-Focused Benefits, Perks

Build benefits, compensation and perks that appeal to women in the workplace.

“Offering benefits that meet the needs of working women – and working mothers – is critical in making sure women who choose to have children aren’t impacted by the ‘motherhood penalty,'” says Rosencrans. “This includes offering parental leave and flexibility to working parents who may need to step out for a child’s doctor appointment or daycare drop-off.

And Neave suggests, “Introduce female-centric perks tailored to working mothers — e.g. parental leave, enhanced maternity leave, flexible working and subsidized childcare. According to Oxfam, women are five to eight times more likely than men to have their employment affected by caregiving responsibilities.”

Implement Unconscious Bias Training

Sometimes, people don’t recognize biases — and that can be especially true when it comes to gender bias.

So you’ll want to add regular unconscious bias training for anyone who manages others and include lessons in conducting unbiased pay negotiation.