Female IT pros don’t see a pay gap

Women in Technology

Senior female IT executives yesterday claimed that they did not see a pay gap between men and women in the industry.

During a panel discussion at the first ever W-Tech event in London, Jo Alma, managing director at Goldman Sachs, and Lis Astall, managing director at Accenture, shook their heads vigorously when the pay gap was mentioned.

Fellow panellist Fiona Capstick, vice president of geographic integration at IBM, said: "I don't feel as if I suffer from a pay gap."

This contradicted a survey released by Women in Technology, one of the event organisers, back in February which showed 55 per cent of women felt their males counterparts were paid more than them.

Although five of the six panellists seemed to agree, Rebecca George, the chair of the meeting and a partner at Deloitte, was adamant there was one.

George said: "There is a pay gap, we all know there is one and we can all see it."

The question of whether the pay gap exists was posed to the panellists during the evening session of W-Tech 2009. The day-long event brought together 1,200 women working throughout the technology sector.

Maggie Berry, one of the event directors said: "This event has been a culmination of two years work and we are so pleased with the turn out and how the day has gone."

Click here to find out why women love and hate working in tech.

Jennifer Scott

Jennifer Scott is a former freelance journalist and currently political reporter for Sky News. She has a varied writing history, having started her career at Dennis Publishing, working in various roles across its business technology titles, including ITPro. Jennifer has specialised in a number of areas over the years and has produced a wealth of content for ITPro, focusing largely on data storage, networking, cloud computing, and telecommunications.

Most recently Jennifer has turned her skills to the political sphere and broadcast journalism, where she has worked for the BBC as a political reporter, before moving to Sky News.