CEO Marc Benioff is aware that the pay gap cannot be solved in one day, but he’s still taking Salesforce steps toward solving it. This week, after examining all female employees’ salaries and comparing them to his male employees’ salaries, he gave $3 million more in salary to female employees. Benioff can now say, “We pay women the same as we pay men.” Fortune reports that with approximately 23 percent (4,000) women making up Salesforce’s 17,000-strong workforce, it comes out to a $750 raise per female employee.
At this week’s Fortune Global Forum, Benioff said, “I think I got called out this year, and it was a difficult moment for me as a leader, for sure. We also believe very strongly in equality. We believe in equal rights for our employees, for them to have those rights, that is. Equal pay for women is critical.”
Google is leading by example, but will its behavior encourage others – mostly men – in male-dominated industries to do the same? If so, this could revolutionize how these companies operate. With an increase in paid maternity and paternity leave policies recently, this could be the next big change in workplace culture.
