A study of the perceived gender differences in pay and the impact on employee job satisfaction

Abstract

Employee job satisfaction is understood to be a major factor in organisational performance while gender pay gaps are a relevant issue that persists in the South African labour market. This study sought to understand what the impacts of employeesÕ job satisfaction would be when gender pay gaps were perceived in organisations. Further the study aimed to present the extent to which the gender pay gap was understood to be present in the labour market, to ultimately assist South African businesses to understand the extent of the gap and the impact it holds, thereby allowing for targeted remediation efforts to continue to be developed, and to shed light on the consequences of employee job dissatisfaction. The study followed a qualitative research design which took the form of interviewing 12 participants who held a combination of senior and/or executive management positions, ranging from four industries and six sectors across the Johannesburg and Pretoria regions in South Africa. The study revealed that perceptions of gender pay gaps often resulted in psychological contract breaches between the employee and the employer that led to job dissatisfaction. The implications of job dissatisfaction had negative effects that impacted the employee directly. These were turnover intent, lowered employee discretionary effort, decreased employee productivity, and performance, poor engagement levels, deviant employee behaviour and low motivation. Other implications for the organisation were lowered ability to attract new talent, reduced progress on embracing diversity, poor company culture, and poor financial performance. These were all deemed to be business risks to the organisations. Further implications of job dissatisfaction extended to macro-economic impacts on society, impacts on communities and unemployment levels, these were deemed to be societal risks.