Onward and Upward? An Empirical Investigation of Gender and Promotions in Information Technology Services

Abstract

Is there a gender bias in promotions at information technology (IT) companies? Do women get an equal lift in their promotion prospects from performance improvements, work experience, and training as men? These are pertinent and important questions affecting today’s IT human capital. We analyze data from a leading IT services firm using robust econometric techniques to suggest that, contrary to expectations, women are more likely to be promoted. Although we do not find any evidence of overt discrimination, our findings, however, are far more nuanced and imply that there may be covert discrimination against women in IT when it comes to promotions: compared with men, women realize less benefit from performance gains than men, less benefit from tenure within the focal firm, but more benefit from training. Although our analysis is limited to the lower rungs of the organizational hierarchy, we propose several actionable managerial and policy insights that can potentially make IT firms more inclusive and attractive to women: more parity in the effect of performance improvements and work experience on promotions and using training as a signaling mechanism that can identify and encourage stellar women as they navigate the promotional ladder in IT firms.