Title: Employee Satisfaction Is Down, Women Respond Differently
Study: Reinvent Opportunity: Looking Through a New Lens (Accenture 2011)
Finding: Women and men have different strategies for handling job dissatisfaction.
InPower Insight: Women and men have similar desires to make their current jobs work for them, but have different strategies for doing so.
Summary:
Employee satisfaction is low. A meaningful number of employees, both men and women, are dissatisfied with their current work situation (a little over 40% report being unsatisfied). The top reasons for employee dissatisfaction were: being underpaid, lack of opportunity growth, little opportunity for career advancement and feeling trapped. Nonetheless, researchers found that most women and men (nearly 70% of women) planned to stay in their current job situation, many seeking more education than men in the same situation. .
While both women and men will ask for pay raises, fewer women than men will ask for promotions. Most notably, only 14% of the women surveyed plan to reach the C- level suite of their companies.
Women and men are both being mentored, but using a mentor’s assistance for different reasons. Women are more likely to use a mentor as a sounding board where men are more likely to ask for a mentor’s help in career planning. The Glass Hammer summarizes this finding as, “What this boils down to is that more men are discussing the next level with their mentors. And more women are discussing the status quo.”
Sixty- eight percent of women cite working hard and long hours as means for career advancement. Both men and women agree that better compensation, challenging assignments, flexible work situations, and leadership positions as reasons to pursue career advancements. Of all these factors, 65% of women cite better compensation as the top reason to advance.
Personal Coaching Tip: If you’re feeling stuck in your job, you’re not alone. Some will get ahead, however, so it’s good to look at what they’re doing and decide whether you want to do that too. Can you use your mentor to help you strategize your career more proactively? Can you be more assertive in asking for a promotion? The guy in the cube next to you may be doing this, and the stats say he’s got a better chance of rising through the ranks because of it. You don’t have to succeed like a man; you can – and should – develop your own style, but don’t ignore what’s working for the men who succeed.
Keywords: Advancement, Compensation, Dissatisfaction, Job Satisfaction, Employee turnover
Guide to Women in Leadership
Organizations with women in their executive suites regularly out-perform others. Yet rising female executives (and their mentors) are frustrated at how hard it is to break through the glass ceiling. In this extensive guide, Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel into higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
