Gender pay: 2018
What is the Gender Pay Gap?
The gender pay gap looks at the difference in the average pay between all men and women in an organisation, taking account of the full range of jobs and salaries.
For context, the UK’s average gender pay gap is currently estimated to be around 18%, meaning that on average, men typically out-earn their female colleagues by 18%.
The Gender Pay Gap is different from ‘equal pay’, which guarantees equal reward for men and women for doing the same or similar jobs, of equal value.
What are we reporting?
Minus results (-) indicate that the calculated gap favours female employees.
Gender Pay at The Crown Estate: 2018
Base pay:
The Crown Estate has a number of senior female leaders, including three women (of four) on our Executive Committee as well as a large number of predominantly male staff within the estate team at Windsor Great Park.
Reflecting this, our median base pay gap for 2018 sits at -25.6% and the mean is at -5.6%.
These figures have shifted slightly compared with 2017, with the median gap closing (from -31% to -25.6%) and the mean gap widening slightly (from -3% to -5.6%). This reflects the fact that since we last reported, we’ve seen a small number of male leavers, at the higher end of the pay scale.
Bonus pay:
Over 2017/18 we have seen a small shift in the make-up of our workforce, with a small increase in female employees, and a small decrease in males. As a business with a relatively modest headcount relative to the size of our portfolio, we recognise that even small shifts in our employee population can have an impact on our reported metrics.
These marginal changes have moved the midpoint for both male and female bonus payments. This divergence has magnified the relative percentage difference between the two midpoints, and accordingly, our median bonus gap has now widened, standing at -57.6%.
To be clear, this shift reflects the changes we’ve seen in our employee population. It does not reflect a material shift in individual bonus payments for either gender, in monetary terms, compared with last year.
In contrast to the median bonus gap, the mean bonus gap has shifted closer to balance (from +16% in 2017, to +10.4% in 2018).
We will continue to focus on ensuring that discretionary pay within The Crown Estate represents a fair recognition of performance, regardless of gender.
Other key stats:
What are we doing to close the gap?
At The Crown Estate, we’re proud to have a good representation of female leaders in our organisation but we recognise that there is more work to do across all levels of the business.
We are committed to promoting greater diversity and inclusion throughout our business, ensuring that men and women have equal opportunities, on recruitment, pay, and career progression. We know this is fundamental to helping us attract and retain talent and support a healthier, more productive workplace.
Drawing new skills and roles into our organisation will be a key focus for us over the coming few years, as we pivot our business and begin to offer a wider base of customers a much broader range of products and services. Doing this in a way which brings in a good balance of perspectives and expertise will be core to our business success.
At The Crown Estate, we have a number of processes in place to help support gender equality, including:
A structured recruitment process, helping to support unbiased hiring decisions and ensure a good mix of male and female candidates is shortlisted.
Active monitoring of our talent pipeline by gender, ensuring that both male and female employees have equal access to development and equal opportunity for progression.
Independent salary benchmarking against the market, irrespective of gender, across all of the sectors in which we operate.
A range of family friendly policies, including for maternity, paternity, shared parental leave and emergency care, helping to support work/life balance.
We recognise that Gender Pay is only one element of diversity and inclusion in the workplace, and it’s important that we consider our approach to all aspects, including ethnicity, age and social background. The property sector’s record on diversity as a whole is poor and that this narrowness of backgrounds and viewpoints presents real risks for our industry.
We and many of our peers are working hard to help rectify this and open our sector up to new talent. For example, The Crown Estate hosts mentoring and careers events, to help promote opportunities and awareness working with the Taylor Bennett Foundation, Reading Real Estate ‘Pathways to Property’ and the ‘Into University’ programme. We also support organisations including Real Estate Balance and The Mentoring Foundation to promote development and progression of senior women in the sector.
These figures reference pay period figures in April 2018 (the equivalent timeframe reported in 2017).
Judith Everett
Chief Operating Officer