Female IT managers topple men in pay league

Female IT managers are for the first time earning more than their male counterparts and women are also climbing the corporate ladder faster, according to the annual salary survey from the Chartered Management Institute (CMI).

Across all sectors the average female team leader, at 37 years old, is four years younger than her male counterpart, while female IT managers earn on average £45,869 per year - £779 more than the men do.

That puts female IT managers fourth in the female earnings league table with one of the biggest remuneration packages across all sectors, despite a £1,446 drop in the average salary compared to last year.

There is also evidence that women are increasingly making their presence felt in the boardroom: the number at senior executive level has trebled over the past 10 years, and women now account for 14.4 per cent of directors.

At the boardroom level, women's salaries are increasingly being supplemented by bonuses and, for the first time since the CMI salary survey started in 1974, they are receiving larger bonuses than male counterparts.

But this corporate ladder climbing also appears to come at a price. The total labour turnover rate for female managers across all sectors is 9.5 per cent compared to 6.5 per cent for men. The figures show women are also more likely to resign than their male colleagues.

The regional breakdown shows that female managers in the northwest and southeast of England are the biggest earners outside of London, with those in Northern Ireland and the Midlands the least well-off.

The CMI survey of 20,989 individuals across 200 organisations was carried out by Remuneration Economics.

Paul Campfield, director of Remuneration Economics, said in a statement: "It is encouraging to see that the number of female managers continues to increase but it is worrying that they are still more likely to resign.

"The implication is that female managers still face difficulties in the workplace and organisations should address these quickly because, unchallenged, these problems will demotivate and disrupt with the end result being poor performance and productivity levels."