Asking for more money at work can be intimidating—especially for women.
Only 36% of women feel comfortable asking for a raise, compared to 44% of men, according to a recent Glassdoor poll. That’s bad news for workplace equality, especially given the fact that the gender pay gap is still in full swing. In 2024, women still earned an average of 85% of what men earned in 2024, according to recent analysis from Pew Research Center. That’s only slightly better than 2003, where women earned 81% of what men did.
Women have been told for years that it’s their responsibility to close this divide by being bold and asking for more at work. But it’s not quite that simple, according to Glassdoor’s chief worklife expert Adam Grant.
“They often face more social pressure to be other-oriented and humble, and that makes it hard to advocate for themselves,” he tells Fortune.
Instead, he says that it’s on employers to foster environments that encourage open dialogue about salary, and encourage both women and men to ask for what to be paid fairly.
“The reality is that in an organization, the employer has the power, and a lot of people—both men and women—are fearful that if they if they cross a line or they ask for something that’s perceived as entitled or inappropriate, that it could jeopardize their relationships, their reputation, and maybe their employment,” he says.
While both men and women aspire to move up the corporate ladder, women face very different obstacles. They are more likely to receive higher performance ratings than men, but received 8.3% lower ratings for potential than men, according to a 2022 MIT study. The result was that female employees on average were 14% less likely to be promoted than their male colleagues.
Grant says that to solve for this gap, employers should create an “opt out” model when it comes to raises and promotions. That means that the employer assumes everyone—regardless of gender—wants a promotion and a raise unless they explicitly “opt out” of consideration.
“The same way that your cell phone provider tells you that you’re eligible for an upgrade,we ought to have leaders and managers reaching out to women especially, and saying, ‘Hey, you might be eligible for a raise.’”