Gender Pay Gap

Our gender pay gap

We have a legal duty to report our gender pay gap information every year - and we welcome this opportunity to be open and transparent.

Our mean (average) gender pay gap has reduced from 8.93 per cent in 2021 to 7.53 per cent in 2022.

And our median (middle) gender pay gap has reduced from 7.32 per cent in 2021 to 3.60 per cent in 2022.

Our chief executive, Matt Stringer on our Gender Pay Gap Report

We've published RNIB’s Gender Pay Gap Report and welcome this opportunity use gender pay reporting to hold us to account and to ensure we’re always striving to do better.

RNIB is working towards a world where there’re no barriers to people with sight loss. As part of our values, we’re committed to creating an inclusive workplace. We’ll continue to invest in equality, diversity and inclusion, with accessibility at the heart of everything we do. We strive to become the best charity that we can be and to help us achieve our vision for blind and partially sighted people where society values them not for the disabilities they’ve overcome, but for the people they are.

RNIB aims to be recognised as a good employer that attracts and retains the best people possible who can achieve their highest potential at work. We’ve an open and high trust culture with opportunities to develop and thrive, collaborate with purpose, make an impact and be recognised for doing so.

How we work out our gender pay gap

There’s a UK government requirement for all companies with over 250 employees to publish their gender pay gap data. The 2022 gender pay figures are based on data available on our reporting date, 5 April 2022.

The gender pay gap is different from equal pay, which formed part of the 2010 Equality Act. The act prohibits discrimination on grounds of race and gender and other protected characteristics and involves females and males or White and ethnic minority employees being paid the same for like/similar work.

The gender pay gap is the difference in average pay between all females and males regardless of the work they perform.

We must report both the mean and median pay gaps. The median pay gap usually gives a better representation of the experience of the ‘typical’ employee as it’s the difference between the midpoint ranges of earnings of all male and female employees. But it doesn’t necessarily reflect the pay of the top earning employees. There are fewer women in the higher-paying roles at RNIB, and the mean pay gap is better able to reflect this as it’s the difference between average hourly earnings of all male and female employees and is often why the mean pay gap is higher than the median.

How we’re reducing the gender pay gap

Our mean (average) gender pay gap has reduced from 8.93 per cent in 2021 to 7.53 per cent in 2022, and our median (middle) gender pay gap has reduced from 7.32 per cent in 2021 to 3.60 per cent in 2022.

We’ve reduced the gap by changing how we recruit our staff:

• We’re working towards anonymised job applications.
• We clearly state salaries on all job adverts.
• We made sure all job adverts focus on accessibility and inclusivity.

These changes help to remove bias from the shortlisting process and ensure we can attract and retain the best talent to help us achieve our vision.

We’ve also introduced a menopause policy and created staff networks, including a women’s network, to support and include all staff.

While we’re pleased that these results show some improvement, our gender pay gap remains higher than we would like so we’ll be looking at ways of reducing it further.

Next steps to further reduce the gender pay gap

We’re continuing to develop our recruitment procedures, including exploring issues around gender-biased language and improving job descriptions to attract a diverse range of candidates to the organisation.

We’re updating our Flexible Working Policy and introducing flexible working from day one of employment for all new recruits, to help those with caring responsibilities and to enable working families to remain employed in roles that reflect their skills.