Sales is traditionally a male-dominated industry, but it’s no longer just a man’s world. Today’s business landscape is dynamic, and sales teams are in the driver’s seat when it comes to an organization’s growth. And the more diverse they are, the better their performance.
Teams with a healthy proportion of women in leadership benefit from higher win and attainment rates. And if that’s not enough to convince you that diversity on a sales leadership team leads to better performance, we’ve got more data for you. Profits are up to 50% higher for companies with women in leadership roles.
The data seems pretty obvious…so how come women hold only 38% of sales leadership positions? Clearly, there’s still an uphill battle for gender equality in the workplace.
If you want to empower your whole sales team to perform their best, you need to make sure you’re setting the women on your team up for success. Lusha asked over 500 female sales professionals for their insight into the state of the sales profession for women.
Here’s some of their major headaches and how you can help.
The biggest challenges faced by women on your sales team
We surveyed female sales professionals and asked them to share the greatest challenges they still face. The biggest challenge? Compensation and salary equity – 45.3% named it as the top problem. We’ll do a deep dive on that in a moment, but let’s touch on some of the other challenges first.
36.5% of respondents said their biggest challenge was making their voices heard, and 39.4% said their biggest challenge was career promotion.
Why do these challenges happen? Well, there’s no one good answer, but women are often left out of important networking opportunities if they’re not part of the “boys’ club” in their office. Like high school cliques, except now there’s money (and career advancement) on the line, not just prime cafeteria seating.
There’s also the sticky problem of biases that women encounter, from being too “aggressive” if they advocate for themselves to coming up against stereotypes that women are “weak.” Add to that the lack of female leadership: with fewer female leaders to mentor and guide them, a lot of women in sales have to fend for themselves, and it’s a jungle out there.
If you want to attract – and keep – top female talent on your sales team, you have to make sure that they have a seat at the table and access to intentional mentorship.
Now back to the number one issue for women in sales. The top answer for the female sales pros we surveyed was compensation and salary equity – almost half named it as their biggest professional challenge, so let’s get into it.
Mind the (3rd largest) pay gap
The pay gap is an issue in every industry, but it’s definitely a major problem for sales. Out of all the industries in the U.S., sales has the third largest pay gap – just behind legal and health related roles. Yikes.
For every dollar that a man in sales earns, a woman in sales earns just 67 cents. And while you might think that it might just be a matter of commission, think again.
In fact, women close more deals than men. A study by Chorus AI found that men have an average win rate of 24%. For women, it’s 33%. That’s one in every three deals. Oh, and did we mention that the average deal size for female reps is $5K more than the average deal size for their male colleagues? So why is their pay lower?
Well, there’s a lot of reasons, but surprise, surprise – performance is not one of them. The wage gap can be a result of things like:
- The “motherhood penalty”: women with children are less likely to be recommended for hire or a promotion and are offered lower salaries than not just men, but also childless women.
- The “broken rung”: women are hired into managerial positions less than men, making the initial leap from entry-level to senior management more difficult
- Boys’ club culture: in male-dominated industries, women often miss out on important networking opportunities or career conversations that take place outside the workplace.
How you can support the women on your team
Look, some of those statistics are pretty bleak. But it doesn’t have to be that way. When individual teams and organizations make changes, they take part in a movement to make things better. And things are getting better.
More than half of the women Lusha surveyed – 59.8% – believe that their organizations are making an effort to improve gender diversity and inclusion in their sales org. That’s not as high of a number as we’d like to see, but it does show that the scales are starting to tip in the right direction.
So what are the actual steps you can take to improve the situation for your team?
The women who took our survey were pretty clear: 30.6% said the first priority should be improving wage transparency and fair compensation.
Other top priorities include:
- Offer diversity and inclusion training.
- Provide sexual harassment training.
- Provide mentorship training.
- Offer inclusive parental leave policies.
Let’s get into more specifics of how you can build a female-friendly sales team and leave the boys’ club days behind, based on the priorities of the 500 female sales professionals who answered our survey.
Provide trainings for the whole team to create an inclusive environment
Training plays a huge role in communicating why it’s important to embrace and respect diversity and in challenging biases and stereotypes. While some organizations are intimidated by the concept of promoting diversity, it’s something that needs to be embraced. By promoting diversity, you get the opportunity to tap into a wide range of perspectives, ideas, and experiences. All these different experiences, backgrounds, and problem-solving approaches can uncover untapped market opportunities and lead to creative solutions.
Similarly, sexual harassment training is a must to create respectful – and productive – work environments. Employees need to know the impact they can have both on individuals and their whole team. Training helps provide them with tools to prevent and respond to any incidents. Empowering employees to recognize, address, and avoid inappropriate behavior helps create a culture of respect and dignity. Ultimately, diversity and sexual harassment training contribute create a team culture where all employees feel valued and respected – which means they’ll be able to perform at their best.
Foster mentorship and coaching for female sales pros
Sales is a tough industry, no matter which way you slice it. That’s why having mentorships is so important. Junior salespeople feel more confident and supported with guidance from more experienced colleagues. And those in mentorship positions benefit too; they get extra leadership experience. When sales leadership actively invests in their junior members’ development, the company benefits: mentees perform better and help drive up that bottom line.
Consider starting a female-specific mentorship program for your sales team. While it’s important to break down stigmas for beneficial relationships between male mentors and female mentees so women get helpful, objective feedback, there’s also a lot of value in fostering female relationships in your sales orgs.
A female mentor can help new female sales reps get settled in a new role and answer questions that might be more difficult to discuss with their male colleagues. Talking openly about challenges and solutions will help your female reps feel comfortable and supported – and in return, they’ll be able to perform even better in their roles.
Close up the gender pay gap
When you’re building your sales dream team, be aware of the ways that the pay gap widens. Create a culture of pay transparency so no one on your team has to wonder if they’re being fairly compensated. When your team knows that they’re earning what they’re worth (rather than making less than someone with the same title), they’ll be more likely to stick around.
Having more equitable parental leave and medical leave policies also goes a long way to closing that gap. Making it clear that women can prioritize their health without having to jeopardize their career will go a long way toward keeping top talent on your team.
Finally, actively look for opportunities to promote your female employees. A big part of the pay gap is that women are passed up for those higher-paying, senior positions. Make sure that you’re providing your female team members with the same opportunities for advancement as their male colleagues.
Prioritizing gender diversity in sales isn’t just about justice (even though that’s important too), it’s also just plain smart. If you want your sales team to perform above and beyond, you need to attract a variety of top talent – and keep them invested.
Key takeaways
- Diverse sales teams perform better – with higher win rates, attainment, and profits.
- The biggest challenges faced by women in sales include lack of career advancement opportunities, not being heard, and inequitable pay.
- Top priorities for attracting and retaining top female sales talent include closing the pay gap, investing in diversity training, and creating mentorship opportunities.
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