A snapshot survey of health organisations, including charities, has found they face smaller gender pay gaps when led by a woman chief executive.

The study by think tank Global 50/50 looked at 45 global health organisations with a UK base, including charities, consultancies, businesses, as well as faith based and philanthropic bodies.

The think tank's study suggests that gender pay gaps in organisations led by a women CEO for at least five of the last eight years will on average close sooner than in those headed by men.

It found that in women-led organisations the gender pay gap is on average 4.3% smaller than those run by a male CEO.

Women led organisations may be more likely “to have processes in place to address structural pay inequalities”, suggests the study.

“Although progress towards closing the gender pay gap is slow and uneven, these findings offer evidence that organisations with women leaders may be more likely to address structural pay inequalities,” said the think tank’s health sector leader Dr Lynsey Robinson.

She adds that overall in the UK women earn only 87p for very £1 paid to men during 2024, which means women effectively worked for free from 14 November until the end of the year.

In the UK organisations with 250 or more staff are legally required to publish gender pay gap figures. The report calls on other countries to adopt similar mandatory reporting.

Of the 45 organisations looked at 41 were required to report their gender pay gap to the UK government in 2024/25.

The remaining organisations, Plan International, World Vision, Medicins Sans Frontieres and International Planned Parenthood Federation have reported their gender pay gap information voluntarily.

World Vision has been led by chief executive Fola Komolafe since 2023. She is a former CEO of Indisys Business Solutions.

Another charity featured in the study to be led by a woman is Plan International, whose CEO Reena Ghelani is a former United Nations assistant general secretary.

Earlier this month charity leadership body ACEVO published its Pay and Equalities 2025 survey, which found that the gender pay gap among charity CEOs has narrowed but remains in double figures.

The previous month a survey by the Women in Charity Network found that lack of career progression is the number one issues facing women in the sector.

Equal pay day

The study has been released two days after Saturday (22 November) marked equal pay day.

President of the GMB union Barbara Plant said: "It’s not a difficult idea is it – that all workers should be paid the same wages for doing the same job, or for doing different work but of equal value.

“We know that women’s work has always been undervalued and underpaid, and history has shown us how hard it is to achieve equal pay.

"Fifty years ago, the Equal Pay Act was brought in, by the then Labour Government, and 50 years later, we still haven’t achieved it.”

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