The Salesforce ecosystem has long prided itself on its inclusivity, and Salesforce itself often boasts that “equality” is one of its five core values.
While both the company and community can make claims of being a more inclusive and more equal landscape than other sectors, our SF Ben Salary Survey ‘26 has revealed some interesting insights into differences between men and women working with Salesforce. Let’s take a look at what those are.
Some Apples and Oranges Data?
It is crucial when drawing any kind of statistical analysis on data to make like-for-like comparisons. Otherwise, incorrect conclusions might be drawn about differences between how men and women are treated when, in actuality, the differences are really between how certain roles are treated. Our survey data reveals quite a stark difference in first roles between our male and female respondents.
For instance, 51.1% of women who filled out the survey listed admin as their first role, followed by 11.3% business analyst, and then developer in third with just 5.73%.
For men, 37.14% listed admin as their first role, with developer second at 21.37% (four times the number for women) and business analyst third at 8.8%.
Like Jessica Watson, MBA, MA.Ed., and Rachel Watson, MBA, write in our Salary Survey 2025-26 results, progress is visible in some areas, but disparities persist, particularly at the regional level.
“While global averages provide helpful directional signals, this year’s data underscores that equity outcomes are deeply shaped by local market conditions, role composition, seniority levels, and work model choices, making context essential for accurate interpretation,” they write.
“Gender-related findings reflect this nuance clearly. At the global level, compensation differences between men and women narrowed further this year, with slight variations leaning in favor of women. However, this global view masks significant country-specific gaps.”
In markets including the United Kingdom, India, and Brazil, women continue to earn meaningfully less than men. Disparities are influenced by several factors, including seniority distribution, role specialization, and regional work norms.
But countries with more balanced representation across roles and career stages, or with smaller sample sizes, showed less of a gap.
So, what does this mean for our comparisons? With men and women generally selecting different career paths, as evident in the admin vs developer disparity, this will have knock-on effects for how men and women are paid overall. And when these differences are controlled for, gaps in income shrink.
But it is perhaps important to note that, even if some differences between pay for men and women can be attributed to differences in pay generally between admins and devs, the conclusion to that is still a world where one group is given more economic self-determinism over another. This reinforces pre-existing patterns of inequality.
As we point out later in this article, there are some differences in what men and women value from an employer, which might be attributed to – and continue to reinforce – gender roles for men and women.
Women seem to value workplace flexibility, including the option for remote work, more than men. This might be explained in part by childcare duties still predominantly falling to women, in a stereotypical scenario where gender roles are enforced. The flip side of this scenario, where “traditional” gender roles persist, is that “breadwinner” duties fall on men. As our data show, men value cash compensation above every other factor – and value it 10% more than women.
Whatever the reader’s particular views on this topic, equality remains one of Salesforce’s five core values – and, for that matter, one of SF Ben’s too. This, we might argue, is justification enough to look at the figures for men and women overall. If inequality exists, and you’ve made equality one of your core values, then that needs addressing.
Otherwise, you need to find another core value to boast about.
New Role Factors
Cash compensation remains the most important factor for both genders, though it carries greater weight for men (35.5%) than for women (22.5%). Women, however, place significantly more emphasis on workplace flexibility. Work-life balance (20.6%) and remote or hybrid work options (20.7%) rank among their top priorities, each approaching the importance of pay itself. For men, these factors are less influential, with work-life balance cited at 15.4% and remote or hybrid work options at just 10.7%.
For men, the second most important consideration after compensation is career growth opportunities (22.1%), suggesting a stronger focus on advancement and long-term professional progression. Among women, career growth ranks lower at 12.8%, indicating that flexibility and day-to-day working conditions may play a more prominent role in employment decisions.
Another notable difference is the value placed on company culture. Women assign nearly twice the importance to culture (11.1%) compared with men (5.8%), suggesting that organizational environment and interpersonal dynamics may be more influential in shaping their perception of an attractive workplace.
Overall, the data suggests that while pay remains the primary driver across genders, women tend to weigh flexibility and workplace environment more heavily, whereas men place relatively greater emphasis on compensation and career progression.
Values and Inclusion
When asked whether they feel respected and valued in their current role, responses were high and very similar across genders: 88.7% of men and 86.8% of women answered “yes”.
Satisfaction with career progression opportunities shows a slightly wider gap: 64.1% of men report satisfaction compared with 59.6% of women, leaving 35.9% of men and 40.4% of women dissatisfied.
Perceptions of inclusivity are also broadly aligned. Regarding whether people of all cultures and backgrounds are valued equally, 89.8% of men and 86.8% of women responded affirmatively. Similarly, when asked if their employer promotes equal pay opportunities and rights for all employees, 79.1% of men and 74.7% of women said “yes”, with roughly a quarter of respondents in each group indicating otherwise.
Career Satisfaction
Overall career satisfaction at Salesforce is relatively strong for both genders. Among men, 34.8% report being satisfied and 37.6% somewhat satisfied, with 18.9% feeling neutral. Women report slightly higher satisfaction, with 39.7% satisfied, and 37.2% somewhat satisfied, and 15.1% neutral.
This suggests that women in Salesforce generally feel at least as positive, if not slightly more positive, about their overall career experience than men.
Skill Level Satisfaction
Perceptions of current skill levels reveal that both genders are more “somewhat satisfied” than fully satisfied. For men, 18.3% are satisfied, 38.6% somewhat satisfied, and 23.5% neutral. Women report as 16% satisfied, 43.7% somewhat satisfied, and 18% neutral. The higher “somewhat satisfied” response among women may suggest that while they see opportunities for growth and improvement, they feel generally competent in their roles.
Workload Satisfaction
Satisfaction with current workloads shows some differences. Women report higher outright satisfaction (30.1% vs. 26.9% for men), though a lower percentage are “somewhat satisfied” (24.9% vs. 26.1% for men). Men also report a slightly higher neutral response (24% vs. 20.4%), indicating that women may feel somewhat more clarity or alignment regarding their workloads.
Overall, these figures point to men being 53% overall satisfied with their workload – adding together both the ‘satisfied’ and ‘somewhat satisfied’ responses – while the number for women sits at 55%. If we had the neutral responses in the mix, to get a new metric, which we can call ‘overall not dissatisfied’, men sit slightly higher at 77%, with the figure for women 75%.
The more data we add in, the more the differences seem to dissipate, but perhaps the starkest contrast still remains the difference between men and women who rank themselves as ‘satisfied’.
Pay Satisfaction
Satisfaction with pay is comparatively lower than career or workload satisfaction, but shows gender differences. Among men, 18% are satisfied, 29.2% somewhat satisfied, and 21.8% neutral. Women report higher satisfaction, with 23.4% satisfied and 28.2% somewhat satisfied, and only 16.1% neutral. This indicates that women may feel slightly more positive about their compensation than men, even though overall pay satisfaction remains moderate.
An interesting thing to note with the above figures is that, while there is a notable difference of 5.4% between men and women in the ‘satisfied’ category – with women sitting at 23.4% and men at 18% – it might not be a proper conclusion that women are in general more satisfied.
Adding the figures together again paints a broader picture. Women still retain the lead in overall satisfaction at 51.6%, to men’s 47.2%. But when the neutral responses are taken into account, we get 69% of men who are not dissatisfied, compared to just 67.7% of women – a curious disparity.
Benefits
Overall, the data shows remarkably similar perceptions across genders. While small gaps exist, particularly in career progression satisfaction and equal pay perceptions, the differences are modest.
This suggests that, at least in this sample, women generally feel respected, included, and supported at similar levels to men, though slight disparities remain in perceptions of advancement and pay equity.
When asked about satisfaction with the overall benefits package offered by their employer, responses reveal some interesting patterns. Among men, 26.3% reported being satisfied, 31.6% somewhat satisfied, and 21% neutral. Women reported higher satisfaction, with 35.2% satisfied, 31.9% somewhat satisfied, and 17.9% neutral.
Interestingly, these satisfaction levels are relatively high despite benefits being ranked as a low-priority factor when considering a new role. Only 2.2% of men and 3.1% of women identified benefits as one of the most important factors in job selection. This suggests that while benefits may not drive initial job decisions, they still contribute meaningfully to overall employee satisfaction once individuals are in their roles.
In other words, benefits appear to function more as a retention and engagement lever rather than a primary attraction factor. Women report slightly higher satisfaction with benefits than men, which could reflect differences in how benefits are utilized or valued post-hire, even if they were not a major consideration during recruitment.
Final Thoughts
Inequality is not a Salesforce problem; it’s a global problem. Magic wands cannot be waved to fix deeply entrenched social differences overnight.
But compensation differences between men and women are narrowing. That being said, equality remains one of Salesforce’s core values, so anyone at the company who claims to be committed to this idea needs to interface with the reality of the situation, as it currently is.
It won’t get better unless inequalities, where they persist, are pointed out. The purpose is not to shame Salesforce or the ecosystem, but to bring us all closer to that goal. After all, it’s easy to say you believe in equality. Committing to bringing it about, step by tiny step, is a bit more challenging.
