Business & Money | Sunday 8 March, 2015 1:42 pm |

While 43% of working women in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region believe they are paid less than their male counterparts, the general sentiment is that workplace equality across the region has grown to be on par with working environments in the Western world. Further data from the Bayt.com survey, ‘The Status of Working Women in the MENA’, reveals that gender bias in the MENA workplace is perceived to be heading towards better equality, with 51% of respondents supporting the fact that they are being treated equally at work.

In today’s workplace, 72% of women across the MENA region work in mixed-gender environments, compared to 15% who work in offices where men and women are segregated, and 13% who have only female employees. While the trend across the region is for the majority of women to be employed in a mixed workplace, the split in KSA is relatively even; 36% of women work in female-only environments, 33% work in a segregated environment, and 31% share their workplace with men.

Seven in 10 women are comfortable with working in a mixed environment – four in 10 claim to be ‘extremely’ comfortable.

The majority of working women in the MENA (77%) state that they currently work for a male manager though they have no preference of working for a man or woman (66%), and that there are more men than women in their workplace (58%).

When it comes to treatment of women versus men in the workplace, women believe that they are mostly on par with men when it comes to working hours, opportunities for training and development, advice and support, and in terms of recruitment and selection for roles. However, women believe they are treated less favourably when it comes to benefits (27% for less favourably; 49% for equal treatment), salary (31% for less favourably; 46% for equal treatment), and career progression opportunities (33% feel women are discriminated against; 42% state opportunities are equal).

Salary in particular presents a split opinion; while 39% of women state that they feel they receive the same pay as their male counterparts, 43% believe they earn less. Only 3% state they earn more than men in a similar role.

Most women who completed the survey state they earn US$200-500 per month (21%), US$501-1,000 per month (19%), or US$1,001-2000 per month (20%). Women working in GCC countries tend to earn more, although 68% of women in Lebanon claim to earn upwards of US$1,001 per month.

Close to half (49%) of women believe that gender has no role to play when it comes to receiving a promotion; they say that their organisation provides career advancement opportunities based entirely on job performance. However, 34% claim that their company favours promoting men over women. This feeling is especially strong in KSA, Oman and Syria.

64% of women working in mixed-gender environments claim that there are no special benefits offered to women employees, and 51% state that men and women employees are treated equally. A quarter (26%), however, believe that men are given preferential treatment, while 59% state that some employees – regardless of their gender – are given preferential treatment in the workplace. Appreciation, recognition and rewards are considered to be distributed based on performance merit alone and not on gender, according to 61% of women. Workplace equality is considered by 67% to have reached the same levels as Western countries, especially in Tunisia, where 53% of women believe their workplace is comparable to those in Western countries to a ‘large extent.’

Opportunities, when it comes to job offers, are also considered to be fair, with 56% of women claiming that experience and qualifications are more important than gender. In KSA, Bahrain, Oman and Jordan, however, more than a fifth of respondents believe that it is easier for men to get a job.

Suha Mardelli, HR Director, Bayt.com, said: “Women in the MENA region are clearly seeing a major breakthrough when it comes to equality in the workplace. The level of empowerment women enjoy today is no doubt a driving factor for the way in which their working environments are continually evolving, levelling out the playing field for all employees. In the West, women are perceived to be on par with men in the workplace and exist in boardrooms in partnership with their male counterparts. We are moving in that direction very quickly as it appears that this sentiment is a driving factor for workplaces to continue to shift away from traditional norms and into more gender-equal environments.”

The majority of women (87%) participating in this survey work 30 or more hours per week. More than half (53%) are single; 27% are married with children, and 12% are married without children. Across the MENA region, 41% of respondents have one other person earning a salary in their household; 49% of these women state that the main contribution to their household comes from a man.

Data for the Bayt.com ‘The Status of Working Women in the MENA’ survey was collected online from October 22nd - November 20th 2014, with 1,543 female respondents aged 18 years and above. Respondents were from the UAE, KSA, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.