Context
- DPMC is a small to medium organisation (422 headcount at Sept 2021) experiencing significant growth and fluctuation of staff. While most of the increase (over 140 since Feb 2021) is in fixed term employees (FT) and secondees, this growth impacts the working environment and our Gender Pay Gap (GPG).
- Outside of secondees (not considered in this report), permanent (perm) staff make up 75% of staff vs 25% FT
- The rapid changes in staffing can cause gender pay data volatility, exacerbated by the impact of FT staff moving in and out.
- For this report we have separated permanent and FT data and, outside of remuneration and recruitment, focused our plan on actions for the retention and development of our perm staff
What does our data tell us?
- Gender pay gap: 16.5% up from 12.8% last year
- DPMC’s unadjusted pay gap is driven by under-representation of women in some higher pay grades and over-representation in lower pay grades
- The ‘horizontal’ GPG for permanent staff, within grades and occupational groups, is consistently a positive GPG or below 5% (with the exception of 3 people in grade 21) with differences explainable
- The rapid growth of staff (mostly FT): 104 employees onboarded/ 31 offboarded, causes our GPG to move around
- Permanent starters in 2020/21 had a GPG of 10% overall, decrease from 32% in 2019/20 – improvement and an ongoing area of focus
- Our ‘pipeline’ roles of analyst/advisor; senior analyst/advisor; and principal analyst are all below 3.5% GPG
- Indicative data is starting to show an improvement in Māori and other ethnic diversity
- Increased diversity in target areas through new appointments – use of new channels, support and tools to support more diverse appointment processes and outcomes
DPMC Data Summary as at 21 Jul 2021
GPG Mean: 16.5%
GPG Median: 6.5%
DPMC Demographics

By employee type
Employee Type | MEAN Total REM | ||
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Male | Female | % Gap | |
Permanent | $134,401 | $111,595 | 17.0 |
Fixed Term | $151,040 | $124,170 | 17.8 |
Total | $138,689 | $115,787 | 16.5 |
Men in fixed-term roles are on average in higher grades and paid more than women
By same/similar roles (permanent employees only) - where sufficient roles to compare
Grade | Role cluster | # female | # male | GPG Mean |
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13.14 | Support | 26 | 2 | -8.4% |
15 | Analyst/advisor | 22 | 14 | -6.8% |
17 | Senior analyst/advisor | 28 | 18 | 2.7% |
19 | Principal advisor | 9 | 12 | 3.5% |
By Pay Band (permanent employees only)

Of the 10 pay bands below T2 roles, 4 have a GPG positive to women, 5 have a GPG up to 5% and one with 16% (3 people, band 21).
Gender balanced leadership

Women occupied 65% of all people leaders roles (48 of 74) and 55% of T2 and T3 roles (within our 40/60 principles).
Onboardings and Offboardings (1 Jul 2020 to 30 Jun 2021)
Onboardings - The GPG for all new (FT & perm) starters was 15%, slightly below the overall DPMC Mean GPG of 16.5%. However for permanent new starters GPG was lower at 10%. Average starting total remuneration (as FTE) was $133,366 for men compared to $112,784 for women. From the 104 new hires:
- 29 were permanent positions (19F / 10M)
- 75 were fixed-term positions (50F / 25M)
The 99 secondees-in onboarded in the same period (55F / 43M / 1 Not stated) are not included in data.
GPG of new starts
Female | Male | Total | |||||
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Type | # | Ave TR | # | Ave TR | # | Average TR | GPG |
Fixed Term | 50 | $118,036.24 | 25 | $142,583.67 | 75 | $130,309.96 | 17% |
Permanent | 19 | $98,962.63 | 10 | $110,323.50 | 29 | $104,643.06 | 10% |
Total | 69 | $112,784.09 | 35 | $133,366.48 | 104 | $123,075.28 | 15% |
New Starts by grade

Approximately 65% of all new hires (68 out of 104) were for positions at grade 17 and below. From those, 73% were filled by women. The majority of women hired are grade 17 or below and the majority of men are grade 17 and above, this impacts the GPG %. The Mean GPG is based on averages and is influenced by employees with very low or very high pay.
Offboardings - 31 staff left DPMC in 2020/21:
- 15 Permanent employees (10F / 5M)
- 16 Fixed-term employees (11F / 5 M)
Considering permanent employees only:
10 were women:
- 40% in grade 17 and 30% in grade 13.14
- 60% with tenure 1 - 5 years
- Overall average PIR 101%
5 were men:
- 40% were in grade 17
- 60% with tenure 1 - 3 years
- Overall average PIR 93%
Ethnicity – DPMC continues to focus on improving our ethnicity profile. At 30 June 2020 89% of DPMC staff identified as European. Of the new starters in 2020/21, 62% identified themselves as European and others identified with at least one of the following ethnicities (staff can choose up to five). This indicates our attraction strategies are beginning to make a difference:
- 62.1% NZ European
- 10.7% Maori
- 10.7% Other European
- 9.7% Asian
- 3.9% Pacific Peoples
- 1% African
- 1% American
- 1% other ethnicity
Action taken in 2020/2021 against our plan
Our Gender Pay Action Plan plan is focused on what is required for DPMC to close its gender pay gap. It also aligns with the broader requirements for all agencies set out by Te Kawa Mataaho, Public Service Commission. This plan should be read in conjunction with our Diversity and Inclusion Action Plan, our Whāinga Amorangi Plan, and our Te Reo Māori Plan
Issue | Focus area | Achieved in 2020/21 | Planned in 2021/22 |
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Under-representation of women in some higher pay grades. | Improve the operation of mechanisms designed to support this (e.g. succession planning, career pathways and promotion/ progression) |
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Staff progression through the leadership pipeline or the analyst/advisor pipelines appears less effective than expected. | |||
The attraction of female applicants into some parts of DPMC was not as effective as in the rest of the department | Attracting more diverse candidates into DPMC
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Ongoing promotion and embedding of:
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Part time staff engagement – Part-time staff are 10% of our workforce (mostly women ) consistently have engagement scores 10% lower than average | Engage with part-time staff to understand what would improve the workplace for this group |
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Impact of fixed term staff (26%) on the data is not well understood. | Outside of managing remuneration, it is challenging to develop programmes with a focus on our permanent/future workforce with the data in a single set. |
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Pay gap in permanent appointments | Focus on starting salaries and ensuring awareness of relativities – within the band, the team, similar roles and horizontal and vertical |
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Action taken in 2020/2021 against PSC Milestones
Topic | Milestone | Achieved in 2020/21 | Planned in 2021/22 |
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Improving Diversity | Attracting and retaining more ethnically diverse staff to reflect the population of Aotearoa/ New Zealand |
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Gender balanced leadership |
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Equal Pay |
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Ensure there is no bias or discrimination in remuneration systems and HR practices |
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Flex by default |
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Ongoing embedding of Flexible working by default as part of:
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