The Impact of Gender Differences on Job Satisfaction, Job Turnover, and Career Experiences of Information Systems Professionals

Abstract

This research addresses the impact of gender differences upon the career experiences of information systems professionals, including the impact of gender differences on job satisfaction, job tasks, turnover behavior, job search activities, and job transitions. Our findings show that the career experiences of females and males in the IT field are relatively similar. One statistically significant finding was that job satisfaction was higher in current positions, as compared with prior ones but that was true for both genders. With respect to salaries, the mean salaries of male IT professionals in current positions in this sample were greater than the mean salaries of female IT professionals in current positions, but the differences were not statistically significant.

In their unfolding model of voluntary turnover, Lee and Mitchell (44) argue that turnover is influenced by a variety of variables, including the occurrence of shocks, following scripts, searching for alternatives, experiencing an image violation, and by lack of job satisfaction. Since a large number of female and male respondents pointed to leaving their positions because of a “shock,” this may also point to the fact that external market forces can influence candidates to make career moves because of greater opportunities, salaries, and benefits in the IT field, even when they may have been fairly well-satisfied with their prior positions.

• diversity
• information technology workforce
• IT turnover
• IT job satisfaction