TAP Network Releases 2023 Report on Diversity within Canada’s Tech Sector

November 28, 2023

Report reveals women, Indigenous peoples, and people with disabilities remain significantly underrepresented

Read the full article on BUSINESS WIRE.

Tech and People Network (TAP Network) today announced the release of their 2023 Diversity in Tech Dashboard, which reports year-over-year progress on the representation of equity-deserving groups in Canada’s tech sector. While the report shows 2SLGBTQ and people of colour are well represented in the sector, women, Indigenous peoples and people with disabilities remain significantly underrepresented.

In 2023, 189 Canadian technology companies participated in the Diversity in Tech Dashboard survey, providing industry-wide data on Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging policies and practices and employee representation. Now in its fourth year, the dataset continues to grow as more tech companies measure diversity of their workforces.

Almost half of the companies in the survey (43%) stated they are conducting pay equity analyses for equity deserving groups. With pay equity legislation in place in several provinces and pay transparency legislation now in effect in British Columbia and recently introduced in Ontario, the prevalence of pay equity analyses is expected to increase significantly over the next couple of years.

All job levels in the survey show a gender pay gap with males earning more than females. Pay gaps range from 7% to 18% depending on the job level. The highest gap (18%) is seen for jobs at the Management level. Only 28% of incumbents in executive level jobs are female and the pay gap is 7%.

According to this year’s report, 21% of organizations’ senior leadership teams now have formal accountability for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging (EDIB) related goals or mandates and another 32% are considering the practice.

“With tremendous growth in the dataset over the past four years, we’re cautioning against year over year comparisons, looking for trends in representation,” stated Stephanie Hollingshead, CEO TAP Network. “That said, in reviewing the data across all four years, it’s very clear that women, Indigenous peoples and people with disabilities are significantly underrepresented in Canada’s tech sector. It’s also clear from the data that people identifying as 2SLGBTQ and as People of Colour are well represented in Canada’s tech sector and that’s worth celebrating.”

According to the 2023 report, the following groups remain significantly underrepresented:

Representation of women is 36.9%. While this is an increase from last year’s 35.8%, it remains significantly lower than the 2021 Canadian census data reporting 50.83% of the population identifying as women. Males represent 62.5% and non-binary or other genders represent 0.6% of the sector. In the Software Developer job family, representation of women has been slowly climbing however it remains very low at 17.8%.
Indigenous representation in the sector is 0.9% this year, which remains significantly below Canada’s Indigenous population (5%). This dataset, which has tripled since 2020 as more organizations choose to collect and report this employee diversity data, has ranged from 0.5% to 1.4%.
People with disabilities remain significantly underrepresented at 4.2%. Statistics Canada’s 2017 Canadian Survey on Disabilities reported 15.3% of the population aged 25 to 44 years as persons with disabilities and 24.3% of the population aged 45 to 64 years.

According to the 2023 report, the following groups are well represented in Canada’s tech sector:

Representation of people identifying as 2SLGBTQ is 8.8%. This dataset is growing rapidly, having quintupled in the past four years. During that time it has ranged from 8.2%-9.8%, which is more than double the 2021 Canadian census data reporting 4% of Canada’s population aged 15 and older identifying as LGBTQ.
Representation of people identifying as People of Colour and/or Black is 37.5%. This is higher than the 2021 Canadian census data which reports 26.5% of the Canadian population as a person of colour and/or Black.

The 2023 Diversity Dashboard report was made possible thanks to generous support from Sun Life, Innovate BC, and Invest Vancouver. The report showcases data from TAP Network’s 2023 Tech Salary and Total Rewards Survey, which is produced in partnership with Mercer and includes data from over 30,000 incumbents at 204 Canadian tech employers.

The growing amount of pay equity and pay transparency legislation across several provinces has increased the importance of measuring workforce diversity. Organizations looking to measure the diversity of their workforces can utilize TAP Network’s Diversity Benchmarking Toolkit, found on the association’s EDIB Resource Hub, a best-in-class library with hundreds of resources and tools that employers can use to help build more inclusive, equitable and diverse workplaces.

For more information and to explore TAP Network’s Diversity in Tech Dashboard, visit https://tapnetwork.ca/edib/diversity-in-tech-dashboard.

About TAP Network

TAP Network is a non-profit association for People and Culture professionals in Canada's tech sector, providing members with access to tech sector data, industry experts and an inclusive peer community to drive innovation, collaboration and results. Through programs and events, TAP Network fosters peer-to-peer connections and collaboration that enable learning and knowledge sharing. The association’s 900+ members lead and influence the People and Culture practices at 250 tech companies spanning numerous subsectors, including ICT, VFX and Animation, Video Game and Interactive Digital Media, Cleantech, AI, Life Sciences and more.

Contacts

Stephanie Hollingshead
Tech and People Network
stephanie@tapnetwork.ca