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Today is Equal Pay Day, and as a woman and an entrepreneur, I want to have an honest conversation about empowerment and equality.
I’ve been in business for over 20 years, and I have learned, often the hard way, how being a feminist, a founder, a mother, a partner and a creative all interplay in the modern working world. I was 27 when I left my post as an accessories editor at British Vogue to co-found a company with an East London cobbler named Jimmy Choo. When I started, I was only interested in making beautiful shoes: I had no idea what I was about to face as a woman in business. Over the following 16 years, I built one of the most recognized luxury brands in the world and discovered exactly how often women need to negotiate.
During my time at Jimmy Choo, I negotiated three sales of the company to private equity firms. It was during one of these sales that I discovered something in the paperwork of the deal—I was being paid less than the men who worked for me. As the Chief Creative Officer and co-founder, my salary was less than comparable C-level positions.
When I took my discovery to the board, I had my first personal salary negotiation. I would go on to have several; at every sale of the company, with the private equity firms that held the business, and with the teams I built. I was told no. I was told that the shares of my own company that I had purchased with my own money were part of my compensation. I was judged, even penalized, for asking.
This was the elephant in the room of feminism—work as hard and accomplish as much as any man, but don’t ask for something that someone doesn’t want to give you. This double standard is what led to my activism around women’s issues and equal pay.
I believe that women are strong. But we are also influenced, whether we care to admit it or not, by invisible cultural forces that have taught us to be nice, to listen, to look before we leap. We carry our confidence and our ambitions proudly, but when it comes to negotiating salary or asking for a raise, we're less likely to succeed.
This is why equal pay is so important: equality and empowerment go hand in hand. Until our culture can embrace the simple fact that equal work is worth equal pay, women will always be asking for permission.
On average, women earn $0.80 to the dollar compared to men. The wage gap has closed $0.22 since the Equal Pay Act of 1963, and and its current glacial pace, it won’t close completely for over 100 years. Despite these numbers, pay disparity is more of a concept, something we know but don’t think about on a daily basis. Our paychecks don’t have our potential earnings on them with a 20% off discount applied. It’s easy to forget in our daily lives that these numbers aren’t innocuous.
This is not going to change unless we change it. That’s why I’m choosing to talk about it. Negotiating your worth and compensation is not something that should live behind closed doors. There is no formula for asking for more, be it money, respect, or support. And talking the talk is not the same thing as walking the walk. Today, I want to challenge all women listening to do just that:
Own Your Voice
The world is full of people who will tell you what to do and how to do it. They’ll be louder than you, more experienced, more educated. Maybe they’ll be none of those things, but they’ll be more confident. If you wait to be the most ‘most’ person in the room, you’ll never feel qualified. I spent years second guessing my gut instincts because someone else’s voice was louder, and more years convincing other people to listen to me. Now, years later and at my own company, I recognize that every step of that effort was worth it, because the other side of doing the hard thing is freedom from its constraints.
Know Your Worth
We’ve always been taught that it’s impolite to talk about money. And while other archaic ideas of what’s polite (hello, sexuality, politics, independance) have gone out the door, I’d venture to guess that you and your friends don’t talk about salary with the same freedom you do your sex life. It’s necessary to get ask questions and get honest. Speak in ranges when you start, and ask if people in your community who work in your industry have any insight into comparable positions. There are many websites to compare pay, but compensation varies by location, experience and past pay—there’s no algorithm for that nuance, just awareness.
Have The Conversation
When you’re ready (and there’s nothing wrong with taking some time to get ready), have the talk the right way. Negotiating a raise is not about a laundry list of your accomplishments, or an entitlement for showing up for work. It’s a conversation about what you bring to the team, the various ways you’ve exceeded your job description, and all the projects in your immediate future the contribute to your growth. It’s also a conversation between humans, not between you and a company. Doing a mental exercise of how you contribute to your supervisor’s day to day is important before you talk numbers.
When I launched my latest company, Tamara Mellon, in 2016, I was determined it would be a brand that reflects me, my beliefs, what I have to say and the things I care about. That it would be a brand by women and for women. Yes, I am a shoe designer, but what I aim to do every day is lift women up. I am a woman designing for women, and as much as I’m interested in the perfect pump, I’m more focused on the woman wearing it.
I’ve always been inspired by the complexity of women; we are empathetic and fierce, loyal and independent. We balance being nurturing, sexy, intelligent, and powerful at the same time, and we’re unapologetic about everything that we are. We’re empowered—and only by owning our own voices, knowing our worth, and asking for what we deserve will be equal.
Today, and every day, I can’t think of a more important practice that showing up for yourself. And it’s just that—a practice, a daily exercise in walking the walk. As a woman who has spent her life in the luxury industry, I can tell you: luxury isn’t about expensive things. It’s about getting what you want.