Page 82 - IJPS-11-1

International Journal of
Population Studies Cultural values and workplace gender equity

interactional effect of generation and gender has also contrast, private sector employees, being more achievement-
been explored in relation to these aspects, revealing that oriented and competitive, tend to score higher on the
Millennial women tend to be more future-oriented and masculinity index (Haussman & Sauer, 2007; Karl & Sutton,
make career choices that prioritize work-life balance, 1998) than their public sector counterparts. However,
while Millennial men tend to take more risks and focus no empirical evidence could be found regarding sector-
on individual growth and success (Jobvite, 2017). Similarly, based differences in conformity tendencies. Nevertheless,
more female Millennials aspire to hold positions of power given that collectivism has been found to be strongly and
than their male counterparts (Pew Research Center, 2013). positively related to conformity (Kim, 2005), one can expect
that public sector employees might be more conforming due
Several studies have demonstrated that women
tend to outscore men on collectivism (Hofstede, 2001; to their collectivistic orientation (Badarch, 2013).
Venkatraman & Reddy, 2012) and long-term orientation Furthermore, sector differences have also been
(Nurmi et al., 1994). In contrast, the pattern is reversed observed in people’s preference for gender equity. The
when it comes to power distance (Désert & Leyens, 2006). World Development Report (2012) highlights that public
Regarding uncertainty avoidance, no significant gender sector employees generally hold more positive attitudes
differences have been found so far (Stedham & Yamamura, toward WGE than their counterparts in the private sector.
2002; Budin & Wafa, 2013). Moreover, gender differences However, interestingly, in India, the pattern appears to
on the masculinity/femininity index are inconsistent, with be contrary to the aforementioned finding. Women’s
some studies showing an absence of any gender differences inclusion rate on the boards of companies has been found
(Stedham & Yamamura, 2002), while others suggest that to be relatively better in private sector organizations
men outscore women (Budin & Wafa, 2013). (Zehra & Sarim, 2017). Therefore, we propose that: (H4)
there would be a significant difference between public and
With respect to gender differences in conformity private sector employees on the dimensions of cultural
tendencies, research has consistently found that women tend to values, conformity tendencies, and WGE.
exhibit greater conformity than their male counterparts (Eagly
& Chrvala, 1986; Bond & Smith, 1996). Likewise, women tend 3. Methods
to hold more positive attitudes toward gender equality (Prasad
& Baron, 1996) and also have greater awareness of women’s 3.1. Participants
issues, such as domestic violence, than men do (Alazmy et al., The participants for the present investigation consisted of
2011). Guided by these research findings, we hypothesized 300 employees within the age group of 20 – 60 years, each
that: (H3) There would be significant differences between male of whom possessed a minimum of 1 year of experience
and female employees on the dimensions of cultural values, working in IT companies, whether in the public or
conformity tendencies, and WGE. private sectors, located within the Delhi National Capital
Region (Delhi-NCR). The selection of participants was
Since organizations served as the context for this research,
it was essential to consider organizational characteristics. carried out using a purposive sampling technique. An
unequal proportion of participants were drawn from three
Therefore, we also explored sector-based differences with generational cohorts, further bifurcated on the basis of
respect to the variables of interest. The previous studies gender and sector (Figure 2). During the data collection
offer evidence of sectoral differences in cultural values
(Venkatraman & Reddy, 2012), indicating that public sector
employees tend to be more collectivistic (Badarch, 2013),
while private sector employees are more comfortable in
situations involving uncertainty (Granrose, 1997). With
regard to sector differences in power distance, although no
empirical evidence has been found, power distance tends
to be higher in organizations where power is centralized
(Investopedia, n.d.). Consequently, it can be expected that
public sector employees would score higher on power
distance due to the bureaucratic structure and unequal
distribution of power in such organizations (Andrews et
al., 2009). Sector differences in long-term orientation are
not consistent, as some studies suggest that public sector
employees are more long-term oriented (Pimpa, 2012),
while others suggest otherwise (Mathur et al., 1996). In Figure 2. Group-wise representation of participants

Volume 11 Issue 1 (2025) 76 https://doi.org/10.36922/ijps.422