Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was forced to backtrack after suggesting at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference on Thursday that women shouldn’t actually ask for a raise.
“It’s not really about asking for a raise, but knowing and having faith that the system will give you the right raise,” Nadella (pictured) said to the mostly female audience at the conference.
Nadella’s comments were flagged by Valleywag via Readwrite. He made the comments during a conversation with Harvey Mudd College president Maria Klawe, a computer scientist, who is on Microsoft’s board of directors.
“That might be one of the initial ‘super powers,’ that quite frankly, women [who] don’t ask for a raise have,” Nadella said. “It’s good karma. It will come back.”
ReadWrite pointed to a Peninsula Press study from February which found that men who have a graduate or professional degrees make 73 percent more than women with the same qualifications in Silicon Valley. Men with a bachelor’s degree also earn 40 percent more than women with the same credentials, the study found.
In a tweet later Nadella said he had been inarticulate earlier.
Was inarticulate re how women should ask for raise. Our industry must close gender pay gap so a raise is not needed because of a bias #GHC14
— Satya Nadella (@satyanadella) October 9, 2014
