how do I calculate wage difference between men and women for ESG questionnaire

Pay gap is the average wage difference between women and men

The pay gap (in English: gender pay gap) is the difference between the average gross hourly wage of women and men in your company, expressed as a percentage of the male wage. The calculation method is straightforward: you take the average (or median) hourly wage of all female employees, do the same for all male employees, and set the difference against the male wage. VSME asks for this as a single percentage for the entire company, not broken down by function or team — this saves calculation work compared to some customer formats that ask per job category.

Where companies often get stuck: which wage concept you include. Base salary, fixed allowances and sometimes bonuses count, but travel expense allowances or one-time payments typically do not. If you do not have an HR system that automatically splits this by gender, a manual export from the payroll administration is usually sufficient — you do not need to have a separate report prepared. If you do not have a reliable figure, then "not yet calculated" is a more honest answer than an estimate you cannot substantiate. This question is often related to the male-female distribution within the workforce, because a skewed distribution can distort the outcome of the pay gap — with a small number of women in senior positions, the figure is less stable.

Where that is stated in the VSME base module

The pay gap is listed as an indicator in the basic module of the EFRAG VSME standard, the voluntary reporting standard for non-listed SMEs. That basic module was drawn up following Directive (EU) 2022/2464 (CSRD), which requires larger companies to request sustainability information about their supply chain — which is why this question now also reaches smaller suppliers. For the precise definition and calculation method, the VSME basic module itself is the designated source; it specifies which wage components count. If your company also receives questions about training hours per employee, this often comes from the same block of the questionnaire and you can collect the data in one go.