Asking Tactically for an “Other-Promotion” (ATOP): Exploring the Effectiveness and Usage of a Novel Strategy for Women in Negotiations

• Applicant: Dr. Jens Mazei
• Subject Area: Social Psychology, Industrial and Organisational Psychology
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 542246415

Women often attain relatively low economic outcomes in pay negotiations (Mazei et al., 2015; Shan et al., 2019), which has important implications for gender inequities. Women’s unique predicament in pay negotiations lies in the fact that, if they asserted themselves when negotiating their pay, other people would evaluate them negatively—a hindrance that does not exist for men (Amanatullah & Tinsley, 2013; Bowles et al., 2007). To help women “negotiate” this predicament, researchers developed specific strategies for women that, if used, could help them obtain high economic outcomes without being evaluated negatively (e.g., Bowles & Babcock, 2013; Kray et al., 2012). Yet, available specific strategies are typically perceived as ineffective and to perpetuate societal gender roles, so that women often do not intend to use them. As such, available specific strategies are characterized by an implementation gap (Lietz et al., 2023; Mazei et al., 2020), revealing a lack of solutions to women’s predicament in negotiations. Hence, the goal of the current research is to fully develop and evaluate a novel specific strategy: In our recent qualitative research (Lietz et al., 2022), we identified a specific strategy that women with negotiation experience actually implement—asking for a performance appraisal before negotiating pay, thereby leading other people to “promote” them. We term this novel specific strategy “Asking Tactically for an ‘Other-Promotion’” (ATOP). In four studies, we now aim to examine how using ATOP affects (a) the behavior of, and evaluations by, women’s negotiation counterparts, (b) women’s economic outcomes, as well as (c) how using ATOP affects the perpetuation of societal gender roles. Moreover, we (d) provide a final, careful evaluation of whether an implementation gap exists for the strategy of ATOP. Altogether, we illuminate the effectiveness and usage of the newly identified strategy of ATOP.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigator: Professor Dr. Joachim Hüffmeier