Step 1 - Scope

Decide the scope and identify the data you need

Think about which protected characteristics you will include in your Equal Pay Audit. Clearly, gender will be a main priority.

If you wish to include other grounds in your analyses, such as race and disability, think first about the quality and quantity of your data. You will have good data on age, and could include this in your equal pay audit. 

However, your data for other protected charactistics, eg religion or belief, and sexual orientation, may not be so comprehensive. For example, let's say that 5% of your staff have declared that they are from an ethnic minority background. 5% is quite low, and it is difficult to make meaningful analyses with small cohorts of data. You will have to make a judgement call with each of the protected characteristics. 

Then think about the main information you will need about each employee, such as their hours, qualifications, length of service, role, time in grade and performance ratings.