The Office of Australia’s Women in STEM Ambassador was commissioned to carry out research activities to support the Pathway to Diversity in STEM Review. As part of those activities, the Office is undertaking a series of systematic reviews of the peer-reviewed literature. Systematic reviews offer a highly-focused and transparent process for summarising the available evidence on a topic. Pre-determined search protocols avoid biases that may arise from less comprehensive review processes. Systematic reviews are carried out solely on the academic peer-reviewed literature. Other publications (e.g., white papers, industry reports) are traditionally not included.

This document provides a snapshot of the evidence that exists in the peer-reviewed literature on workforce initiatives to address gender equity. Following a preset protocol, the authors identified 67 peer-reviewed publications offering data on the efficacy of initiatives ranging from career development and mentorship programs to fellowships. The authors complemented this with additional peer-reviewed studies on initiatives not covered well in our initial search, including pay transparency policies, bullying and sexual harassment initiatives, and quotas. This resulted in a total of 82 publications. Most, if not all, adopted a binary approach to gender (discussing only women and men), which does not align with the nonbinary nature of this construct.