Introduction Despite significant changes in participation rates, the situation for women in the workplace is still significantly different from men. Occupational segregation by sex still restricts women’s ability to work in a variety of jobs and a variety of labour markets around the world (Anker, 1997). Moreover, women continue to be concentrated in lower levels within organizations with limited access to management (Still, 1993). The reasons argued for the disparity between men and women in the workplace are varied and include natural differences between the sexes, labour market seg- mentation driven by human capital and product- ivity exchanges, customary and legal constraints that deny women access to the world, and the dominance and power of men. While each theory describes or explains in part the differences men and women experience and each prescribes a means of addressing the disparity, none is fully able to do so (Anker, 1997; Tong, 1989). Calls for change range from keeping the status quo, through individual change, to equal opportunity via social and organizational change based on individual rights and/or justice. However justice is difficult to define and more difficult to implement, because of often conflicting and competing views and assump- tions on the definition and causes of injustice and the means of addressing it. The main aim of this study was to explore the features that account for the differences between approaches used in equity management in Austra- lian private-sector organizations and to identify the differences in outcomes for women’s employ- ment and employment status. British Journal of Management, Vol. 12, 267–285 (2001) © 2001 British Academy of Management Approaches to Equity Management and their Relationship to Women in Management Erica French School of Management, Faculty of Business, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane 4001, Queensland, Australia email: e.french@qut.edu.au Developing equitable practices that provide fair access for all individuals to the benefits and burdens within an organization remains a dilemma for management both in policy and in practice. Research continues to show that the employment status and representation for members of some groups is significantly less than in relation to those of other groups. Addressing the issue of disparity has resulted in a number of different approaches. The main aim of this paper is to explore the ability of a typological theory of equal employment opportunity implementation to account for the differences in the numbers of women in management and in management tiers. This paper identifies and analyses four ideal-typical equity management approaches to achieving workplace parity: traditional (non-compliance), anti-discrimination, affirmative action and equal employment opportunity. While the objective of these approaches may be to ensure equity management in order to encourage equal outcomes the results tell a different story. Results show that an affirmative action approach to equity management predicts increases in women in management across all tiers of management.