Who Gets the Office Housework? How Non-Promotable Tasks Affect Career Equity
Every workplace has work that needs to get done but rarely appears in anyone’s promotion case.
Someone takes meeting notes.
Someone organizes the team event.
Someone serves on the committee, updates the shared document, helps onboard the new hire, or handles the administrative task everyone else would rather avoid.
This work is sometimes called office housework. Researchers often use the term low-promotability or non-promotable tasks for work that benefits an organization but carries relatively little weight in performance evaluations or promotion decisions.
Research has found that these tasks are not always distributed evenly.
A widely cited study published in the American Economic Review found that women were more likely than men to volunteer for low-promotability tasks, more likely to be asked to take them on, and more likely to accept those requests (Babcock et al., 2017a).
That matters because time is limited.
If one employee spends more of their working time on tasks that keep the organization running but do little to support advancement, they may have less time for work that is more visible or more heavily rewarded.
But newer research also adds an important nuance:
Not every task outside someone's formal job description is necessarily career-limiting.
The question is not simply who does extra work.
It is which work employees are doing—and whether the organization recognizes and rewards it.
Note: This article provides general information about workplace diversity and career equity. It is not legal advice.
What Are Non-Promotable Tasks?
Babcock and colleagues describe low-promotability tasks as work that benefits an organization but offers relatively little benefit to the employee performing it when promotion decisions are made (Babcock et al., 2017a).
Examples can include:
taking meeting notes;
serving on committees;
preparing routine reports;
coordinating schedules;
planning team activities;
handling recurring administrative work; or
taking responsibility for necessary tasks that other employees prefer not to do.
The exact task will depend on the workplace.
A committee assignment, for example, might be highly valuable in one organization and barely considered during promotion decisions in another.
That is why promotability is partly about how the organization rewards the work, not simply what the task looks like.
Who Gets Asked to Do Non-Promotable Work?
Research has identified a gender difference.
In a series of studies, Linda Babcock, Maria Recalde, Lise Vesterlund, and Laurie Weingart examined how low-promotability tasks were allocated.
They found that women were:
more likely than men to volunteer;
more likely to be asked to volunteer; and
more likely to accept requests to perform the task.
The researchers found that beliefs that women were more likely to say yes appeared to be an important driver of the difference (Babcock et al., 2017a).
That last point matters.
The pattern was not simply:
“Women like doing these tasks more.”
If people expect women to agree, they may also be more likely to ask women in the first place.
Over time, repeated small assignments can create very different workloads for employees who technically hold similar positions.
Why Can Non-Promotable Tasks Affect Career Equity?
The problem is not that this work has no value.
Quite the opposite.
Organizations often need someone to do it.
The career-equity issue arises when essential work consumes an employee's time without providing comparable recognition, visibility, skill development, or advancement opportunities.
Babcock and colleagues argue that if women consistently perform less-promotable work than men, those differences in task allocation can contribute to slower organizational advancement (Babcock et al., 2017a).
Consider two employees working the same number of hours.
One spends significant time:
coordinating meetings;
documenting decisions;
supporting colleagues; and
completing internal administrative work.
The other spends more time:
leading visible projects;
presenting to senior leaders;
managing high-value accounts; or
taking assignments directly linked to promotion criteria.
Both may be working equally hard.
But the work may not carry equal career value.
That distinction is what makes task allocation a workplace-equity issue.
Are Women Simply More Likely to Volunteer?
The research suggests the story is more complicated than individual choice.
Women were more likely to volunteer in Babcock and colleagues' research, but they were also more likely to receive requests to perform low-promotability work (Babcock et al., 2017a).
The researchers concluded that expectations about who would agree helped drive the difference.
A related 2017 study by Babcock, Recalde, and Vesterlund examined whether fear of penalties for saying no explained the gender gap.
The researchers replicated the finding that women received more requests and were more likely to accept them, but they did not find evidence that anticipated penalties for declining increased the gender difference in task allocation (Babcock et al., 2017b).
That is an important limitation.
It would therefore be too broad to say:
“Women do office housework because they are punished whenever they say no.”
The research supports a difference in requests and acceptance.
It does not support reducing that difference to one universal explanation.
Is All Extra Work Non-Promotable?
No.
And recent research makes this distinction particularly important.
A 2026 study published in Work and Occupations examined non-core work among 32 women and gender-minority employees in the U.S. high-tech sector.
Researcher Maureen Cowhey identified four broad categories of non-core work:
secretarial work;
diversity, equity, and inclusion and mentoring work;
fun and culture-building work; and
shadow management.
(Cowhey, 2026)
The study found that these forms of work did not have identical career consequences.
Secretarial and some culture-building tasks were often described as providing little career benefit.
Cowhey found that DEI and mentoring work had higher perceived promotability than the other categories of non-core work. At least three participants attributed promotions or career advancement to DEI-related work.
That finding complicates the phrase non-promotable task.
A task outside someone's formal job description may be invisible and unrewarded in one workplace while providing meaningful leadership evidence in another.
The better question may be:
Does the organization actually recognize this work when decisions about performance, compensation, and advancement are made?
What About “Shadow Management”?
Cowhey's 2026 study also identified a particularly interesting category: shadow management.
Some participants described informally performing management responsibilities—training colleagues, assigning work, helping peers prioritize tasks, or providing ongoing support—without having the formal title or authority of a manager (Cowhey, 2026).
That kind of work may demonstrate genuine leadership capability.
But if the organization does not document or recognize it, employees can perform management-level work without receiving management-level credit.
This shows why task allocation is not only about obvious office chores like taking notes or ordering lunch.
Some non-core work can involve substantial skill while remaining poorly recognized. Cowhey describes shadow management as individual contributors performing managerial responsibilities without the corresponding title, pay, or formal recognition.
The career question is whether that contribution is visible when opportunities for advancement appear.
Why Office Housework Matters for Workplace Diversity
Diversity at work is not only about who gets hired.
It is also about what happens after people enter the organization.
Who gets:
the high-visibility project?
the presentation opportunity?
the stretch assignment?
responsibility for an important client?
the chance to demonstrate leadership?
And who repeatedly gets asked to:
organize;
coordinate;
document;
support; and
clean up the work around everyone else?
One meeting-notes assignment is unlikely to determine anyone's career.
The potential equity problem appears when small differences in task allocation become repeated patterns.
Over time, employees may accumulate very different portfolios of experience even when they started at similar levels.
That is why career equity requires looking not only at promotions themselves, but at the work employees receive before promotion decisions are made.
What Can Employers Do About Non-Promotable Tasks?
The research does not establish one universal task-allocation system for every workplace.
But it does give employers some useful questions to ask.
Identify Which Work Actually Leads to Advancement
Managers should understand which assignments tend to matter during performance and promotion decisions.
If employees are told that leadership, revenue generation, strategic projects, or client visibility determine advancement, organizations can examine who receives those opportunities.
At the same time, they can identify necessary work that receives little formal recognition.
Stop Relying Only on Volunteers
If the same people consistently volunteer for low-promotability work, asking for volunteers may keep reproducing the same pattern.
Babcock and colleagues' research found gender differences in volunteering and in who received requests (Babcock et al., 2017a).
For routine tasks that genuinely need to be shared, employers can consider more deliberate allocation instead of waiting for the same person to say yes.
Track More Than Job Titles
Two employees can have identical titles while receiving very different assignments.
Managers can pay attention to who receives: career-building work and organizational-maintenance work.
The goal is not to eliminate necessary work.
It is to avoid concentrating it repeatedly on the same employees.
Recognize Valuable Non-Core Work
Cowhey's research provides an important reminder that not all non-core work deserves to be treated as worthless.
Mentoring, DEI work, team development, and informal leadership can create real organizational value and demonstrate useful skills (Cowhey, 2026).
If an organization values that work, its evaluation systems can reflect that value.
Otherwise employees may be told a contribution is important while simultaneously discovering that it counts for little when promotion decisions are made.
What Can Employees Look For?
Employees can also pay attention to the mix of work they are accumulating.
Questions worth asking include:
Which assignments appear in promotion discussions?
What work gives people exposure to decision-makers?
Which tasks demonstrate skills needed at the next level?
Who normally receives those opportunities?
Which responsibilities consume substantial time but rarely appear in performance reviews?
The answer is not necessarily to refuse every administrative or supporting task.
Some of that work is part of being a good colleague and functioning team.
The career question is whether support work has become most of what someone is known for while other employees are accumulating more advancement-oriented experience.
Final Thoughts
The tasks that keep a workplace running are still work.
Someone has to take the notes, organize the committee, support the team, coordinate the details, and solve the problems that fall outside a neat job description.
The career-equity question is not whether those tasks should exist.
It is:
Who keeps doing them—and what opportunities are they giving up while they do?
Research shows that women can be more likely to volunteer for, receive requests for, and accept low-promotability work.
Newer research also reminds us that the category is not simple. Some non-core work can demonstrate leadership and create career opportunities when organizations actually recognize it.
For Diversity.com, that distinction gets to the heart of workplace equity.
Hiring people from different backgrounds is one part of inclusion.
Making sure employees also have access to the work that helps careers grow is another.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is office housework?
Office housework is an informal term for necessary workplace tasks that often receive limited recognition or career reward, such as note-taking, committee work, coordination, and routine administrative responsibilities.
Research often uses terms such as low-promotability tasks, non-promotable tasks, or non-core work.
What is a non-promotable task?
A non-promotable or low-promotability task benefits the organization but receives relatively little weight in performance evaluations or promotion decisions (Babcock et al., 2017a).
Whether a particular task is promotable can vary by organization.
Do women do more non-promotable work than men?
Babcock and colleagues found that women were more likely than men to volunteer for low-promotability tasks, more likely to be asked, and more likely to accept those requests in the settings they studied (Babcock et al., 2017a).
That evidence should not be interpreted as meaning every woman performs more non-promotable work than every man.
Why do non-promotable tasks matter for career advancement?
Time spent on work that contributes little to promotion can reduce the time available for assignments that provide greater visibility, responsibility, or advancement value.
Researchers have argued that systematic differences in task allocation can therefore contribute to differences in organizational progression (Babcock et al., 2017a).
Is DEI work a non-promotable task?
Not necessarily.
A 2026 qualitative study of women and gender-minority workers in high-tech found that some participants viewed DEI and mentoring work as career-enhancing, while other forms of non-core work provided little advancement value (Cowhey, 2026).
The career value of the work depends partly on how the organization recognizes and rewards it.
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Sources & References
Babcock, L., Recalde, M. P., Vesterlund, L., & Weingart, L. (2017a). Gender differences in accepting and receiving requests for tasks with low promotability. American Economic Review, 107(3), 714–747. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20141734
Babcock, L., Recalde, M. P., & Vesterlund, L. (2017b). Gender differences in the allocation of low-promotability tasks: The role of backlash. American Economic Review, 107(5), 131–135. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.p20171018
Cowhey, M. R. (2026). She plans, they party: Gender and non-core job tasks in high-tech firms. Work and Occupations. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/07308884261486034
