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Despite higher educational investments, women fall behind men on most indicators of labour market success. This study investigates whether workplace skill investments set men and women off on different tracks in which the human capital acquired through higher education is either devalued or further developed. A survey sample of Swedish men and women who recently graduated from five educational programmes, leading to occupations with different gender composition, is analysed (N approximate to 2300). Results show that, a few years after graduation, men are more likely than women to acquire complex jobs and that this difference contributes to early career gender gaps in wages and employee bargaining power. The findings do not support the notion that child-related work interruptions provide a main mechanism for sorting women into less complex jobs.