Corporate Leadership and Social

Responsibility

“Glass Ceiling turned labyrinth”

Aaiza Zuberi

27-Dec-2017
It's not a Glass Ceiling for Women. It's
a "Career Labyrinth"
“The Glass Ceiling: Why Women Can’t Seem to Break the Invisible Barrier That Blocks
Them from the Top Job.”
However, Eagly and Carli believe a better metaphor for what confronts women in their
careers is the term “labyrinth” because it “conveys the idea of a complex journey toward
a goal worth striving for. Passage through a labyrinth is not simple or direct, but requires
persistence, awareness of one’s progress, and a careful analysis of the puzzles that lie
ahead.”

How can you make your way through the career labyrinth? According to Eagly and
Carli, women need to better understand the barriers that make up the labyrinth, determine
how successful women find ways around these barriers, and then attack all barriers to
advancement simultaneously.
GLASS CEILING It is believed to be an unofficial, invisible barrier that prevents women
and minorities from advancing in businesses or barrier to career advancement an
unofficial but real impediment to some body’s advancement into upper level management
positions because of discrimination based on the person’s gender, age, race or ethnicity. It
is also defined as an unacknowledged discriminatory barrier that prevents women and
minorities from rising to positions of power or responsibility, as within a corporation.

GLASS CEILING, concerning the real equality of all people regardless their race,
gender, or social position, still persist. In such a situation, the arguments concerning the
position of female in the modern society are among the most contradictive since on the
one hand, there are people who sincerely believe that women have eventually managed to
get an equal position in society compared to men and, at the present days, they have
really equal opportunities as men do.
On the other hand, there is a totally different view on the position of women in the
modern society, according to which the glass ceiling still remains an unsurpassable
barrier women regularly face in their life. The latter position is more realistic and
corresponds to the actual position of females in the modern society since their leadership
is still rather an exception than a norm. Both points of view are grounded on certain
reasons which should be analyzed in order to fully reveal the extent to which the belief in
the real improvement of the position of women in the modern society and their access to
top positions is erroneous. First of all, it should be said that the fact that women have
made a great progress compared to the previous epoch is beyond a doubt. It is really true
that females play a significant role in the modern society and they have larger
opportunities and formally they have absolutely equal rights compared to men. As a rule,
those, who believe that the glass ceiling syndrome has gone and totally vanished from the
modern society, stand on the ground that modern women have not only equal rights
compared to men but also have wide opportunities to realize their right. In this respect, it
is necessary to agree that nowadays women have really got a chance to receive the same
basis for their future professional development and career growth. To put it more
precisely, modern women have access to education and have an opportunity to receive
higher education of the same quality that men do that is one of the basic conditions of
their future perspectives as potential leaders.

GLASS CEILING dominated society; especially women are missing from top jobs. Even
though women can have a real chance to receive the higher education similarly to men
but this does not necessarily mean that they will and actually have the real opportunities
to realize the acquired skills, abilities and knowledge in their professional life. To put it
more precisely, the recent researchers reveal the fact that81% of well-qualified women
that can occupy top positions face serious barriers engendered by the existing stereotypes.

Many employers simply feel an aversion to taking a risk by hiring a woman, or not
clearly planning their careers or job assignments to benefit them and, what is more, less
than 1% of CEOs see the development of high potential of women as a priority (Feldman
1997).In such a way, it is obvious that the stereotypes and biases still prevent women
from an opportunity to occupy top positions in organizations. In this respect, it is even
possible to speak about the failure of anti-discrimination legislation, which, being
actually good in principle, has turned to be unable to change the stereo types that have
been existing for decades, if not to say centuries.

The image of ambitious female managers simply crashing against a glass ceiling is out of
date. Rather than any male conspiracy, women face a labyrinth of obstacles, including
long hours and macho cultures, that stop them even getting to a point where they can
make a bid for the top.

"The research shows that when a woman is assertive and takes charge, people often react
negatively, but if she fulfills the prescribed stereotype of a kind and gentle woman, she
may be regarded as a poor leader,"
To rise in an organization women needed to do a better job at building social capital by
expanding their social networks beyond the narrow confines of their jobs.
Employees who had good relationships with colleagues both inside and outside of their
own organization tended to rise faster than those who focused more narrowly on
traditional managerial tasks.
Women had gained access to most lower- and middle-level positions, now constituting a
majority of managers in many areas, with the greatest concentrations in medical and
health services, human resources, social and community services and education.
Yet women still did not have nearly as much power and authority as men, the research
suggested.

"As the labyrinth implies, a woman's route to a leadership role can be challenging,"
Of the most highly paid officers in Fortune 500 companies – with titles such as chairman,
president, chief operating officer and chief executive officer – just six per cent were
women. Most notably, only three per cent of Fortune 500 CEOs were women, she added.
Besides the small number of women in the corporate elite, many of their positions were
peripheral to the centres of power.
For example, women were concentrated in staff management positions rather than line
management positions that involved direct responsibility for corporations' bottom lines.
1) women's wages remain lower on average
2)Marriage and parenthood are associated with higher wages for men but not for women
3) promotions come more slowly for women
4) bias against women at all levels, not only high positions
5) Problem is NOT glass ceiling Issues of Leadership style Demands of Family Life -
Women delayed childbearing until they reached a certain status