Glass ceiling

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The term glass ceiling ( Engl. Glass ceiling ), often glass ceiling or rare glass ceiling effect , is a metaphor for the phenomenon that members not ascend a particular population group in leadership positions.

In the narrower sense, the expression is mostly used today with regard to the fact that qualified women rarely advance into top positions in companies or organizations and "get stuck" at the level of middle management at the latest . It is assumed that such glass ceiling effects come about and are reinforced by a number of obstacles, such as stereotypes and prejudices regarding the suitability of women in management positions, a corporate climate that is tailored to men and a lack of access to informal networks. These obstacles are often inextricably linked with the organizational structures and are therefore difficult to recognize, hence the metaphor of an invisible barrier to advancement, i.e. a glass ceiling .

Since the 1980s, numerous international scientific studies have been published on this phenomenon, both by economists and sociologists . In a broader sense, one also speaks of a “glass ceiling” in view of the limited opportunities for advancement of homosexuals , ethnic and other minorities.

definition

The glass ceiling is not generally equated with inequality or discrimination . Four criteria must be met in order to be able to conclude that glass ceiling effects exist:

  1. Inequality between sexes or ethnicities cannot be explained by other work-related characteristics of the employees.
  2. Inequality is greater at higher levels of the corporate ladder than at lower levels.
  3. Inequality relates to the opportunities for advancement and not just to the proportion of women or minorities at higher levels.
  4. Inequality increases over the course of a career.

In a study, David Cotter and his colleagues found these effects for African American and white women, but not for male members of ethnic minorities. The glass ceiling is therefore a phenomenon that only affects women.

Possible reasons

Studies and others cite as reasons for the existence of the glass ceiling. a. the stronger promotion of male employees by male superiors and the extensive exclusion of women from important professional networks. In addition, HR managers often tacitly assume that women will take a “family break” at some point, sometimes without having asked the woman in question - which would also be inadmissible in most legal systems.

It is often believed that a career and children are difficult to reconcile. In Germany, for example, there is often the opinion, even among women in managerial positions, that from a certain level in the hierarchy a clear decision has to be made between parenthood and career. This is also supported by the analysis of a leaky pipeline at universities, where, for example, 30% of students are female, but only 10% of the same cohort become professors. Specifically, there is a demand to have more or better childcare in order to give women the opportunity to present their research results internationally and to network. There is also the view that the easier it is for a mother to have her child looked after externally, the higher the proportion of female bosses.

The publicist Heleen Mees describes the Glass Ceiling as a “waste of valuable human capital” and emphasizes that career obstacles for well-educated women in Europe are more based on corporate culture , gender-related distortion effects and stereotypes than on open discrimination and that it takes place through group-dynamic processes.

Christiane Funken , professor at the Institute for Sociology at the TU Berlin , has investigated the advancement opportunities of women and the phenomenon of the glass ceiling in several research projects. In June 2005 she said in a speech:

“ Glass ceiling can be described as a powerful career restriction that subtly and barely measurable prevents women from entering senior management. However, the fear of a lower average productivity of women and of higher female turnover rates has been clearly refuted by numerous national and international studies. Instead, stereotyping and expectations of homogeneity in recruitment and promotion policies in career-relevant networks ensure that women are closed down. "

- Christiane Sparks

A McKinsey survey identified prevalent expectations as one of the major obstacles to women's advancement , based on the model of a man whose wife is responsible for household and family responsibilities. Expectations such as unrestricted mobility , constant availability and an uninterrupted professional biography excluded mothers in particular. There was a lack of female role models and a change in the criteria for promotion.

Social scientist Hildegard Maria Nickel also sees the reasons mainly in the informal practices and rules existing within organizations . The management culture provides for “neither space nor behavior patterns” for women. In addition, key qualifications , which are often referred to as soft skills (“soft skills”) or, in relation to sex, as feminine skills (“female skills”) are in demand at lower management levels, but at higher hierarchical levels compared to male attributes such as Assertiveness , ability to act and determination to take a back seat.

Carsten Wippermann, Director of Social Research at the Sinus Sociovision Institute , prepared a representative study bridges and barriers for women to management positions for the BMFSFJ , for which 500 men and women in management positions in private companies in Germany were surveyed, then narrative in- depth interviews were carried out with 30 men and Personnel service companies ( temporary work ) were surveyed. As a result, he established a distinction between three mentality patterns, the viewpoints of which, taken together, worked like a locking bar. The conservative type, particularly represented in senior management, regards the management level as an inner circle of men whose partner has their backs free due to the healthy family background, which is endangered by the presence of women; In addition, women are not sufficiently familiar with the norms and logics in management levels, so that they have a disruptive effect, and they are often lone fighters and too attached to operational business , which means that they delegate too little . The second type, mainly represented in middle management, has an emancipated basic attitude, but sees a merciless efficiency orientation and hardness as a prerequisite for top management, which is unsuitable for a woman and leads to a loss of authenticity . The third, individualistic-oriented type refers to an uninterrupted professional biography without family-related interruptions as a prerequisite for a management function and to the fact that women lose authenticity and flexibility by imitating men. Taken together, these mentality patterns created “a multiple secured social locking function with very selective permeability”. In a study by the Free University of Berlin on persistent gender inequalities in top positions despite measures to promote gender diversity in management, hyperinclusion and path dependency were found to be stabilizing factors.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Susanne Böing: Basics of gender and gender issues in companies . Eul Verlag, Lohmar 2009 (dissertation at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf), ISBN 978-3-89936-854-3 , p. 214f.
  2. ↑ Sandra Beaufaÿs: Management positions in science . In: Sandra Beaufaÿs, Anita Engels, Heike Kahlert: Simply great ? New gender perspectives on careers in science. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2012, ISBN 978-3-593-39596-8 , p. 91f.
  3. ^ Federal Glass Ceiling Commission: Good for Business: Making Full Use of the Nation's Human Capital. ( Memento of the original from August 10, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 1.0 MB) US Department of Labor, Washington (DC) March 1995, pp. 26-36. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.dol.gov
  4. ↑ a b David A. Cotter, Joan M. Hermsen, Seth Ovadia, Reece Vanneman: The glass ceiling effect . (PDF; 2.6 MB) In: Social Forces . 80, No. 2, 2001, pp. 655-681. doi : 10.1353 / sof.2001.0091
  5. ↑ "Conversations with women in leading positions" Webarchiv.org, accessed on October 8, 2012 ( Memento from December 9, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 338 kB)
  6. ↑ Do not treat women equally, but equally! , ETH Zurich President Ralph Eichler and Renate Schubert, Delegate for Equal Opportunities, in an interview on the recently introduced Gender Monitoring, January 26, 2011.
  7. ↑ Quota for women without childcare senseless , Wirtschaftsjunioren Frankfurt, January 19, 2011.
  8. ↑ BETTER CHILD CARE, Brüderle against women's quota , Frankfurter Rundschau, January 23, 2011
  9. ↑ Developing country Switzerland: women occupy only 12 percent of all management positions , Aargauer Zeitung, March 8, 2011.
  10. ↑ Heleen Mees: Break through the glass ceiling. Project Syndicate, January 31, 2007, accessed June 6, 2010 .
  11. ↑ http://www.tu-berlin.de/?id=76082
  12. ↑ Christiane Funken: Glass ceiling - fact or fiction? (PDF) Total-e-quality.de. Archived from the original on October 9, 2007. Retrieved May 1, 2014.
  13. ↑ Michaela Schießl: Ascent in the labyrinth. In: SPIEGEL knowledge. Retrieved May 27, 2008 . Published in: SPIEGEL special 1/2008 of February 26, 2008, p. 58.
  14. ↑ Pavin Sadigh: Women want female careers. In: Zeit Online. March 7, 2008, accessed November 29, 2008 . P. 2
  15. ↑ Pavin Sadigh: Women want female careers. In: Zeit Online. March 7, 2008, accessed November 29, 2008 . P. 3
  16. ↑ Women in management positions: "The men are the keepers of the glass ceiling". Zeit Online, accessed February 13, 2010 .
  17. ↑ Clear text: Why female executives do not make it to the board. "Women are an irritation". Hamburger Abendblatt, February 6, 2010, accessed on February 13, 2010 .
  18. ↑ Carsten Wippermann: Bridges and barriers for women to management positions. (PDF) (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on August 13, 2011 ; Retrieved February 13, 2010 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.fidar-einegutewahl.de
  19. ^ First equality report: New ways - equal opportunities. Equality between women and men in the life course , German Bundestag, Drucksache 17/6240, June 16, 2011, Section 5.6.3 Stereotypes and prejudices as explanations for unequal working life courses for women and men, p. 128
  20. ↑ P. Erfurt Sandhu: Persistent Homogeneity in Top Management. Organizational path dependence in leadership selection (PDF, 2.9 MB), dissertation, Department of Economics at the Free University of Berlin, 2013. See Chapters VI and VII (pp. 167–208) in English, abridged version of the dissertation (in German) P. 215; Summary (in English)