Women in Management essay
A stereotype is an unfair and oversimplified fact that a group of individuals is attributed to a particular characteristic or all the people in that group are similar. Gender stereotype tends to limit the advancement of natural talents, abilities of either men or women and education as well as professionalism in life opportunities. Stereotypes on women result from and cause deeply ingrained attitudes, norms, values as well as prejudices against their gender. They are used as a perfect tool for the justification and maintenance of the historical relations of power of either man over woman or women with power or those of a higher ranking over the powerless holding back their advancement (Korek, Sabine et al, 2). The aim of this research paper is to determine the sources of gender stereotypes, how they affect women in business and the remedies for this type of discrimination.
In the current era, the society has held several views one of which is the expectation that the world of entrepreneurship is gender-blind. This, however, is not the reality. Differences in gender emotions still persist and have an influence on the entrepreneurial creation of businesses. In this case, the male’s sense of pride tends to appear greater with the comparison to that of their female counterparts Manalo & Ailel, 2). An example of such a scenario is when there is a collision between family and business. This creates a more vivid anxiety and guilt for women. However, male entrepreneurs display similar emotions in the failure of a business ideology because of the less intensity of the interplay between home and work (Patel, 2).
Gender stereotyping is solely responsible for the unequal pay between men and women in business. From the available data, it is evident that women are paid when compared with men despite the similarity of the tasks performed as well as the working hours. This discrimination has put women in an awkward situation where they cannot invest in their personal development other than providing for their basic necessities (Patel, 2). Statistical example to prove the inequality is where women must work an additional average of 44 days in order to earn the same amount of salary as the males. In addition, even in job categories i.e. child care which women predominantly occupy, they still earn around 95% of what men earn undertaking the same job. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
The fact that men and women claim and are in need of equal chances of promotion averagely 78% and 75% respectively, women are less likely to be promoted to the next level in the organization (Robnett & Rachael, 4). Across many organizations and businesses, a study indicates that women are leading with a 15% less likely chance of a promotion. At such rates, in order to achieve gender equality, it is likely to take more than a century. As a result of gender stereotypes, there are only a few women aiming for top positions, unlike the men. This is due to the fact that these positions are associated with stress and pressure. Promotions need superior skills as well as experience. Women’s limited relationships tend to limit their abilities in securing senior positions as they try navigating through the hidden prospects for a job promotion (Korek, Sabine et al, 2). Another reason for their retained positions rather than get promoted is the fact that women in leadership have a tendency to stay with their companies, represented by around 20%. Other misconceptions held against women are the limiting factors to their promotion. One of such misconceptions is that women with families are less ambitious in their careers. Therefore unmarried women stand better chances than those with families.
Gender stereotyping has resulted in the loss and limitation of career advancement opportunities by women. One of the reasons as to why this is possible is because women have reduced participation in their place of work as a result of their increased domestic duties (Korek, Sabine et al, 2). This disparity tends to create an undesirable situation for women, forcing them to choose an unhealthy work and life balance in order to get a chance of pursuing their careers. Limited human capital among women puts them in an awkward spot in terms of career development as well as entrepreneurship. Human capital is the experience, skill, and knowledge brought by an employee to the position they are employed. Women in business, therefore, are likely to come from non- business related backgrounds and hence success is limited due to the fact that they lack adequate business leadership experience (Manalo & Ailel, 2). The opportunities of women are limited as they tend to have a false optimism and the elimination of the perception of making things better.
The “glass cliffs” phenomenon is among the threats facing women entering or already in positions of power in a business. Women tend to be favored for positions with leading units in crisis as women with the ability to push the upper limits are seen as a potential participant in taking over a decisive point or critical condition (Manalo & Ailel, 2). Limitation in terms of the support around women from fellow women as well as the counterpart males make them find the roles very stressful, opting to leave their positions for a lower position or seek employment elsewhere. The departure, on the other hand, is associated with their lack of skills as well as the unwillingness to commit themselves into the hard work required at the high levels of leadership in a business. The choice of leaving is a lateral move to a business where they have to re-establish themselves again hence it’s a hiccup in the entrepreneurship world (Robnett & Rachael, 4).
Patel, (2) suggests that gender stereotypes result in concerns with connections to collective structures which influence women directly. The organizational structures affect and restrain female adjustments. Some of these forms entail male domination and increasing ambiguity concerning adjustments. For networks already existing in an organization, they can be homogeneous as well as long-standing. In this case, it is hard for the female gender to join an already existing network as they are mostly not comfortable with the act of meeting new people in business environments of a set context. In addition, committing extra time outside the working hours of women has proven difficult because of their commitments back at home (Mandy, 3). For this reason, employers are less interested in welcoming new female members into their businesses which in turn limits the network around women at high levels of power rendering it unhelpful.
Social policies such as the one aimed at women perpetuating inequality in domestic obligations have played a vital role in limiting women in business. The chance of working as a part-timer for women after childbirth is an opportunity only enjoyed by women. This opportunity reinforces the perception that it is more suitable for women to tend to family commitments as compared to men. Despite a decrease in the domestic responsibilities, a study shows that an average woman works 13.3 hours in a week on house duties in comparison to her spouse who works for about 6.5 hours (Manalo & Ailel, 2). Another gender biased perception is the one held by the society that leadership qualities are considered to be closely associated with male qualities. In several organizational cultures, women with attributes associated with men are resisted. With such kind of resistance, no woman in power can do much. Societal expectations of men and women are agentic and communal respectively (Robnett & Rachael, 4). Communal qualities tend to include affection, gentleness as well as helpfulness. Agentic, on the other hand, includes control and assertion. This expectation formulates a framework for widespread stereotyping in the workplace and culture. Professional women in business, therefore, are expected to replace warmth with competence due to societal norms basing on the fact that women can’t be warm and competent at once.
Top position traits that tend to mirror agentic style have already been supported as acceptable. When women secure these positions in business, they tend to experience a deep-rooted entanglement of expectations as they are expected to exhibit both communal traits and agentic traits (Korek, Sabine et al, 2). Due to the difficulty in balancing, women are criticized for being too lenient on either side of the traits creating stress as well as frustrations despite their efforts. For this reason, attitudinal penalties and subordination by associates are inevitable for failure to conform to the perceived role. Such penalties include poor evaluation, social rejection, and criticism. Therefore, men will accelerate their promotions up the ladder, leaving their female counterparts to work through external acuity (Mandy, 3).
Despite the fact that discrimination and judgment in relation to women in business have subsided, they are still present for women in power. They surface as tokenism, stereotypes, sexism among others. Women in power are often stereotyped to be the mother, seductress, and the iron maiden. Due to the lack of other women in the management, women in high positions are more often than not isolated by other and viewed as a symbolic gesture of the entrepreneurship’s goodwill step towards equality (Mandy, 3). The progression of a small number of women to the seats of power has created a situation termed as “tokenism”, an interpretation that those in power display equality of the opportunities when in reality it’s just a lie (Korek, Sabine et al, 2).
In order to save women from the grasp of gender stereotypes, several actions have been put in place by government bodies as well as the non-governmental organizations in favor of the feminine gender. One of such acts is the ability to sue business partners and organizations for gender discrimination, as well as harassment. By doing so, women have a choice of remaining at their current business positions while holding it accountable for failure to address any complaints they have filed. The willingness of women to raise awareness about the difficulty in their working environments come in handy in aiding through the circumstances they go through at work. In doing so, business firms advertise and renders itself to be a gender-diverse institution not only through words but action wise as well. The ability to voice their awareness to a particular problem in the current era has aided in fighting previously held perceptions such as women lack the ability to advance because rather than shrinking from an opportunity like before, women have gained confidence and experience for any top position (Patel, 2).
In response to barriers caused by gender stereotypes, women have decided to avoid careers with a high rate of stereotyping and discrimination. Such business organizations tend to be male-dominated, involving skills traditionally viewed as male strengths. Career opportunities on the other hand based on math and science had previously been considered as male related are now open for ladies as well. Details from studies show that women perform much better than the male gender. However, companies need to be proactive in the concern about welcoming women by stating clearly on the type of gender they are in need of hiring in order to support women as well as monitoring salaries and promotions regularly to ensure equal treatment (Robnett & Rachael, 4).
Incorporating gender equivalence as a fraction of the education and training, the inexperienced are aided in selecting careers which are promising and future-oriented in spite of sex. This gives them an advantage of the flexibility and work-life balance in which the business or organization offers several options to its workers. As part of the education, mentoring, coaching, and networking helps build confidence and career development in women. In such a case, women’s talents and opportunities are not limited as they are offered practical support (Manalo & Ailel, 2).
In conclusion, although women in business have generally been perceived to have made great improvements towards equality in achieving seats of power, the fact still remains that women don’t share equal presenters in these roles due to gender stereotypes. Executive women do not conform to the normal type and therefore, pervasiveness and ongoing barriers continue to limit most of the women who are in need of moving to positions of power in business. In order to completely correct gender stereotypes and its effects, businesses, governments, and organizations must distinguish the reality from the myths and act accordingly.
Cited works
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Korek, Sabine et al. “The Gender Role Self-Concept Of Men In Female-Dominated Occupations: Does It Depend On How They See Their Jobs?” Journal of Applied Social Psychology, vol 44, no. 4, 2014, pg. 2. Wiley, doi:10.1111/jasp.12235.
Patel, Dhvani. “Leader-Gender Stereotypes in Female Congenial Workplaces”. OPUS: HR Journal, vol 7, no. 1, 2016. Pg. 2 Publishing India Group, doi:10.21863/opus/2016.7.1.013.
Robnett, Rachael D. “Gender Bias in STEM Fields”. Psychology of Women Quarterly, vol 40, no. 1, 2015, pg. 4. SAGE Publications, doi: 10.1177/0361684315596162.
Manalo, Ailel Suzzet D. “Gender Representation and Stereotypes in The K-12 English Learner’s Materials”. International Journal of Scientific Research and Management, vol 6, no. 08, 2018. Pg. 2 Valley International, doi:10.18535/ijsrm/v6i8.el02.