Authentic Talent Development in Women Leaders Who Opted Out: Discovering Authenticity, Balance, and Challenge through the Kaleidoscope Career Model

Jennifer Knowles,Lisa Mainiero

doi:10.3390/admsci11020060

Jennifer Knowles, Lisa Mainiero

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/admsci11020060

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Abstract

We investigated the parameters of authenticity, balance, and challenge as viewed through the lens of the Kaleidoscope Career Model to discern the career motives of women who opted out and then returned to the workforce. We also were interested in comparing women and men in their leader practices. We triangulated quantitative and qualitative methods to explore these phenomena. First, in Study 1, 2009 individuals completed both the Kaleidoscope Career Self Inventory (the KCSI) as well as an abbreviated version of Kouzes and Posner’s Leadership Practices Inventory (the LPI). Participants rated their needs for authenticity, balance, and challenge on the KCSI as well as their leader practices of challenging the process, inspiring a shared vision, modeling the way, enabling others to act, and Encouraging the Heart. Women were found to exceed the leader practices of men, and women were most interested in authenticity. In Study 2, situational mapping and life history process was used to determine themes of eight high-achieving women who opted out. We interviewed an additional 15 women to deeply understand and assess their opt-out and re-entry experiences as well as “career shocks” they experienced upon returning to the workforce. Our second study offers a robust, deep, penetrating look into social ascription processes and endemic discriminatory social structures that hold women back from achieving advancement. To stop this “brain drain” of talent, we propose a series of actions for human resource professionals to develop the authentic leadership talent of women who reenter the workforce.

Highlights

Social ascription processes (Debebe 2017; Reskin 2012) differentially shape the internal and external conditions that influence the sorting of individuals into roles and occupations, leading to systemic racism and sexism that is perpetuated through endemic norms and behaviors
Utilizing Kouzes and Posner’s (2011) five practices of exemplary leadership alongside the three parameters of the Kaleidoscope Career Model (Mainiero and Sullivan 2005) as the theoretical foundation of this exploratory research, we propose the following research question that may elucidate prescriptions for women’s leadership and future authentic talent development in the workplace: Research Question #1: How do the parameters of authenticity, balance, and challenge correlate with Kouzes and Posner’s five practices of exemplary leadership?
While it is commonly assumed that work–family balance issues cause women to opt out, that assumption does not disclose the whole picture. Interviewees expressed how they felt they had leadership potential, yet the decision to opt out affected their careers, as it became difficult for them to return to the workforce

Summary

Introduction

Social ascription processes (Debebe 2017; Reskin 2012) differentially shape the internal and external conditions that influence the sorting of individuals into roles and occupations, leading to systemic racism and sexism that is perpetuated through endemic norms and behaviors. By reinforcing hierarchies based on race, gender, and other social identity groups, social ascription processes sustain power relations. This leads to a self-perpetuating cycle of endemic discrimination and micro-aggressions that lead women to leave the workforce as they believe opportunities for advancement are rare. Three categories of reasons have been posited for why there remains such a large gap in women’s lack of advancement to the executive suite: (1) stereotypic thinking associated with the development of women’s talents, career identities, goals, or ambition that uncover broader social ascriptions about women and men in the workplace (Heilman 2001; Heilman et al 2004; Koenig et al 2011),. While there may be stereotypical perceptions that women are less ambitious than men, in reality, women may either be more ambitious than perceived or beaten down by discriminatory social structures; such social ascription processes may be pervasive and life long, causing women to abandon their ambition

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