Meta description of female business engagement scenarios

Abstract

This article contains a meta-analysis of representations of the main models of recruiting women into the field of professional business in European, English language and Russian periodical press. The aim of this study is to systemize the theoretical-conceptual and practical aspects of reproducing certain means of recruitment into the economic elite, as well as the restrictions which women face when choosing a professional development trajectory. A meta-description of the career paths of those women who established themselves in the entrepreneurial field allows for reconstructing women’s scenarios of choosing and forwarding their career in business, as well as for constructing a typology of narrative strategies which affect women’s choices in professional development trajectories in the context of different countries. The empirical basis for this study consists of full-text articles from periodical and serial publications in leading foreign and domestic academic journals. Using critical discourse analysis of articles and open data allows for reconstructing the significance of gender aspects when it comes to choosing a career in business, as well as for tracing the influence of the context of developing female entrepreneurship on recruitment mechanisms in various countries. The results of the empirical study show that the representation of mechanisms for recruiting women into the professional environment is differentiated in different ways in English language and Russian periodic press. Peculiarities inherent to different countries are one of the factors which affect the development of business trajectories specific to certain regions. In Europe a discourse-system education prevails as the most adequate means for establishing oneself in the economic field. Eastern Asian countries mostly focus on the immigration process. In Russia we see gender labeled strategies in leadership positions. The manner in which recruitment mechanisms are pitched also varies: European articles mostly focus on positive trends and representing the discourse of successful business cases, while Russian periodical press concentrates on the obstacles and restrictions women have to deal with when choosing a career path. The narratives used for reconstructing the mechanisms for recruiting women into the realm of business, together with the terminology chosen by the authors of this article, confirm a positive representation of female entrepreneurship in Europe, an ambiguous nature of the business environment in countries of the Far East, and a certain degree of underdevelopment in Russia’s segment.