Glass Ceiling Effect Research Articles

Two decades of women’s underrepresentation in public service leadership: the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

ABSTRACT During the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (2001–2021), the expected representation of Afghan women in leadership and executive roles was not achieved. This study examines factors contributing to this glass ceiling effect. Our research involved 317 participants, comprising 302 civil service professionals and 15 civil society activists. Employing a mixed-methods approach, thematic analysis was conducted for the qualitative data. For the quantitative data, descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation were utilized to characterize the data, and analysis of variance (ANOVA) was employed to explore differences in responses across key demographic and professional categories. We found that several glass ceiling perceptions, specifically ‘Cultural Barrier Factors’ including entrenched patriarchal norms and familial challenges; ‘Individual Factors’ such as work-family conflict (WFC); ‘Work-Environment Factors’ like nepotism and the absence of merit-based systems; and ‘Interpersonal Relationships’ including weak support networks and the existence of ‘Queen Bee Syndrome’, impeded the advancement of Afghan women in leadership roles.

Exploring the Challenges and Unveiling the Glass Ceiling Effect on Career Progression among Turkish Women in 3 to 5 Star Hotels

Purpose: Despite the significant growth in women’s participation in the hotel industry workforce, Turkish women continue to encounter limited access to senior management positions. This study investigates the obstacles faced by Turkish women in their pursuit of top managerial roles within the hotel industry and explores potential strategies to break through the glass ceiling. The purpose of this study is to investigate challenges and unveil the effect of the glass ceiling on the career development of Turkish women in 3-to-5-star hotels. The research endeavors to examine the experiences and challenges stemming from gender perceptions encountered by individuals within the hotel industry. Additionally, it seeks to discern the underlying social, organizational, and individual factors contributing to the disparity in leadership or senior positions held by women within this sector. Design/Methodology/Approach: The study utilizes a qualitative research approach, employing semi-structured, in-depth interviews with employees from 3 to 5-star hotels in Antalya, conducting an inductive thematic analysis approach the research aims to investigate the challenges faced by women in advancing their careers within the hotel industry and the diverse factors influencing their workplace performance. The statistical sample of the research includes people who have different viewpoints on the subject of the research. Findings: Twelve women working within the hospitality industry were interviewed. A thematic analysis revealed three interconnected barriers contributing to the glass ceiling faced by Turkish women: cultural and social obstacles, organizational challenges, and personal hindrances. These primary barriers encompass sub-barriers that collectively reinforce the glass ceiling, impeding numerous women from attaining senior positions. This research demonstrates that overcoming the barriers—especially organizational ones—can empower Turkish women to break through the glass ceiling and realize their leadership aspirations. Additionally, the study explores the implications for policymakers, academics, and practitioners regarding the impactful contributions of Turkish women to the hotel labor market." Practical Implications: This research showed evidence that there are real barriers for these women and the findings from this study offer implications that overcoming these barriers, particularly cultural and social barriers, could help Turkish women to crack the glass ceiling and achieve their dream of leadership. Originality/Value: The Hotel industry faces a worldwide shortage of Women in Leadership positions. This study aims to explore the challenges faced by the hotel sector in retaining highly skilled female employees who aspire to pursue managerial career trajectories. In addition, this research can add value to revealing gender inequality problems faced by Muslim women employees in the hospitality industry.

The Impact of Gender Stereotypes and Self-Efficacy on the Glass Ceiling Phenomenon in the Religious Affairs Office of Purwakarta Regency

This study aimed at gender stereotypes and self-efficacy as determinants of the glass ceiling effect. Data was collected through questionnaires distributed to employees in the office. The linear regression analysis method is used to analyze the data. Office of the Ministry of Religious Affairs of Purwakarta District. The results showed that Gender Streotypes partially had a significant influence on Glass Ceiling, Self-Efficacy had a significant influence on Glass Ceiling. The implications of these findings are discussed in the context of the Importance of addressing Gender Stereotypes in the workplace: Organizations need to be aware of the impact of Gender Stereotypes on the Glass Ceiling and take steps to reduce or eliminate those stereotypes

The glass ceiling effect in Spanish advertising creative departments

The representation of women in advertising creative departments has been studied worldwide. The findings have shown a low representation that does not favor the emergence of a critical mass of women, who could contribute with alternative visions to make advertising more inclusive. The underrepresentation, above all, occurs in managerial positions where they do not usually reach 35%. This study aims to update and report quantitatively on the phenomenon of the glass ceiling in Spain. In addition, in order to contextualize the level of segregation, these departments are compared with available international data. The results of a content analysis of the credit forms of 839 Spanish campaigns published in 2019 (a sample of 1,311 creatives) revealed gender dynamics, with a balanced starting group of creatives in non-managerial positions (just over 40% are women), but a figure of just 18% of women in managerial roles A higher glass ceiling effect was also found when European and global data were compared. The results analyzed through the perspective of the proportional representation theory (Kanter, 1977a, 1977b, 1987), suggest the need to raise awareness of gender inequalities within creative departments; this would foster the equality demanded by today’s society, of which advertising should not be oblivious.

Does Working from Home Increase the Gender Wage Gap? Insights from an Italian Survey of Occupations

ABSTRACT This article investigates to what extent the working from home (WFH) feasibility of occupations can influence the gender wag gap (GWG) at the mean and along the wage distribution. Based on Oaxaca–Blinder decompositions and unconditional quantile regressions, results show that the GWG is greater among women working in an occupation with a high level of WFH feasibility. We find evidence of both sticky floor and glass ceiling effects for employees with high WFH feasibility and only a sticky floor effect for the group with low WFH feasibility. The positive association revealed between the level of WFH feasibility and the GWG appears particularly strong among older and married women employees. These results underscore that the WFH feasibility may play an important role in exacerbating future gender gaps in wages, as WFH is expected to remain a normal practice beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. HIGHLIGHTS Working from home (WFH) feasibility of occupations influences the gender wage gap (GWG) in Italy. GWG is overall wider among employees with high WFH feasibility than employees with low WFH feasibility. The GWG is higher among older and married women employees. A possible explanation is Italy’s ungenerous work–family policies and poor childcare availability. There is a need for policies aimed at regulating WFH from a gender-equality perspective.

Women Representatives and Politics of Image Construct in Pakistan: A Study of Parliamentary Debates on Selected Issues (2013-2018)

Politics and political process across the world has generated a debate that how to create an inclusive democracy in which vulnerable segments of the society has to be provided a sense of equality and justice. Pakistan since 1947 and onward has undergone a systemic change to address multiple issue and problems that needed to refurbish its social and political system to accommodate the justified concerns of the subjected parts of the polity. Women quota was increased in political representation which helped them to break the glass ceiling effect and gave a sense of self-construction. In the parliament, they automated the concept ‘personal is political’ to dispel the social taboos which were working under the auspices of patriarchy and religiosity. In the above given time span of the government, women parliamentarians raised their voices over all kinds of issues and abridged the gulf between public and private. Despite toeing party lines of which they are nominee, they were successful in creating niche for them in the domain of politics. They developed their own caucus to make their identity meaningful in the politics of Pakistan. Parliamentary debates from archives of the parliament were consulted for this research.

She’s worth IT: challenges for female CIOs in ensuring IT security compliance

PurposeIT security compliance is critical to the organization’s success, and such compliance depends largely on IT leadership. Considering the prevalence of unconscious gender biases and stereotyping at the workplace and growing female leadership in IT, the authors examine how the internalization of stereotype beliefs, in the form of the employee’s gender, impacts the relationships between leadership characteristics and IT security compliance intentions.Design/methodology/approachA controlled experiment using eight different vignettes manipulating Chief Information Officer (CIO) gender (male/female), Information Technology (IT) expertise (low/high) and leadership style (transactional/transformational) was designed in Qualtrics. Data were gathered from MTurk workers from all over the US.FindingsThe findings suggest that both CIOs' and employees' gender play an important role in how IT leadership characteristics – perceived expertise and leadership style – influence the employees' intentions and reactance to comply with CIO security recommendations.Research limitations/implicationsThis study's findings enrich the security literature by examining the role of leadership styles on reactance and compliance intentions. They also provide important theoretical implications based on gender stereotype theory alone: First, the glass ceiling effects can be witnessed in how men and women employees demonstrate prejudice against women CIO leaders through their reliance on perceived quadratic CIO IT expertise in forming compliance intentions. Secondly, this study's findings related to gender role internalization show men and women have a prejudice against gender-incongruent roles wherein women employees are least resistive to transactional male CIOs, and men employees are less inclined to comply with transactional female CIOs confirm the findings related to gender internationalization from Hentschel et al. (2019).Practical implicationsThis study highlights the significance of organizations and individuals actively promoting gender equality and fostering environments that recognize women's achievements. It also underscores the importance of educating men and women about the societal implications of stereotyping gender roles that go beyond the organizational setting. This research demonstrates that a continued effort is required to eradicate biases stemming from gender stereotypes and foster social inclusion. Such efforts can positively influence how upcoming IT leaders and employees internalize gender-related factors when shaping their identities.Social implicationsThis study shows that more work needs to be done to eliminate gender stereotype biases and promote social inclusion to positively impact how future IT leaders and employees shape their identities through internalization.Originality/valueThis study redefines the concept of “sticky floors” to explain how subordinates can hinder and undermine female leaders, thereby contributing to the glass ceiling effect. In addition, the study elucidates how gender roles shape employees' responses to different leadership styles through gender stereotyping and internalization.

Posrednička uloga fenomena "staklenog plafona" u relaciji između karijernih mogućnosti i angažovanosti zaposlenih u ugostiteljstvu

Purpose -The main purpose of this paper is to examine and analyze the relationship between career opportunities and employee engagement, as well as the mediating effect of the glass-ceiling phenomenon within the hospitality. Methodology -Beside desk research, this paper employs the empirical research undertaken by use of a specially prepared online questionnaire. Research was conducted between October 2023 and April 2024 with participation of 567 women employed in the hospitality, while proposed relationships were tested by using the partial least squares method for structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM, SmartPLS software). Findings -The research results showed the existence of a positive relationship between broken glass-ceiling and employee engagement, that career opportunities are positively related to employee engagement and elimination of the glass-ceiling effect, and that the glass-ceiling effect mediates the relationship between career opportunities and employee engagement within the hospitality. Implications -This is one of the first studies which addresses the topics of glass-ceiling, career opportunities and employee engagement in the hospitality by using specific methodology (questionnaire and PLS-SEM). The research findings may be used as a basis for decision making process for retaining employees in the hospitality on the long run by eliminating glass-ceiling effects, improving career opportunities and employee engagement.

From Awareness To Action: Addressing The Underlying Factors Of The Glass Ceiling Effect For Women In Multiple Sectors

The Glass Ceiling Effect is a phenomenon that portrays intangible obstacles often interfering the career advancement of talented people, especially women, to top-level management positions. This article aims to explore the underlying factors of the Glass Ceiling Effect in Indonesia, with a focus on the career challenges faced by women and the barriers in achieving gender equality in the workplace. The study included 100 female respondents working in various sectors. The research findings show that there are several factors reflecting the Glass Ceiling Effect such as Internal Business Structure, Social Challenges, Situational Challenges, and Individual Challenges. On the other hand, the Government Challenge factor does not reflect the Glass Ceiling Effect.

Defeminization of practicing dentists: A national perspective

Madam, The dental profession has witnessed a progressive shift where female dentists are becoming more prevalent in many countries, including Pakistan. This trend, known as the feminization of dentistry1, can be attributed to changing societal and economic perceptions, increased acceptance of diverse gender roles, and the recognition of the benefits of adopting feminine traits in the dental profession.2 In Pakistan, the transition began in the early 1990s when the quota system limiting seats for women in medical and dental schools was abolished. Currently, around 70% of undergraduate dental students in Pakistan are female.2 However, despite the promising number of female dental students, there is a significant drop in postgraduate training and professional practice. Only 5% of graduating female dentists pursue postgraduate training, and only half of the registered female dentists work.3 The reasons for this decline include a glass ceiling effect, which hinders women's advancement in their careers, the lack of female representation in leadership roles, the absence of female mentorship at the postgraduate level, and dual family and domestic responsibilities. Additionally, female dentists may face bias and preference towards their male counterparts in high-status specialities, impacting their promotional opportunities and patient preferences.4,5 Persistence of societal pressure and traditional gender roles also contribute to the dropout rate of female dentists in Pakistan. Many young women are often pressured to prioritize family obligations over professional commitments, leading them to leave the dental profession early. Moreover, the absence of part-time options further limits their ability to balance family responsibilities with dental practice. To address these challenges and enable the sustained involvement of female dentists, several measures are necessary. Increasing female representation in leadership roles, make leadership part of the educational curriculum, providing mentorship opportunities, and establishing strong social support systems for women are crucial. Reforms should also focus on improving ergonomics in dental practice, highlighting cultural loopholes for gender biases, equity issues and implementing policies that support working mothers, such as flexible working hours, adequate maternity leave and family care facilities. While efforts have been made to increase the number of female dental students, there is still a long way to go in creating an inclusive and supportive environment for practicing female dentists in Pakistan. By addressing the root causes of the gender disparity and implementing necessary reforms, Pakistani society can break the glass ceiling and allow future generations of women to contribute fully to the field of dental healthcare.

Unveiling the Veil: Exploring the Origin, Effects, and Coping Strategies of Menstrual Stigma

Menstruation, also referred to as the period, faces pervasive stigmatization globally despite being a natural female biological process. This stigma, rooted in historical gender inequalities and fueled by misconceptions, holds significant implications. This study investigates period stigma comprehensively, exploring its origins, impacts, and potential solutions. The stigma originates from patriarchal structures and gender inequality, reinforcing harmful biases and impeding womens career growth, exemplified by the glass ceiling effect. The resulting psychological toll on women is considerable. Efforts to combat period stigma include policy interventions, feminist movements, and NGO initiatives like United Nations International Childrens Emergency Fund. This paper enhances understanding of the stigma and its consequences, proposing practical strategies to counteract it. However, limitations include the lack of qualitative and quantitative methods due to data constraints and insufficient historical sources, impacting the portrayal of its inception. In conclusion, this study illuminates the enduring complexity of period stigma, raising awareness about its harm. Synthesizing existing literature provides valuable insights into its origins, consequences, and coping mechanisms.

The glass ceiling phenomenon: A review of literature and a theoretical perspective

It is challenging for a woman to obtain a worthy platform for herself in a patriarchal culture with values that are primarily male dominated. As a result, gender issues have gained significant attention in the field of management studies. The glass ceiling phenomenon that prevails in businesses is one of these salient gender issues. This research reviews many papers on the glass-ceiling effect and groups them into one of the following four categories: (i) Proof of the "glass ceiling" occurrence. (ii) The origins of the glass ceiling; (iii) the effects of having a glass ceiling; and (iv) what happens when a glass ceiling breaks (iv) Strategies for breaking the glass ceiling at work. This research makes a significant contribution to the quantity of knowledge already available on the glass-ceiling issue, and it will also assist future researchers in streamlining their research directions.

Impact of Glass Ceiling Effect on Women’s Career Success with the MediatingRole of Women Empowerment: Perspective from Sri Lankan Hospitality Industry

This research explores the gender equality in the hospitality sector with the support of the Glass Ceiling Effect and how it applies to Women's Career Progress. Women's Career Progress. Women's career progress and women's empowerment being the dependent variable and mediator respectively, this study employed five independent variables as the key predictors of glass ceilings. Simple random sampling procedure was applied to select 123 respondents and SPSS and Smart PLS software were used to analyze the data. Research findings revealed that there is no impact of internal job mobility and organizational culture on women empowerment at 3 and above-star hotels in the Sri Lankan context due to having less P-Values than 0.05. Female representation in hotels was lower (7.40%) than male representation. By delegation of authority, fair performance reviews, training and incentives, scholarships, and flexible work arrangements are all ways to improve the qualification credentials of female employees.

ASSESSING GLASS CEILING AND GENDER INEQUALITY FOR WOMEN EMPLOYEE IN SERVICE SECTOR

The glass ceiling is a barrier to the advancement of capable female professionals in the workplace, primarily due to gender or racism (Abidin, Z. Z. 2009). Carol Hymowitz and Timothy Schellhardt of the Wall Street Journal developed the term "glass ceiling" in 1986. Many researchers like (Shukla, 2015) have confirmed the presence of a glass ceiling based on various constructs such as social, cultural, and individual constraints. In India, there is no substantial proof on this topic. In their workplaces, the majority of the respondents had experienced some form of prejudice. Despite increases in women's education and knowledge, the percentage of women who advance in their careers is still quite modest. There are few studies that indicate the major impediments to women's advancement in the workplace. The study's sample size was set at 200 people. Data was obtained from female responders to eliminate any type of bias. So, sample were 145 respondents (Women Employee). SPSS was used to examine the data. Individual factors, social and societal factors, organizational factors, cultural aspects, family factors, and gender related issues were investigated using exploratory factor analysis. The effect of the factors on the respondents' job performance was calculated using percentages. According to the findings, women employees can only break through the glass ceiling if positive factors impacting their professional advancement are boosted. This can be done by improving their economic power by updating their abilities, educational qualifications, communication skills, and having competent mentors who can guide and counsel them in the right direction. The study's goal is to see, if there is a glass ceiling in different service industries. This research also looks into the effects of the glass ceiling on women's advancement in the workplace. The purpose of this study is to look for glass ceiling effects, which limit women's professional opportunities and advancement at a particular point.

“Making visible the invisible”: Exploring the role of gender biases on the glass ceiling in Qatar's public sector

Most studies exploring the impact of gendered organizational factors on women's leadership opportunities have focused on Western economies. This study investigates how unconscious gender bias is hindering women's access to leadership in Qatar's public sector. We conducted 45 semi-structured interviews with both male and female employees working in the Qatari public sector to understand their perceptions, attitudes, and experiences regarding women's career support, leader preferences, and work-family balance issues. Our findings reveal the existence of unconscious gender bias among male and female employees in the Qatari public sector. While many participants recognized recent efforts to promote gender equality in employment and career advancement, and felt that women face no barriers to their career advancement, they also expressed preferences for male managers over female ones. Additionally, while women faced more challenges than men in maintaining work-life balance, some male participants attributed these struggles to individual women's abilities rather than acknowledging systemic gender biases. These biases, both in the workplace and at home, underscore the underestimated and unacknowledged role of gender in contributing to the glass ceiling effect in Qatar's public sector.

Harnessing the Power of Precision Medicine and Novel Biomarkers to Treat Crohn’s Disease

Crohn's disease (CD) is a chronic inflammatory condition that affects the gastrointestinal tract. It is part of a spectrum of inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD). The disease is complex, characterized by significant inter and intra-individual heterogeneity, which contributes to a diverse and multifaceted portrayal of the disease. Consequently, applying specific and accurate treatment is challenging, and therapeutic success rates remain disappointing and insufficient. In recent years, significant advances in the therapeutic potential of CD have been made. Hope has been provided by these developments in the form of an expanding treatment toolkit. However, even with these beneficial adjustments, patients are frequently treated using an ineffective "one size fits all" treatment protocol, ultimately leading to a plateau in drug effectiveness and a decline in overall treatment success rates. Furthermore, with the advancement in the genome-wide association study, in combination with significant bioinformatic developments, the world of medicine has moved in the direction of personalized, tailored-treatment medicine, and this trend has not escaped the world of IBDs. Prediction models, novel biomarkers, and complex algorithms are emerging and inspiring optimism that CD patients will be treated with "precision medicine" in the near future, meaning that their treatments will be selected based on the patient's various unique features. In this review, we will outline the current diagnostic and therapeutic limitations that lead to a glass ceiling effect and thus send us in pursuit of discovering novel biomarkers. We will illustrate the challenges and difficulties in discovering relevant and innovative biomarkers and implementing them into everyday clinical practice. We will also heighten the progress made in practicing personalized medicine for CD patients and shed light on future directions and horizons.

Women as leaders: the glass ceiling effect on women’s leadership success in public bureaucracies

Purpose Much research has been conducted regarding leadership success challenges. However, few are practically oriented on whether the success of women's leadership aligns to organisational, personal and societal contexts as glass cliffs. Thus, this study aims to examine these factors and introduce how they inhibit women from leadership success. Design/methodology/approach This research examined the glass ceiling effects Ethiopian women leaders face. This research focused on adjusted clusters and a survey of 446 female employees from zones, woreda and kebeles. The data was processed through SPSS 25.0 to regress the values. Findings Breaking the glass ceiling, the glass cliffs effects on women’s income levels, the lack of an arena for self-improvement, the nature of organisation policies and challenges in teamwork were found to contribute to women’s under-representation in top leadership positions. Research limitations/implications The results focused only on the 94 public organisations in Ethiopia that were selected by adjusted cluster sampling. Practical implications Realizations of substantial change and refocusing on bringing a significant number of women to the boardrooms in the public bureaucracy, besides glass cliffs. Social implications Enhancing the importance of accepting women leaders. Originality/value To add value to the stock of literature in gender equality, this research brings a strategic focus on factors that inhibit women from top leadership positions.

Dentistry and Gender Gap: An Overview of the Italian Situation.

Recently, the issue of the gender gap in dentistry and in the leadership in the dental field has placed new challenges on dental profession representatives and politicians. Indeed, the inequity between genders in healthcare workforces represents a limit to the progression of those in the professions, inhibiting talented colleagues from accessing high positions in the academic world and not providing adequate role models to inspire future generations. The Italian population practicing dentistry in 2021 was composed of 74% males and 26% females. The aim of this study is to analyze the level of the gender gap in the dental field in Italy by focusing on the gender distribution of professional leaders in institutional category associations and invited speakers at dental conferences accredited for the Continue Education in Medicine program. The search strategy considered three different fields in the national dentistry scene: the dental committee boards, the union category associations, and the cultural field. The roles in the dental boards were retrieved from the website of the National Medical and Dental Committee from 2018 to 2022; the roles in the union category associations at the provincial, regional, and national levels were retrieved from the related web pages, considering the period from 2018 to 2021; and the information about the speakers at national conferences from 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2021 was retrieved from the National Agency for Regional Health Services (Agenzia nazionale per i servizi sanitari regionali (AGENAS)) websites. The extracted data were grouped and examined using descriptive statistics (frequency), and due to the categorical nature of the data, non-parametric tests (chi-square tests) were used to assess any differences between the two genders. The null hypothesis was that there were no statistical differences between the two genders' distributions. A p-value was considered significant when <0.05. In addition, aiming to understand the representation of male and female dentists, a comparison of the distributions of males and females in the dental boards with the percentages of female and male dentists operating in Italy in 2021 was performed using a binomial test. The analysis of the data regarding the composition of the dental boards and of the union category association boards revealed a statistically significant difference in the distribution of the roles between the two genders at the regional and local levels, with a p-value of <0.05, and a significantly low representation of the women practicing dentistry (p < 0.05). In Italy, women practicing dentistry are underrepresented in dental organizations and in cultural events, given the low numbers of female dentists in leadership and/or speaker roles in the years 2018-2021. Even though the glass ceiling effect continues to affect Italian female dentists, initiatives and political measures have been taken to improve this condition and reach gender equity.

Gender equity in Lebanon’s news industry: The chasm between management’s perspectives and women journalists’ experience

Senior management’s lack of knowledge and acknowledgement of gender injustice in journalism organizations has negative implications for the advancement of women journalists’ right to a hostile-free and equitable workplace. This study examines news leadership’s perceptions of gender inequity in the Lebanese news industry. The qualitative study relied on a focus group with sixteen senior Lebanese news managers from major journalism institutions in the country. It found the perceptions of most news managers to be inconsistent with extant research that has documented the hostile gendered work environment in the Lebanese news industry. Many of the issues that women journalists in Lebanon face, including gender discrimination, glass ceiling effects, pay inequity and sexual harassment, were neither acknowledged nor sufficiently addressed in the policies and practices of these organizations, partly due to this lack of awareness about women’s status in the industry and society.

GLASS CEILING EFFECT AMONG WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP POSITION IN HOSPITALS

The aim of the study was to explore the glass ceiling effect faced by women leaders in hospital. The study was conducted on a population from the state of Kerala and Delhi, whereby fifty- three participants filled out the screening questionnaire, out of which ten participants were screened out to be a part of the qualitative study using semi-structured interviews. The sample consisted of women in leadership position for at least more than a year. Certain areas were explored, which lead to a finding that the women in leadership positions face a plethora of issues at workplace revolving around aspects like overwork, challenges faced, relationships in workplace and employees, discrimination faced and the expertise in the field etc. The major aspect that was brought into focus was that women's gender denies them the best opportunities