The Warriors Within: Change and the Change Agent (original) (raw)

Gender Change, Organizational Change, and Gender Equality Strategies

2011

Change is at the heart of gender studies and the fi eld of gender, work, and organization is no exception to that. Since second-wave feminism provided the impetus to question women's and men's positions in society, an ever increasing fl ow of research has problematized the gendered division of labor and made a plea for gender equality. A quest for change is thus more or less central to the fi eld. Despite many initiatives aimed at changing organizations into gender-balanced or gender-equitable workplaces, change is slow at best. Only from a historical perspective, when one looks back a few decades, does it become clear that changes toward equality have indeed occurred, at various levels (welfare states, organizations, and the attitudes of people).

Champions of gender equality: female and male executives as leaders of gender change

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine male and female executives as leaders “championing” gender change interventions. It problematizes current exhortations for male leaders to lead gender change, much as they might lead any other business-driven change agenda. It argues that organizational gender scholarship is critical to understanding the gendered nature of championing. Design/methodology/approach – This paper draws on a feminist qualitative research project examining the efficacy of a gender intervention in a university and a policing institution. Interviews with four leaders have been chosen from the larger study for analysis against the backdrop of material from interviewees and the participant observation of the researcher. It brings a social constructionist view of gender and Acker’s gendering processes to bear on understanding organizational gender change. Findings – The sex/gender of the leader is inescapably fore-fronted by the gender change intervention. Gendered expectations and choices positioned men as powerful and effective champions while undermining the effectiveness of the woman in this study. Research limitations/implications – Further research examining male and female leaders capacity to champion gender change is required. Practical implications – This research identifies effective champion behaviors, provides suggestions for ensuring that gender equity interventions are well championed and proposes a partnership model where senior men and women play complementary roles leading gender change. Originality/value – This paper is of value to practitioners and scholars. It draws attention to contemporary issues of leadership and gender change, seeking to bridge the gap between theory and practice that undermines our change efforts.

Women in power: Undoing or Redoing the Gendered Organization?

Gender & Society, 2015

A growing literature examines the organizational factors that promote women’s access to positions of organizational power. Fewer studies, however, explore the implications of women in leadership positions for the opportunities and experiences of subordinates. Do women leaders serve to undo the gendered organization? In other words, is women’s greater representation in leadership positions associated with less gender segregation at lower organizational levels? We explore this question by drawing on Cohen and Huffman’s (2007) conceptual framework of women leaders as either “change agents” or “cogs in the machine” and analyze a unique multilevel data set of workplaces nested within Fortune 1000 firms. Our findings generally support the “agents of change” perspective. Women’s representation among corporate boards of directors, corporate executives, and workplace managers is associated with less workplace gender segregation. Hence, it appears that women’s access to organizational power helps to undo the gendered organization.

From rhetoric to reality: A multilevel analysis of gender equality in Pakistani organizations

From rhetoric to reality: A multilevel analysis of gender equality in Pakistani organizations

Despite numerous governmental attempts to improve women's employment and equality in Pakistan, statistics suggest that these effortxs have not been entirely fruitful. Steps taken by the government are usually in response to pressure from international donors and rights groups. However, there seem to be important contextual and sociocultural differences at play when it comes to how gender equality is to be achieved in organizational practice. Such differences, as well as an apparent lack of genuine commitment at the policy level, may explain why there remains a gap between the policy and praxis of gender equality in Pakistan. Informed by structural and relational perspectives of gender, this article draws on in-depth qualitative interviews with female employees to explore the multilevel issues related to gender equality at the macro-national, meso-organizational and micro-individual levels. In particular, it highlights such issues as societal norms of female modesty and gender segregation (macro), sexual harassment, career-related challenges and income gap (meso), and family status and agency (micro).

Introduction: The Many Faces of Gender and Organization

Texts on gender and organizations often start by referring to common knowledge or statistics showing an inferior position of women in relation to men. Women in general have lower wages, even within the same occupation and at the same level, experience more unemployment, take more responsibility for unpaid labour, are strongly underrepresented at higher positions in organizations, and have less autonomy and control over work and lower expectations of promotion (e.g. Chafetz, 1989; Nelson and Burke, 2000; Ely et al., 2003). There is massive empirical evidence on these issues and those arguing that there exists a gendered order (or patriarchal society), which gives many more options and privileges to men, particularly in working life, but also in life in general, have little difficulty in substantiating their case.