Factors affecting Women's Success in Management (Research Paper Sample)

Name
Institution
Professor
Date
Factors affecting Women’s Success in Management
Women continue to enter professional and managerial positions at a rate comparable to that of men. In the United States for instance, the number of women entering professional management ranks has doubled in the last three decades. Notably though, women are still underrepresented in senior levels. They constitute approximately five percent of all Fortune-500 CEOs (Mattis 376). The case is the same in Europe where women constitute about three percent of publicly quoted CEOs. This underrepresentation necessitates for an evaluation and analysis of factors that influence Women Managers’ success, which is the focus of this paper. Success in management refers to the ability to advance and ascend the corporate ladder.
The society has broad societal factors that promote stereotypes and assumptions that challenge women leadership abilities. For instance, the media promotes gender stereotypes through the use images that depict men as the management and leadership experts. A woman raised in such a society may easily doubt their leadership abilities (Babcock 127). Further, the media perpetuates stereotypes by depicting female executives as being anomalies. Images show women as home caretakers and younger than men, which reinforces the misconception that women are incompetent for management positions (Babcock 128). Clearly, social norms often promoted by the media have significant effect on the success of women in managerial positions.
Other than the societal level factors, there are also systemic organizational level barriers to the advancement and development of women. Women in leadership position are held to high performance standards relative to men. They are tasked with roles and responsibilities with a significant risk of failure (Mattis 379). Further, women in leadership positions may not get opportunities for development through “stretch” assignments. This limits the women’s opportunity to progress and success in management (Powel 64). In addition, the work versus family conflict has significant influence on women’s success. Some women may feel unable to balance family life with work at managerial positions. Nonetheless, evaluators may deny promotion because of the perception that a female candidate may not adequately balance the work-family life.
There are also individual level factors that affect women’s success in leadership and managerial positions. Researchers have observed that some women lack the confidence needed in managerial positions, which affects their success once in those positions (Powel 82). An individual’s sense of reduced self-efficacy highly depends on the social context with few role models. The impact is more in high gender professional stereotypes such as the male dominated roles like leadership (Babcock 132). For instance, women may not promote themselves. When successful, they credit the team but blame themselves when they fail. Another personal level fact is communication style. Many women feel that they are less likeable, socially unattractive, and less hirable if they assert themselves and negotiate for their int...