LEADERSHIP AND GLASS CEILING

The Leadership Role Of Women In The Business And Corporate World And The Effect Of The Glass Ceiling

Abstract

This paper explores the way people 'do Leadership' in the workplace. Using examples from our extensive database of interactions, recorded in a number of workplaces, the analysis identi?es a variety of discourse strategies used by those in positions of responsibility in Leadership colleagues. The mentors in our corpus draw from a wide repertoire of strategies, ranging from those which focus on procedural aspects of career advising, through corrective and appreciative comments, to supportive advising, and indirect coaching. Although Leadership has traditionally been associated with men, the examples demonstrate that women leaders do Leadership too, and the analysis suggests that some do it very well. The main purpose of the research is to analyse the exploratory look at how Leadership is accomplished indicates that 'feminine' strategies are well represented among those available, and appear to be very effective. It is suggested that successful women leaders contest or 'trouble' established gender boundaries and thereby expand the very concept of what it means to be a leader. Through their discursive practices, they give the legitimacy of power to a range of discursive strategies, including some conventionally regarded as feminine. Thus, it is argued, the process of constructing one's identity as an effective leader becomes increasingly compatible for women with that of constructing a socially coherent gender identity.

Table of Content

Abstractii

Introduction1

Think Leader, Think Male1

Definition of Leadership2

Purpose of Leadership4

Assessment Of Mentors And Role Models6

Women & Corporate World And The Effect Of The Glass Ceiling8

An Alternative Perspective9

Leader Development10

Perspectives Towards Leadership11

Good mentors as formative leaders13

References16

Introduction

Leadership is a complex concept which has been studied from a myriad of perspectives across diverse disciplines, but sociolinguistics and pragmatics have not been among them to date. Most existing research on leadership has been undertaken in the areas of business communication and organisational science (e.g., Helgesen, 1990; Alvesson and Due Billing, 1997; Sinclair, 1998; Hackman and Johnson, 2000; Northhouse, 2001; Parry, 2001; Harris, 2002). Within this literature, leadership has generally been de?ned as 'the ability to in?uence others' (Dwyer, 1993: 552; Hede, 2001) and this in?uence is typically de?ned as relating to the achievement of 'a common goal' (Northhouse, 2001: 3). Such studies therefore tend to evaluate 'good' and 'effective' leadership performance ''in terms of organisational outcomes'' (Hede, 2001: 7). Moreover, they focus predominantly on behavioural strategies which qualify people as good leaders, but they tend to neglect or overlook the discursive strategies used to perform leadership.

Think Leader, Think Male

A second feature of research in the area of leadership is the predominance of a remarkably masculine conception of what makes an effective leader. The standard measures used in much research on leadership seem embedded in an authoritarian and masculine' perspective on the way it is accomplished. 'Think leader, think male' is how feminist analysts have summarised this tendency (e.g., Hearn and Parkin, 1989; Kendall and Tannen, 1997; Sinclair, 1998; Holmes, 2000a; Gunnarson, 2001). Leaders who illustrate this conceptualisation are characterised as authoritative, ...