Essay/Term paper: The glass cieling

Essay, term paper, research paper:  Position Papers

The "glass ceiling" has held women back from certain positions and opportunities in the workplace. Women are stereotyped as part-time, lower-grade workers with limited opportunities for training and advancement because of this "glass ceiling". How have women managed their careers when confronted by this glass ceiling? It has been difficult; American women have struggled for their role in society since 1848. Women"s roles have changed significantly throughout the past centuries because of their willingness and persistence. Women have contributed to the change pace of their role in the workplace by showing motivation and perseverance.

The Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 started a women"s rights movement; a small group of women demanded the right to vote, claim progress in property rights, experience employment and educational opportunities, have social freedoms, and other essential demands touching every aspect of life. Women wanted a change and needed a new place in society. They did not have the most basic democratic equality of all, the equal right to vote, until the 19th amendment was adopted in 1920. As they gained the right to vote, women began feeling the right to explore other opportunities.

In the 1920s, women struggled to develop a work identity that would give them professional status and preserve their femininity (Walkowitz, 1051). They wanted to be eligible for an executive position, but at the same time they also wanted to be Women finally began working outside the home, but not yet at the level, status, and rank they deserved. They deserved

Women have long participated in American business, and their roles have greatly changed. The jobs that women held at first were considered simple and feminine. Many were secretaries, office helpers, or assistants to male executives. Some women were known as the earlier entrepreneurs, the traditionals (Emmott, 521). Traditionals were usually sole proprietors who extended domestic services and related skills into the marketplace. These women entrepreneurs opened the way to new horizons for other women in the workplace for future years.

In the 1950s, women comprised less than one third of the labor force (Berger, 4) (See Appendix B). Women had their place in the workforce, yet it was not very influencial. Women had to fight to hold their positions while confronting many hardships. They had to contend with management"s efforts to rationalize work with their family"s expectations of being a mother.

Women also had to live up to their family heritage and what their family"s thoughts were of a woman in the workforce. Some women felt that family issues had delayed the dawn of their careers. Barbara White, in Women"s Career Development, describes these women as late starters. Late starters are women who have been held back because of other commitments, beliefs or opinions. Some of today"s "profssionals" made late commitments to their careers. Thirty-one percent decided that they would work at an early age because of family morals and traditions (White, 104).

Women entered their chosen occupation at the bottom of the business ladder. A very small number of them became entrepreneurs; it took determination, even though they were already part of the workforce. The ones who did strive to become entrepreneurs were known as "go-getters" (White, 104). "Go-getters" were hard-working women who wanted a significant role in American society. Some of these women had a problem with being segregated from men in the workplace. Certain fields were then classified as a male, female, or a neutral occupation. The majority of successful women entered what could be described as neutral or predominantly female careers (White, 51). Most of the successful women had professional and vocational qualifications, having studied business administration. (See Appendix A). Women were then expected to enter one of these fields, if they were to pursue any career at all. As some women became lucky and were able to acquire a college or university education, so too did biases against women by the male-dominated professions. Well-educated women struggled to build careers by establishing a series of popular professions, including teaching, social work, librarianship, and nursing.

In American Dreams, a series of oral histories compiled by Studs Terkel, several women describe their experiences in the workforce. One of these women, Joan Crawford, is an old-fashioned example of how women made it in society. She was a very poor girl that slept on a pallet on the floor when she was young, but today is a member of the board of directors of Pepsi-Cola. She describes the image that she had for herself in society as, "I was always struggling too hard. I"ve been working since I was nine years of age" (Terkel, 59). Crawford had to undergo much competition, working eighteen to twenty hours a day, never having any time for herself and her family. "I think the world is more of a jungle today than it was in the golden days."

Joan Crawford was a successful woman always living up to the expectations of others. "It"s such a wonderment to try and become that for them." With Joan"s poor family background, she still made it to a high rank in American society. Women like Joan Crawford who have young goals, can grow up to achieve what they have always wanted. Joan Crawford is a woman who has contributed to the change in women"s roles in the workplace.

Women are now entering the millennium with huge hopes and aspirations. Are more women entering executive positions? Yes. Are many women shattering the glass ceiling? Yes. There is progress, but it is not happening nearly fast enough (See Appendix B). In order to hold a respectable role, women were compelled to seek a new work identity. Some women are crossing organizational and occupational boundaries and designing careers that better match their own values and needs. When a company promoted a woman, it was often into executive positions in the human resources, corporate affairs, and legal departments, depriving women of experience in profit-and-loss line positions (Reed, 2) "It is imperative that corporate America move more aggressively to promote women into the executive ranks--not just to enhance diversity, but to make effective use of a vitally essential resource, women in the workplace" (Reed, 3).

The percentage of women participating in the labor force has grown rapidly. In 1977, nearly half of all women age sixteen and over were working or looking for a potential job (Smith, v). Past projections of labor force growth by many statistics bureaus have repeatedly underestimated women"s participation. Hewlett-Packard was what many people would describe a "white male haven," populated by graduates of engineering schools in dark suits with starched white shirts. Today, more than a quarter of Hewlett-Packard"s managers are women. Hewlett-Packard"s new chief executive is Carly Fiornia, who had a tough competition to deal with. Her rival for the top job was also a woman. It seems clear that the glass ceiling that stops the rise of female executives at so many other companies is being shattered (Reed, 1).

According to Terkel"s book, American Dreams, more…..

Female participation has grown to a great extent in the workforce. According to Emmott"s classification system, there are women whom he calls moderns - the second generation of women entrepreneurs (521). These women came together and started their own businesses or got into business ownership. Not only do these women want to supplement their career as family income, but they also seek to drastically pave future roads into traditionally male-dominated industries. Today there are women at work in more industries and professions than ever before. Many women are now becoming anything they want to be; like bartenders, bank tellers, miners, accountants, and even chief executive officers. Women are now involved in construction. The road signs no longer say "Men at Work"; today they read "People at Work" (Berger, 5). They are also getting involved and well known for their achievements in politics. Nearly fourteen percent of the nation"s lawyers are female now (Berger, 7). In 1981, Sandra Day O"Connor was granted the opportunity to be the first woman appointed to the Supreme Court. Congresswoman, Geraldine Ferraro, was nominated as the first to be the vice-president of the United States in 1984.

The increasing participation of women in the labor force has brought on the growth of more women-owned businesses. They provide a background of important changes that started the trend to join the workforce. There are four distinct factors for women to join the workforce. One is the implementation of new technological processes that has lead to the de-skilling of jobs. Because of new advancements, women are now able to perform the same tasks as other women who are more highly educated in a certain area. (Example here…)Secondly, women look for work-related as opposed to marriage-related self-identities. They want their lives to revolve around their careers, rather than their marriage. Also, demographic changes have enabled women to take up paid employment which consists of marring earlier, living longer, and having fewer children sooner (White, 2). Lastly, the fact that women"s incomes were needed to keep many families above the poverty line has also been pushing them to pursue a job in the workplace. As society changes, more and more women are becoming the only or major source of income for a growing number of families in the United States (Berger, 5).

Women expect to be a significant role model, along with a source of income for their family and children. Women went through many years of schooling for a solid education. Without the right to educational opportunities, they would not have had the opportunity. In 1979, women earned most of their college degrees in the fields of home economics and library science (Berger, 74). Women are now more likely to have a comprehensive education, which perhaps could be the pattern for this century (White, 285).

The motivation and persistence of the successful woman of today must be strong. Even though women will continue to struggle in future years to come, they have gotten to a point in the ladder of life that they should be proud of. Reed Abelson, in the New York Times, found that some companies drove women away because of companies" policies. The policies were not flexible enough to accommodate womens" lives outside of the workplace (Abelson, 1).

Between the 1960s and 1990s, the "business woman" grew into the much-criticized and overworked "business woman", whose daily routine was scrutinized by newspapers and weekly magazines (Blaszczyk, 290). The experience of Hollywood film executive, Dawn Steel, the first woman to head a major studio, revealed the stress and contradictions of the businesswoman"s career. She was responsible for such blockbuster movies as Top Gun, Flashdance, and Fatal Attraction. During her successful years, she was given some horrible names by the press, like "Hell on Heels" and "The Queen of Mean", yet she was a great success and brought much to our twentieth century entertainment world.

Women decide in their lives what challenges to take, how much effort to expend and how they will face difficulties down the road. A group of women were once asked how they had achieved their success. Many successful women said they had tenacity and perseverance which had enabled them to work hard and consistent throughout their careers. "I achieved my success through determination; by putting myself up front, and by persevering" (White, 85).

Barbara White, author of Women"s Career Development, gives an opportunity for successful women to give advice to other women wanting to pursue a career in the workforce. First, they explained that women need to be single-minded today. They must make their own choices and know what they want. If a woman hopes to achieve her goal of an "American Dream" and live up to it, then she should be persistent and keep working at achieving her objectives. The best advice given in White"s book is that a woman should not underestimate herself (227-229). A woman today can be whatever she pleases. It takes work, dedication and persistence to achieve goals in general, not just in the career aspect of life. As seen through Joan Crawford and Dawn Steel"s stories, a "business woman" has a bright future now and for years to come. Women"s roles have drastically changed throughout the past century along with the actual number of women now working. It is phenomenal to see such an increase in women"s participation, and hopefully this course will continue even higher into the twenty-first century.