The Glass Ceiling

I am currently taking the course “Women in Leadership: Inspiring Positive Change” taught by Professor Diane Bilimoria and we lightly touched on the subject of the “glass ceiling.” This topic fascinated me and I did some research and thought about how this affects women and minorities.

First of all, across leadership establishments, achievement and performance are emphasized and achievement is gained through hard work. However, between upper middle management and the executive level, corporate culture nearly always shifts to a culture based on power. Unfortunately, women are blocked by this so called “glass ceiling” that restricts them from advancing and stifling their further personal growth in their workplaces. This pervasive resistance to the efforts of not only women but also minorities to reach the top ranks of management in corporations is detrimental to the broadening of the variation and diversity of corporate leaders.

In the course, we discussed how the main way of improving the number of women and minorities in top ranking roles in major establishments is through “task networks, career developmental networks, and social support networks,” in order to help each other rise to become strong, effective leaders within society.