An Analysis of Glass Ceiling Effects in Corporate Organizations

This report delves into the pervasive issue of the glass ceiling within modern corporate organizations. The research, based on literature review, surveys, and interviews, examines the barriers faced by female employees in their career progression. It explores factors contributing to the glass ceiling, including gender-based biases, lack of experience, and limited opportunities. The report highlights the adverse effects on employee performance, satisfaction, and overall organizational effectiveness. Findings indicate that the glass ceiling disproportionately impacts senior female employees. The study analyzes the presence of glass ceiling at IBM and concludes with recommendations for organizations to mitigate the negative impacts, such as offering more flexibility and support to female employees. The research aims to identify factors causing the glass ceiling, its impact on the workforce and organizations, and ways to eliminate its adverse effects. The report offers valuable insights for businesses striving to create inclusive and equitable workplaces, and is a valuable resource for students studying leadership and management.

GLASS CEILING

Acknowledgment:
I would like to express my special thanks of gratitude to my teacher who gave me the golden
opportunity to do this wonderful project on the topic, Effects of Glass Ceiling in Corporate
Organizations, which also helped me in doing a lot of Research and i came to know about so
many new things I am really thankful.

Abstract:
The current research deals with analysis on the effects of glass ceiling in the modern corporate
organizations. The research is conducted through literature review, survey among the working
professionals in corporate organizations (with less than three years experience), and the
interview with female corporate professionals with more than five years experience. The findings
of the research indicate that the glass ceiling show more adverse effects on senior female
employees. Support from organizations to the female employees and introducing more flexibility
to the work can reduce effects of glass ceiling.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgment:............................................................................................................................2
Abstract:...........................................................................................................................................3
Chapter1...........................................................................................................................................9
1.Introduction:.................................................................................................................................9
1.1 Background of the research:......................................................................................................9
1.2 Research aim and objectives:...................................................................................................11
1.2.1 Aim of the research:..............................................................................................................11
1.2.2 Objectives of the research:....................................................................................................12
1.2.3 Research questions:..............................................................................................................12
1.3 Structure of the report:.............................................................................................................12
Chapter 1:...................................................................................................................................12
Chapter 2:...................................................................................................................................12
Chapter 3:...................................................................................................................................12
Chapter 4:...................................................................................................................................13
Chapter 5:...................................................................................................................................13
Chapter 2: Literature Review.........................................................................................................14
2.1 Introduction:............................................................................................................................14
2.2 Glass ceiling in the modern organizations:..............................................................................14
2.3 Recognition of glass ceiling in modern organizations:............................................................17
2.4 Barriers for the progress of women at workplace:...................................................................18
2.5 Impact of glass ceiling on employee performance and satisfaction:.......................................19
2.6 Changing role of women in the Economy and effects of glass ceiling on the Economy:.......22
2.7 Conclusion:..............................................................................................................................24
2.8 Recommendations for further study:.......................................................................................25

Chapter 3: Research Methodology................................................................................................26
3.1 Introduction:............................................................................................................................26
3.2 Research Onion:.......................................................................................................................26
3.3 Research Philosophy:...............................................................................................................27
3.4 Research Approach:.................................................................................................................28
3.5 Research Strategy:...................................................................................................................28
3.6 Data collection:........................................................................................................................29
3.7 Ethical consideration:..............................................................................................................30
Timeline:........................................................................................................................................30
3.8 Conclusion:..............................................................................................................................31
Chapter 4: Findings and Analysis..................................................................................................32
4.1 Introduction:............................................................................................................................32
4.2 Quantitative data analysis:.......................................................................................................32
4.3 Qualitative data analysis:.........................................................................................................39
4.4 Conclusion:..............................................................................................................................40
Chapter 5: Presence of Glass Ceiling at IBM................................................................................42
Chapter 6: Conclusion and Recommendations..............................................................................43
6.1 Introduction:............................................................................................................................43
6.2 Linking findings to objectives:................................................................................................43
6.3 Recommendations:..................................................................................................................44
Chapter 7: Critical Evaluation.......................................................................................................45
References:....................................................................................................................................46
Appendix 1:...................................................................................................................................51
Appendix 2:...................................................................................................................................54

Table of Figures:
Figure 1:Research Onion...............................................................................................................26
Figure 2: Experience-wise distribution of respondents.................................................................32
Figure 3: Opinion of respondents on senior roles..........................................................................33
Figure 4: Opinion of employees on gender based bias in organizations.......................................34
Figure 5: Opinion of employees on conflicts between personal and professional life..................35
Figure 6: Opinion of female employees on need of breaks in career............................................36
Figure 7: Opinion of female employees on challenges faced after career break...........................37
Figure 8: Opinion of female employees on need of additional support........................................38
List of Tables
Table 1: Timeline for the research.................................................................................................31
Table 2: Opinion of female employees on need of breaks in career.............................................35
Table 3: Opinion of female employees on challenges faced after career break............................36
Table 4: Opinion of female employees on need of additional support..........................................37
Table 5: Opinion of female employees on need of flexibility at work..........................................38

List of Tables
Table 1: Timeline for the research.................................................................................................28
Table 2: Opinion of female employees on need of breaks in career.............................................32
Table 3: Opinion of female employees on challenges faced after career break............................33
Table 4: Opinion of female employees on need of additional support..........................................33
Table 5: Opinion of female employees on need of flexibility at work..........................................34

Chapter1
1.Introduction:
In the modern corporate organizations, the men and women are entitled to obtain the similar
opportunities to grow and develop. The modern corporate cultures of the organizations nowadays
are providing women with the opportunities to apply their skills and grow in the career. Despite
the opportunities present in the corporate world, the female employees of the organizations often
experience the issues related to glass ceiling (Cook & Glass, 2014). The glass ceiling refers to
the invisible barriers that the women face while progressing through their career. In other words,
the female employees of an organization can face a number of problems while working in the
company and sometimes, the problems can be difficult to detect. As the problems cannot be
detected easily, it is difficult for the businesses to solve such issues and providing the female
employees with the equal opportunity to grow. Presence of the glass ceiling often restricts the
female employees to reach the top leadership positions. The glass ceiling problems not only
causes issues in the career progression of the female employees of the organization, but it may
restrict the organizations also from utilizing its entire workforce fully (Newman, 2016).
Therefore, presence of the glass ceiling problems is disadvantageous for both the organizations
as well as the employees. So, analyzing the nature of the glass ceiling issues and assessing their
impacts on the modern workplaces is necessary. The current research deals with analysis on the
presence of glass ceiling issues in the modern workplaces and assessing their impacts on the
organizations.
1.1 Background of the research:
In the recent years, the women are participating equally at the workplace with men. The
organizations of the contemporary business environment are focusing to provide the female
employees with the equal opportunities to take part and grow within the business (Ezzedeen et al.
2015). As a result, the participation of women in the businesses has increased significantly than
it was before. However, the participation of women in the organization is not same at all levels.
A significant number of women are now participating in the entry level but the rate of

participation starts to reduce at the higher level. In many organizations, participation of women
in the board level and the Board level is less than 10% (Ezzedeen et al. 2015). However, apart
from the lower rate of participation in the top level of the organizations, the participation of the
female employees is also limited to certain positions. In most of the cases, participation of the
women are limited to the positions like the administration, Peoples Resources and the
Communications. The trend indicates that the organizations, even if they are promoting the
women to the top level, then also the skills and abilities of women are being used in some limited
roles only.
The women employees in the organizations face a number of barriers. The first barrier that the
female employees need to face is the differences in payment. The modern businesses give
emphasis on providing the male and female employees with equal pay. However, the scenario
changes often as the employees move upwards the organizational ladder. In the higher positions,
the female employees experience greater disparity in terms of the salary with their male
colleagues.
Lack of experience of the female workers is another factor that restricts them to progress in the
career. The female employees often need to take break from the work because of their
responsibilities in the family, especially the child birth related issues and the child rearing
activities (Berthier et al.2017). Taking frequent breaks often restricts the women from having
adequate experience than their male colleagues. Frequent breaks not only cause the lack of
experience among the female employees but it also causes the skill gaps as well. Possessing the
exact skills that the female employees used to have before the break often becomes difficult to
regain. The lack of adequate skills also restricts the women from obtaining the same level of
employment opportunities than their male counterparts.
The women are often recruited as the part-time employees. Therefore, the women get the lower
hourly rates. Due to being employed on the part-time basis, the female employees get less chance
to make progress in their career (Davis & Maldonado, 2015). The role of women in the
community is often underpaid. The lack of valuing the role of women in the organization also
restricts them from obtaining the higher position.

Discussion on the nature of glass ceiling indicates that the invisible barriers in the workplace
affect progress of career of the women. In addition, presence of the glass ceilings also affects the
level of workforce utilization in the organization. Although the participation of women in the
workplace has increased, their skills and abilities are not being utilized fully due to the presence
of glass ceilings.
In an organization, the employee performance and the employee satisfaction always play a key
role. When the employees of an organization are satisfied, then they perform better. Well
performance of the employees is effective to improve performance of the organization as well.
However , employee satisfaction is affected to the significant level due to various factors which
impact on the performance of the employees also (Ng & Sears, 2017). As an impact, the
performance of the entire organization also gets affected due to lack of the employee satisfaction
level. Glass ceiling is one of the factors that affect the level of employee satisfaction and
performance of the employees in the organization. When the glass ceiling is present in the
organization, the employee performance degrades in terms of the employee contribution for
taking organizational decision, the turnover rate of the employees and the rate of employee
absenteeism. The degradation in the performance of the workforce can affect the productivity
and competitiveness of the organization. So, assessing the effects of glass ceiling and analyzing
its nature is necessary for the modern organizations to obtain the optimum benefits from the
workforce. The current research focuses on analyzing how the glass ceiling is affecting the
organizations. So, the current research is effective for the modern businesses to create an
organizational culture where every employee would get the scope to utilize their skills and
abilities fully and optimize the contribution to the organization.
1.2 Research aim and objectives:
1.2.1 Aim of the research:
The current research aims at analyzing the nature of glass ceiling in the modern organizations
and identifying how the presence of glass ceiling is impacting the workforce as well as the
business.

The current research focuses on exploring the concepts related to glass ceiling in the modern
organization. The study also reveals how the glass ceiling barriers are impacting the workforce
of the organization in terms of the employee performance and the satisfaction. Effects of the
glass ceiling on performance of the organization are also identified in the study.
1.2.2 Objectives of the research:
Objectives of the research are as follow:
 To explore the factors causing glass ceiling in an organization
 To identify the impacts of glass ceiling on the workforce and organization
 To identify the broader impacts of glass ceiling
 To recommend organizations the ways for getting rid of the adverse effects of glass
ceiling
1.2.3 Research questions:
The current research attempts to answer the following questions:
 What are the factors that result in development of glass ceiling in modern organization
and how does the glass ceiling impact on the business?
 Is there any broader impact of glass ceiling and what are they?
 How do the organizations get rid of the adverse effects of glass ceiling?
1.3 Structure of the report:
The dissertation is divided into five chapters.
Chapter 1:
The first chapter of the research deals with discussion on the background of the study, aim and
objectives of the research and the key questions that are answered through the research.
Chapter 2:
The second chapter includes discussion on the theories related to the research topic.

Chapter 3:
The third chapter is based on the methodology which is followed in the study.
Chapter 4:
The fourth chapter focuses on collection and analysis of the data related to the research. Findings
of the research are also presented in the study.
Chapter 5:
The fifth chapter includes the conclusion drawn on basis of the findings and recommendations
for the organizations.