Women can shatter job barriers.

• Author: Scandura, Terri

There are high-potential career opportunities in medium and small organizations with less built-in prejudice against females.

Men make up half of the U.S. workforce today, yet only three percent in the largest service and industrial companies have managed to break through what has been labeled "the glass ceiling" in corporate America. In their 1987 book, Breaking the Glass Ceiling, Ann Morrison and colleagues at the Center for Creative Leadership defined it as "a transparent barrier" that keeps women from rising above a certain level in corporations and note that it applies to women as a group who are kept from advancing higher because they are women." The glass ceiling may exist at different levels in different corporations, but most place it just below general management positions.

The importance of this artificial barrier has been underscored by the U.S. Department of Labor in A Report on the Glass Ceiling Initiative, which describes the results of an investigation of nine large U.S. corporations ranked in Fortune magazine's listing of the 500 top American companies. Lynn Martin, former Secretary of Labor, concludes in the report that the glass ceiling is comprised of those artificial barriers based on attitudinal or organizational bias that prevent qualified individuals from advancing upward in their organization into management-level positions." The Department of Labor's investigation found that the glass ceiling not only exists in the corporations studied, but at lower levels as well.

The path to the top for women in corporate America has been described as an obstacle course in which they face barriers not found in traditional male careers. Most views of job mobility are based upon studies of men's careers and do not consider issues which may be important in those of women. In considering some of the more subtle perceptual, behavioral, and structural attributes that may limit the career advancement of women, a number of explanations have been offered. Breaking the Glass Ceiling suggests that certain pressures exist for females in today's corporate workplace, such as demands of the job itself, plus additional pressures due to the fact that many women in corporate management positions are "pioneers" in the role. The strain of balancing career and family obligations also is cited.

Although some of these aspects are present in men's experiences, women may face a higher degree of scrutiny with respect to these performance pressures, due to being newcomers to management positions. Another explanation offered for the persistence of the glass ceiling is the widespread stereotype that females are not suited for managerial work. For instance, many men and women today still feel that women are "too emotional" to be effective managers. In some organizations, their exclusion from important mentorship and networking...