1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910392727103321

Autore

Bushell Meryl

Titolo

The Network Trap [[electronic resource] ] : Why Women Struggle to Make it into the Boardroom / / by Meryl Bushell, Kim Hoque, Deborah Dean

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Singapore : , : Springer Singapore : , : Imprint : Springer, , 2020

ISBN

981-15-0878-X

Edizione

[1st ed. 2020.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (145 pages)

Collana

Work, Organization, and Employment, , 2520-8837

Disciplina

650.13

Soggetti

Diversity in the workplace

Women

Success in business

Careers

Diversity Management/Women in Business

Women's Studies

Careers in Business and Management

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di contenuto

Chapter 1: The ‘problem’ of women on corporate boards -- Chapter 2: Explaining the lack of women in the boardroom: social capital and networking -- Chapter 3: The role of social capital and networking in board selection processes -- Chapter 4: Human capital theory, preference theory, attribution theory and self-efficacy -- Chapter 5: Gender differences in social capital and networking -- Chapter 6: Are women less willing and able to leverage their social capital? -- Chapter 7: Discussion and conclusion.

Sommario/riassunto

As we begin the third decade of the twenty-first century, women have entered the workplace in unprecedented numbers, are now outperforming men in terms of educational qualifications, and are excelling across a range of professional fields. Yet men continue to occupy the positions of real power in large corporations. This book draws on unique, unprecedented access to Chairs of FTSE 350 Chairs, boardroom aspirants and executive head-hunters, to explain why this is the case. The analysis it presents establishes that the relative



absence of women in boardroom roles is not explained by their lack of relevant skills, experience or ambition, but instead by their exclusion from the powerful male-dominated networks of key organisational decision-makers. It is from within these networks that candidates are sourced, endorsed, sponsored, and championed. Yet women’s efforts to penetrate these networks are instead likely to trap them into network relationships that will be of little value in helping them to fulfil their career aspirations. The analysis also identifies why women struggle to gain access to these networks, and in doing so, it demonstrates that the network trap in which women find themselves will not be overcome simply by encouraging them to change their networking behaviours. Instead, there is a need for a fundamental reconsideration of how boardroom recruitment and selection is conducted and regulated, to ensure the development of a more open, transparent and equitable process. .