Full Text Available

Note: Clicking the button above will open the full text document at the original institutional repository in a new window.

An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace

Mini-disseration (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2015.

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Other Authors: Hawarden, Verity
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: University of Pretoria 2016
Subjects:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1867613522018435072
access_status_str Open Access
author2 Hawarden, Verity
author_browse Hawarden, Verity
author_facet Hawarden, Verity
collection Thesis
dc_rights_str_mv © 2016 University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria.
description Mini-disseration (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2015.
format Thesis
id oai:repository.up.ac.za:2263/52341
institution University of Pretoria (South Africa)
language English
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:37:28.861Z
license_str Other — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UPSpace — University of Pretoria Institutional Repository
publishDate 2016
publishDateRange 2016
publishDateSort 2016
publisher University of Pretoria
publisherStr University of Pretoria
record_format dspace
source_str UPSpace — University of Pretoria Institutional Repository
spelling oai:repository.up.ac.za:2263/52341 An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace Hawarden, Verity ichelp@gibs.co.za Van Heerden, Amelia UCTD Mini-disseration (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2015. Women in South Africa and across the world remain under-represented in the workforce. Female representation at board and senior executive level is necessary to bring awareness to the boardroom of the importance of female transformation in the workplace, as well as to prepare organisations to attract future talent and increase their competitiveness. The main aim of the research was to identify and test the factors that shape an enabling environment in favour of the advancement of women. The research studied the individual behavioural factors, organisational structures and metrics, legislation and international pressure or trends. Purposeful and snowball sampling methods were used to identify twelve senior executive men and women who manage diverse groups of employees and each has more than five years senior executive-level experience. All the respondents serve on the main or executive boards of their respective organisations. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted with the participants. The feedback was analysed using a combination of narrative, content and comparative analysis. The research found that women mostly remain under-represented in the workplace. The main themes that emerged from the research as limiting factors ? in order of frequency cited ? were gender bias, corporate culture, skills shortages, the queen bee syndrome, the requirement for mindset change, mentorship, equality imbalance, female advancement policies and the requirement for female board and executive level representation. According to the respondents, female board and executive-level representation is critical to bring awareness to boardrooms in order for companies to implement structures in support of female advancement in the workplace. In addition to the aforementioned ten factors, it is clear that the majority of companies do not have adequate structures in place to drive and support the advancement of women, and that legislation, although it acts as a driver, fails to address the invisible barriers, such as gender bias, corporate culture and stereotypes, that hinder female representation. Finally, the social context, education and economic environments of South Africa were found to be underlying contributors to the failure of the advancement women. Chapter 7 contains a model that was devised to complement the Hay Group (2014) factors and guide organisations on female talent management and advancement in the workplace in the South African context. nk2016 Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) MBA Unrestricted 2016-05-04T13:45:45Z 2016-05-04T13:45:45Z 2016-03-30 2015 Mini Dissertation van Heerden, A 2015, An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace, MBA Mini-disseration, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd <http://hdl.handle.net/2263/52341> GIBS http://hdl.handle.net/2263/52341 en © 2016 University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. application/pdf University of Pretoria
spellingShingle UCTD
An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title_full An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title_fullStr An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title_full_unstemmed An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title_short An investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
title_sort investigation into the organisational and behavioural factors that influence the advancement of women to senior positions in the workplace
topic UCTD
url http://hdl.handle.net/2263/52341