Blackwell Reference Online

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Women's career issues are defined as those issues that affect the progress of women in organizations, such as barriers to entry, sex segregation of occupational career pathing , the career stages experienced by women, how women cope with work–family conflict , and the factors affecting women's ability to break through the upper executive level. This discussion will focus on the organizational issues that affect the promotion of women as a group. Women often are hired into staff rather than line positions and subsequently find it hard to move into a line or field capacity. When women are stuck in career paths that preclude line experiences, their prospects for career advancement are limited. Researchers Karen Lyness and Donna Thompson, in a comparative study of 69 men and women executives, found that women reported greater barriers to advancement, such as lack of culture fit and exclusion from informal networks, as well as the need to develop relationships to facilitate advancement (Lyness and Thompson, 2000). According to a Catalyst, Inc. survey, female executives cite obstacles to advancement such as: lack of general management or line experience (79% agreement), stereotypes about women's roles and abilities (72% agreement), and failure of top leaders to assume accountability for women's advancement (68% agreement). Additionally, 67 percent agreed that “commitment to personal ... log in or subscribe to read full text