In Case Study 15.1 “The Glass Ceiling”, Lisa Weber, a top level portfolio manager is held back from promotion despite her exemplary work.  The firm that she is working in is plagued by many cultural obstructions blocking her pathway to success.  Some of these cultural obstructions appear to be part of the firm’s historical culture. The CEO states that they have never in their long history had a female partner.  Some of the obstructions come straight from the CEO himself.  In his corporate world, he does not have a perspective to allow into partnership someone who has been a professor nor will he allow a woman to advance further.  These multiple prejudices keep him from fostering an inclusive culture in his organization.

The hostile atmosphere created by the firm’s history and directly from the CEO filters down throughout the senior partnership and to Lisa herself.   When the CEO is not present, she has regular meetings with her peers where she is valued by them. This behaviour has the potential to become collaborative rather than competitive in nature and perhaps bare even more fruit for the firm.  In the presence of the CEO and his ridicule of her, her peers will not stand up for her, and neither will she.  To be seen as one of the boys, Lisa herself is influenced by the negative culture of the firm.

Lisa has brought in more clients than any of her peers, she rose rapidly through the corporate structure of the firm, her clients praise her for outstanding performance , even all of her peers look to her for guidance and direction because of her competence, yet her CEO does not see her.  He appears to be blind to her success because she is a token woman (Nugent, Pollack and Travis, 2016). As soon as there are ripples with her and it is predictable that she will likely move on, the next token woman is brought in to be a senior portfolio manager and replace her (Northouse 2016).

I am intrigued by how the story ends.  Lisa moves on to start her own firm.   I wonder if her negative experience with gender discrimination would influence her own company positively or negatively.  I also wonder what mechanisms she will put in place or what culture she will establish that will allow for her employees to rise to their full potential within her new organization.

 

References

Northouse, P. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice (7th eds). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.

Nugent, J., Pollack, A. & D. Travis, (2016). The Day to day experiences of workplace inclusion and exclusion. Retrieved from http://www.catalyst.org/system/files/the_day_to_day_experiences_of_workplace_inclusion_and_exclusion.pdf