ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The aim of this report is to highlights in glass ceiling covered the issue related the many problems facing by the women in management level and workers level. For preparing informative report like this we required some combined inputs from many people. Some people helped us to high light important issues and some devoted their precious time to review this report. We are extending our deepest appreciation to these contributors.

I thankful to Mrs. Kajal Sharma (Faculty, NICM) for providing guidance for conducting activities useful in the preparation of this report.

I thankful to Ms. Meghna Kothari (Faculty, NICM) for encouraging me to conduct this project and helping me to understand management perspective related to Glass Ceiling.

I thankful especially those MBA’s students they share them experience during the summer internship.

At the end, I thankful to all the people, organisations and associations working for environment and helping us directly or indirectly to make our lives better.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………..

WHY THE GLASS CEILING PERSISTS……………………………

WOMEN AT WORKPLACE………………………………………….

WOMEN IN HIERARCHY……………………………………………

WHERE THE MALE CONTINUES TO RULE………………………

SEXUAL HARASSMENT AND GLASS CEILING………………….

FROM CEILIGS TO CLIFFS………………………………………..

FROM GLASS CEILING TO PAY GAP…………………………….

WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP………………………………………….

WHY THERE ARE SO FEW WOMEN MANAGERS IN INDIA…..

ILO AND GLASS CEILING…………………………………………

FACTS ON WOMEN AT WORK……………………………………

WOMEN IN INDIA………………………………………………….

GENDER EQUALITY AND EQUITY………………………………

RECOMMENDATIONS…………………………………………….

CONCLUSION………………………………………………………

NOTES………………………………………………………………

APPENDIX…………………………………………………………….

INTRODUTION

History

The concept "Glass Ceiling" originally was first used in 1986, when 2 Wall Street Journal reporters coined the phrase to describe the invisible and artificial barriers that impeded women from advancing to senior leadership positions in organizations. Since then, the metaphor of the glass ceiling has also come to be applied to the advancement of minorities, deaf, blind, disabled, and sexual minorities. It is unmistakable that ceilings and walls exist throughout most workplaces for minorities and women. These barriers limit the development and mobility opportunities of men and women of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds.

What are types of Glass Ceiling barriers?

Lack of management commitment to establish systems, policies, and practices for achieving workplace diversity and upward mobility;

Pay inequities for work of equal or comparable value; Sex, race, and ethnic-based stereotyping and harassment; Lack of family-friendly workplace policies; Parent-track policies; Limited opportunities for advancement to decision-making positions;

The glass ceiling is a barrier not only to individuals but to society as a whole. This barrier reduces the potential pool of corporate leaders by ignoring, or worse, discriminating against over one-half of the population.

Definition

The “glass ceiling” refers to the barriers that often confront ethnic minorities and women in trying to reach the upper echelons of the corporate hierarchy. The fact remains that while the world has come a long way in achieving equal opportunities in employment, and things have definitely improved what they were a decade ago, discrimination on the basis of gender and race endures.

The case deals with the concept of 'glass ceiling,' which prevents women from reaching top management positions in the corporate world. It explains the concept in detail and examines the various reasons that prevent women from reaching the top management.

Why the Glass Ceiling Persists

Theories as to why the glass ceiling continues in corporate world are varied. Most research on the topic points to stereotypes, lack of efforts to recruit women, and lack of women in important pipeline positions.

Major barrier

stereotypes lacking the characteristics most needed to succeed and, consequently,

were often judged to be lessqualified than men. characteristics of successful middle mangers were more similar to

descriptions of men than women. Lack of recruitment and opportunities for advancement Lack of good faith efforts. channeled, tracked and trapped in staff jobs that do not lead to the

executive suite. women are in public relations, human resources, and investor relations

rather than in line positions that more typically lead to top executive jobs.

Sexual harassment.

WOMEN AT WORKPLACE

India has come a long way from Sati to the workplace. In 2005, the ratio of women to men in Indian IT companies is 24:76 expected to be 35:65 by 2007. BPO-ITES industry has 69:31 as the ratio [1]. There is definitely a drastic rise in the number of working women in the Indian economy with qualification and performance taking precedence over gender, but the abovementioned cultural issues are still at play. It is more difficult for women to balance work and home. It is common to see many working ladies in Mumbai doing some daily household chores in the local train in which they travel back home. Moving from the broader cultural and social issues to the situation at the workplace, there seems to be a difference in the perception of similar activities of women vis-à-vis men. Some of the common ones would be as follows:

Women are seen as emotional entities compared to men who come about as more rational, though women are seen to be more creative, flexible and better team players.

An impending marriage in a man’s life is a good reason for a raise but it may be perceived as a major drift in focus for the woman.

It is understood that after marriage, the woman may take a career break or may shift the job or her focus from work to family.

Minor symbols like a family photo on the desk of a man can mean his being a well rounded gentleman but on a woman’s desk may mean that her life’s focal point is her home and not career.

Business trips, long working hours and night-shifts in a married woman’s life do not come easy.

During informal interactions, a lot of perceptual gaps exist. For example, a group of women talking would be understood as gossiping. A casual dinner with someone of the opposite sex from theworkplace may be interpreted as a date or an affair.

PERCEPTIONS OF WOMEN AS MANAGERS

Many women and men “want it all”: a successful career and a happy family life. However, finding a balance between paid work and family life is difficult, especially for women. Women still perform a large share of household tasks in addition to childrearing. Therefore, they often have to choose between paid work and family, or they have to prioritize one over another at some stage during their lives. Men their female partners seem to be able to “have it all” more easily, but traditionally their participation in household tasks is far less than that of their female partners.

WOMEN IN HIERARCHY

A HIGHER percentage of women hold managerial and executive jobs these days than they used to in the past. True, we have come a long way, but it is still not far enough.

According to a study of more than 400 executives (74% of them women), conducted by international organisational development expert Adrian Savage, a majority of those surveyed believed that different standards were used to judge the performance of women and minorities. They also felt that the glass ceiling seriously hampered their career advancement potential as compared to their male counterparts with similar qualifications and experience.

Even in a seemingly technologically advanced, liberated and forward thinking country like the US, only 5 percent of all senior manager positions are filled by women. What's more, the remuneration of female managers is a mere 68 percent of what their male counterparts earn on an average.

Lack of pay parity along with the omnipresent glass ceiling continues to impede the career advancement and success of women in business.

But, women have their own special strengths and abilities that can, with a little planning and strategising, help them come out on top even in fields that are typically seen as male bastions. Here are a few strategies women should consider to garner maximum leverage from their career paths:

Education and training

Education is, by far, women's most powerful secret weapon. The best hope to crash through that glass ceiling is to get the finest possible foundation for a successful career in the form of education and training. Consider informal ways of educating yourself through, for example, joining professional organisations, attending conferences and keeping up with trade publications in your field.

When seeking a job too, look for companies that offer training programmes and professional development opportunities. At the time of interview, make it a point to ask what kind of training is available. Your goal should be to develop a set of transferable skills that can be applied to various career fields.

Don't shy away from competition

Ambition isn't a dirty word. It is perfectly okay to be ambitious, to want to be known beyond the confines of family and friends. Many a time, it is the social framework rather than the company that hinders career progress of women. Women are more reluctant than men to put themselves forward as competitors. Further, they are more likely to sacrifice their careers or leave the corporate world entirely for the sake of family. Politics and power struggles are part of the corporate world; you have to steel yourself to play the game if you want to climb up the slippery path to success.

Volunteer to take up challenging assignments and projects. Volunteering is a way to promote your career and demonstrate your value while expanding your knowledge in critical areas of your company.

Plan your career

Career planning is important for everyone, more so for women because they generally have to overcome more number of hurdles and speed breakers along the road to career success compared to men. Having a clear road map and unambiguous long-term goals makes it easier for you to focus on your career path in the long run. Decide where you want to be five, 10 and 15 years from now. Build flexibility into your career plans to allow for changing circumstances. Your plan may need modification to accommodate major challenges that life may throw at you. But, your core plan should equip you for such contingencies.

Network

While women tend to network well socially, in the business sense, they seem to lag a tad behind men. In fact, a survey that studied the networking propensities of both men and women found out that women were more likely to network with people both at lower levels than themselves, as well as those at the higher echelons. Men tended to focus on people with power and influence. Women traditionally tend to be pre-occupied with home and family once they are outside office, while men have the old-boys' network that helps them clinch business deals.

Women have to become as comfortable as men discussing business outside the office and nurture a network that can help them get ahead in their careers.

Find a mentor

If you are not keen on networking, at least find yourself a mentor! Mentors can both protect women from discrimination and also be great sources of information and career guidance on how to navigate their way past obstacles to career success.

Practice Self-promotion

Women are generally team players and often fight shy of self-promotion. Modesty has traditionally been seen as a virtue and it is not easy to unlearn what was drilled into them at an early age and change their roles at work. As a result, women are relatively less aggressive at workplace about promoting themselves.

They often prefer to wait for recognition and opportunities to arrive of their own accord, rather than doing something about it. However, recognition does not come easily unless you turn the spotlight on your true worth. You need to toot your own horn because nobody else may do it for you. Make sure people within and outside your workplace know about your accomplishments. Remember, if no one knows how great you are, you simply won't get ahead.

No matter what their career aspirations, women are capable of busting every last male sanctuary and achieving dizzy heights of success and glory through sheer talent, hard work and determination.

As the cliché goes, the bad news is that women have to work twice as hard to prove themselves on par with men; the good news however is that you don't have to work too hard!

WHERE THE MALE CONTINUES TO RULE

While one boss referred to a female colleague as a `tethered goat', meaning a sexual bait, another had the audacity to say, she `had cancer, been a pain and is now pregnant.'

That women have made it right to the topmost level in the corporate world is evident from the fact that right from 1998 Fortune magazine has been coming out with its annual surveys on the power pack of 50 women in business. This shows that even while existing perennially for most women, the glass ceiling is being battered now and then by at least some of them.

But the troubling factor is that whether one is an anonymous peg in a huge industry, or holding a top job in the world of financial services, gender discrimination and sexual harassment just refuse to go away.

There is constant reminder of this — the latest being the December issue of Bloomberg Markets. Its cover story outlines the discrimination and harassment some of the most qualified and talented women are facing in London's financial hub, referred to as the `City'.

Titled Sexism and the City - Women fight back in London's financial hub, the article details the amazing stories of brave and determined women who are hitting back at their employers by suing the firms that have denied them promotions or adequate salaries and bonus, compared to their male colleagues.

The most preposterous story is that of Carina Coleman, whose boss and founder of the investment bank Lansdowne Capital Ltd kept referring to her as a "tethered goat'. We are told her boss began using the phrase after watching the film Jurassic Park, where a goat tied to a stake was used to lure dinosaurs. When he used the term the third time, and in front of clients, where the reference pertained to using her as sexual bait in some merger, she realised it was the beginning of a campaign against sexual harassment, and the whole thing ended with the woman being forced to resign in August 2001. A few days later she filed a suit for sexual harassment.

Says the article, "More women in London's City are standing up to treatment they say is unfair, sexist and nasty," adding that 8128 women in the UK had filed sex discrimination claims in 2002-2003, compared to 4,926 in the financial year 2000. "As the cases have increased, so have payments to settle them. The biggest publicly disclosed award was the £1.4 million ($2.3 million) an employment tribunal ordered Schoder Securities to pay Julie Bower, a beverage industry analyst, last year for unfair dismissal and sex discrimination. Bower's boss had said she had `had cancer, been a pain and is now pregnant'."

The magazine quoted Patricia Hewitt, the British Trade and Industry Secretary, saying, "Although a lot has changed, women can still face discrimination in the City. I have concerns about the lack of transparency and objectivity surrounding some employers' decisions on bonuses. We know that this can sometimes lead to men and women being rewarded unequally."

Sounds familiar? One is sure it does, to hundreds of women who have crawled their way up several layers of the glass ceiling in corporate India too. Unlike Wall Street or London's City, our financial district in Mumbai has not reported too many, if any, legal complaints of gender discrimination in the world of finance and investment. That must be because women are still trying to get a foothold in this magic world.

Fortune magazine's latest pack of 50 international power women might have two Indians — Vidya Chhabria, Chairperson of the Jumbo Group and Naina Lal Kidwai, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director of HSBC Securities and Capital Markets, Mumbai, at the 38th and 47th positions respectively.

But in this coveted world women are as yet newcomers. Those who have made it are still trying to feel their way around and one doubts that there are too many brave souls out there who would want to jeopardise their careers by challenging their bosses on grounds of discrimination in pay or promotions, or downright sexual harassment.

The most talked about case of sexual harassment slapped on an Indian company pertained to Infosys Technologies, but even there the woman who complained was an Infosys employee in the US.

However, if you turn to Wall Street or the world's largest securities market, there are numerous cases of women seeking compensation for gender discrimination and sexual harassment. The most famous case is, of course, the one that is referred to as the "Boom Boom Room" case of 1996 in which 20 current and former employees of Smith Barney Inc. sprung a surprise on Wall Street by participating in a class action sexual harassment and discrimination suit. These women claimed that the male employees ran what they called a "boom boom room" in an office of the firm in Long Island, where the men indulged in bawdy behaviour "drank Bloody Marys from a barrel and routinely subjected women to lewd pranks." The company ended up paying millions of dollars after a protracted legal battle in which many skeletons rolled out of the cupboard.

Following the Smith Barney harassment case, a group of female brokers in Chicago filed a sex discrimination suit against Merrill Lynch. In a settlement announced in May, 1998, Merrill Lynch agreed to pay $5 million in legal fees as well as a total of $600,000 to the eight women who filed the suit.

The same company was once again in trouble when a former employee of its Massachusetts office filed another suit on sexual harassment. The plaintiff, Susan Rosenberg, alleged that she was fired because of her age and gender and that at one point a supervisor had handed her a vibrator when she went into his office.

All this was only the tip of the iceberg and since then the "Boom Boom Room" case has become a kind of catchword for sexual harassment on Wall Street. According to a report dated December 20, 2003, on arkansasnews.com, currently there are at least a dozen class action claims concerning gender discrimination on Wall Street, "involving such venerable names as Goldman Sachs, ING Barings, J.P. Morgan Chase, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and Salomon Smith Barney."

A study done in 2001 by Catalyst, a research and advisory organisation for women, found that the majority of women working in the financial services industry are happy with their jobs and employers, but believe subtle discriminatory behaviour and practices do exist.

The study titled Women in Financial Services: The Word on the Street, conducted in response to a gender-discrimination trial, surveyed 838

women and men employed at seven leading securities firms. Of the 482 women surveyed, five per cent said they have to work harder than men to get the same rewards, 51 per cent said they get paid less than men who do similar work, 42 per cent believed that projects or clients are assigned fairly and only 32 per cent thought promotions are handed out fairly to men and women.

Interestingly, and predictably, the majority of the men surveyed didn't see things the same way. They saw only two barriers to a woman's advancement in her career — commitment to family and lack of management experience. How boringly predictable!

But despite the discrimination they faced, the women said they would not quit, and rightly so. Sixty-one per cent of the women surveyed said departing Wall Street would be a financial blunder for them.

And why should they leave? As Sheila Wellington, the president of Catalyst says, "Few industries evoke more images of power and prestige than the financial services industry."

SEXUAL HARASSMENT AND GLASS CEILING

Sexual harassment is a common term today and many corporate cases related to the same have been reported in the past. However it is found that it is associated with a lack of concrete HR policies in place to tackle with the issue. This leads to a distinct subjectivity to it. Many cases go unreported and cause job-switches or subjugation. It is true that an employee leaves a person (boss or peers) rather than the company. To pursue the case and file a complaint is itself associated with a lot of harassment. This problem needs to be tackled with an exercise to instill a sense of respect for the opposite sex, awareness about the new laws in the Indian judiciary, concrete company and HR policies and the emphasis on the separation of professional life from the personal one.

Glass ceiling is a term coined in mid-eighties and is raised frequently with respect to women. An unofficial barrier to top management posts may be placed for the women in a workplace, due to a perceived lack of capability. There will never be a concrete proof to verify the existence of Glass Ceiling. However for various reasons, it is seen that top management does lack women. A look at the board of directors of randomly picked firms from various sectors like Marico India, Jet Airways, Pfizer India, Polaris Software Lab Ltd, State Bank of India, Arvind Mills, Hindustan Lever Limited indicate one or less than one woman in their board of directors. This maybe because the numbers joining at the entry level itself must be less, which can be rooted back to the fact that the number of females in engineering and management institutes is less.

Some Facts: From IT Industry (India)

Presented below are the basic roles of a man and a woman in any context, these were the findings:

FROM CEILIGS TO CLIFFS

WOMEN wearing pants, women outnumbering men at workplaces, woman CEOs, woman entrepreneurs (millionaires too), glass ceilings -- all passé, yes, yes, yesterday's news. The concept that's being talked about today is of `glass cliffs'.

Research has found that women who consistently break the glass ceiling in their organisations face a trickier task - find themselves on a `glass cliff', a risky and precarious position. In other words, they are given more onerous tasks than their male counterparts. A recent `Times' report states that companies, which had consistently performed badly, often appointed women at senior positions. This, because managements think that if there is a crisis in the organisation, woman leaders are more likely to bail them out and deal with the situation more effectively. The idea being that women are more adept at dealing with crises. However, ironically, with every financial downturn, these woman leaders were in danger of being held responsible for the negative outcomes. Their abilities were questioned and their leadership skills came under much fire and criticism. This when the factors, which adversely affected the company, had been set in motion long before the manager had assumed her post. In contrast, once the performance picked up, women were less likely to be hired at senior levels. This is the glass cliff, which women are finding themselves on -- more dangerous and subtly sexist.

Women are getting top jobs but it is a `poisoned chalice' as the research terms it. If a company is doing well, the boys make the grade but a failing company will look to a woman for bailing it out. Also, not so surprisingly perhaps, women are seen as more expendable employees than their male counterparts.

Ingrained beliefs

At work as well as at home women habitually allow themselves to be ruled by belief structures that have been ingrained in them for years. They allow themselves to be influenced by various issues, which in turn can restrict their natural leadership qualities. Sometimes the struggle to balance life and work becomes so tough for women that they would rather give up working. While women at senior levels of management find that one of the

biggest hurdles they face is a stereotyping of their roles and skills, women who are low on the corporate ladder can still laugh about it and refer to the glass ceiling as the distant skylight! But, whether it is overt or subtle, one need not contend with it alone.

There are a few resources that women do have at their disposal, which can help prevent and also overcome bias of this kind at the workplace:

The first important step — choose your employer well. Study your employer at the interview stage itself while they are sizing you up. Find out, if you can, as to how many women are working with the organisation.

Know the company policies going in and their take on addressing gender issues

Don't be afraid to ask for help when you need it. Select mentors who understand how the system works. If things start to get bad, maintain notes in a journal with dates and events mentioned and also the person/s involved so that you have recorded proof.

Talk to your peers. If you encounter gender bias in the workplace, you may be able to get some wise counselling from someone who has dealt with a similar situation before.

Remember you are in charge of your own career so be your own cheerleader! Accept high visibility assignments and do your best work. Woman managers are often praised for being more sensitive to employees' needs, keeping others better-informed and getting results.

For women striving for the top job is not necessarily a question of power; the woman's personal standards play a major role in her achievements— the ability to assert herself and her capability of making strategic decisions. However, despite attempts by organisations to increase the number of women working at senior level, the rate of change and the pace of progress have remained at best erratic. And it should not come as a surprise that a majority of men and women believe that it's advantageous to be a man than a woman!

So, is the `superwoman' who wants to be the world's best mom, best wife and best boss, dead? Like the battle of the sexes, this battle continues too!

FROM GLASS CEILING TO PAY GAP

Why are there pay gaps?

women continued to choose occupations and industries where there is more flexibility in order to balance the needs of work and family, which results in occupational segregation. Even when working as managers, the data showed that they were in positions that required less education and were lower paid. They tended to work in areas with fewer career development prospects. They were 50 per cent less likely to have a college degree than their male counterparts, particularly in the finance sector. Also, when they opted for part-time work they lost healthcare, retirement and social security benefits but continued paying for part-time child care.

Childbearing and child rearing which interrupt women’s careers and permanently slow down their earning power, can now explain an increasingly large part of the gap.

The problem in India, they say, is nearly 95 per cent of the women bringing a case refuse to make a formal complaint to anyone at work because there was no one they felt they could complain to. They were too embarrassed, they feared that they would not be believed or they thought they could handle it for the sake of their careers.

Women employees in India are still fighting an uphill battle for level pegging, in areas such as equal pay for equal work.

Consider the startling findings of a Sakshi survey of 2,400 men and women in a cross-section of workplaces and hierarchies: 80 per cent of respondents said sexual harassment existed at their workplace and 53 per cent said men and women did not have equal opportunities at work. Frequently, managements pressured the victim to withdraw the complaint.

Last year, a team of labour researchers did a survey of women workers in three prominent industrial belts of India (Bangalore, Delhi-Faridabad and Pune).

The study, done by Best Practices Foundation, Bangalore, and titled Women Workers: Inequalities at Work, found that bias against women

included wage and non-wage discrimination as well as qualitative differences in the nature of work offered to women.

Although more and more women are working, much remains to be done. In addition to the "glass ceiling", the "pay gap" between women and men is still significant in most countries. Women are also more likely than men to be found in the lower-paid and least secure jobs. Unemployment rates have almost always been higher for women than men.

Discrimination can occur at every stage of employment, from recruitment to education and remuneration, occupational segregation, and at time of lay-offs. Men and women tend to work in different sectors of the economy and hold different positions within the same occupational group.

Women tend to be employed in a narrower range of occupations than men, and are more likely to work part-time or short-term. They also face more barriers to promotion and career development.

Coming out of the courtroom, Schieffelin alleged that Morgan Stanley had destroyed everything that she had put her heart and soul into for 15 years." Very few women employees in India have shown such guts to air their grievances in public, but India Inc would do well to take the early warning signals seriously.

WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP

There is clearly a universality of opinion among women executives in corporations worldwide that little progress has been made by them in assuming leadership roles in the organisation, and that the barriers to women’s advancement are remarkably similar across the global workforce.

It is quite striking that this consensus of views emerges when women get together for candid conversation in forums that range from the elite Ivy-league financial women’s association in the US to the national women’s conference in New-Delhi.

What is inspiring, however, is that the pressures of global competition and cross-cultural models for doing businesses worldwide are forcing CEOs and top-management to re-define their traditional mind-sets and recognise that there is growing need to become more innovative to survive and enhance the talent-bucket in the global marketplace.

Companies that aspire to gain the competitive advantage will need to leverage this tremendous and virtually untapped resource of smart women executives and look beyond narrowly- defined “high-potentials” in the organisation in the search for globally inclusive leadership teams.

The best global companies are also recognising that recruiting, retaining and advancing women is no longer a matter of social responsibility. Successful corporations have understood the strategic and economic significance of women as executives, investors, customers and clients in the global economy, and make a clear “business case” for diversity and inclusiveness in the organisation.

Some of the leading Fortune 500 companies that have successfully done this include GE, IBM, Monsanto, EI Dupont, Pfizer, Ford Motors and Shell Group, among others.

At the same time, it is not enough for best-employers and HR leaders to simply focus on increasing the “number” of women in the workforce – either at the entry-level or at the mid-executive level. The priority should be also on including women in top-management positions at the board of directors, president-level or CEO-level.

It is, therefore, no accident that more than 35% of Fortune 500 companies have at least one woman on the board of directors, and the number of Fortune 500 companies with more than 25 % or more women on boards increased from 11% to 64% between 1995- 2005. Women are also holding more than 15% of board-level seats of S&P 500 companies, as compared to only 8% in mid-cap companies.

What then is preventing women from making it to top positions in Indian corporations, as they aspire to reinvent themselves in global corporations?

The single most important barrier seems to be the “stereotypes” and preconceptions of women’s roles and abilities in the company – especially when it comes to core functions like finance, audit, legal, economics, business security and HR.

Further, findings seem to suggest that male executives often do not realise that they harbour these misconceptions about women’s roles and abilities, which makes this challenge even more difficult to address.

Other barriers include lack of visible successful female role models, lack of significant general management experience or line-expertise among women executives and lack of mentoring.

Interestingly, the often-cited “family or personal commitments” that HR leaders seem to designate as obstacles to women’s advancement appear at the lower-end of women’s challenges, when viewed by women themselves.

Further, women are sometimes resentful of using specially designated privileges and formal “work/life options” at the workplace as they often carry negative career consequences over the longer-term.

For those of us who have successfully achieved leadership positions in corporate India, it is clearly time to establish a mandate and a mission for taking some time in mentoring other women.

This contribution is a key requisite for doing justice to our leadership positions and demonstrating commitment to change.

At the same time, it is imperative to continue with integrity, accomplishment and grace to open new opportunities for bringing in diversity of thinking, perspectives and skills into corporate boardrooms and top-management decision-making.

The world will surely gain by using the best minds of its entire population – than only a part of it.

WHY THERE ARE SO FEW WOMEN MANAGERS IN INDIA

Indra Nooyi's climb -- from last year's number 11 to the top of Fortune's 2006 list of power women -- has been breathtaking. Even more encouraging is Fortune's conclusion that the list of brand-name firms with women chief executives is longer and more impressive than ever, after a year of stunning breakthroughs in corner-office hiring.

Add to this, a recent study by Catalyst, a leading researcher of women in the workplace. The study shows that Fortune 500 companies with the highest percentages of women corporate officers yielded, on an average, 35.1 per cent higher return on equity than those with the lowest percentages.

Despite all these feel-good news, the "stunning" breakthroughs seem to have eluded Indian companies. Barring a handful like ICICI Bank, HSBC and Biocon, an overwhelming majority of Indian boardrooms are still no-go areas for women. Women today comprise only 2 per cent of the total managerial strength in the Indian corporate sector.

The reasons are many. The HR head of a large consumer electronics and durables firm says while it's fashionable to attack the so-called sex discrimination in Indian workplace, the fact is women themselves are partly responsible for this.

He quotes a BBC report late last year which said at the heart of the matter is the Cinderella complex - where no matter how successful a woman is, subconsciously she still expects that a prince is going to come along and rescue her.

Many also deny that the problem for women is the glass ceiling or the men's club. The business door is open but that women, looking for different and more balanced lives, have not been interested in entering.

"Women outperform in care-taking qualities and men outperform in taking-charge qualities," says the CEO of another large family-managed Indian firm where women are non-existent in senior management.

While the CEO's son is heading an important division in the company, his daughter - an MBA graduate from a reputed foreign university - hasn't

joined the business. "It's not in our family culture for women to be in business. She is happily married," the CEO says.

These stereotypes are the main reason why surveys have shown that only four out of 10 CEOs in India considered the advancement of women to be critical for their organisations. The increasing feeling is that a majority of Indian companies still have a kind of institutional sexism that assumes women are less able than men.

The problem, however, isn't restricted to India alone. An ILO (International Labour Organization) report says wage differences in male and female managerial jobs all over the world stem from the reality that even when women hold management jobs, they are often in less strategic, lower-paying areas of a company's operations.

But how do you move beyond persuasion to actual results? Though it's a hugely controversial move, one leading HR consultant says the way out could be to follow the Norwegian model.

Effective January 1 this year, Norway's government has imposed quotas under which the top 500 publicly traded firms have until 2008 to fill 40 per cent of their boardroom seats with women, or be delisted. France is imposing a 20 per cent quota, while Spain has decided to give preferential treatment to companies who appoint more women on their boards.

There may be huge problems in enforcing such a quota in India as it interferes with corporate freedom and overlooks merit. Besides, when the Department of Company Affairs proposed that 20 per cent of board seats should be reserved for women, lots of women managers themselves thought this was insulting and natural evolution is better than force. Every female director will now feel that she has been appointed just to fill the quota.

The consultant, however, says it may sound outlandish, but experience shows quotas may be the only means of achieving change. A survey done after Norway's move, by Egon Zhender International, showed precisely this.

While women's presence on boards in Scandinavia, where quotas have been introduced or mooted, has grown rapidly, in the rest of western Europe, the numbers have hardly changed and in Germany and the Netherlands they have even dropped back.

Women now account for nearly 29 per cent of directors in the biggest Norwegian companies, up from 22 per cent in 2004. In Sweden, Finland and Denmark, where Norway's move has attracted attention and increased pressure for action, the numbers have risen to 23 per cent, 20 per cent and 18 per cent, respectively.

INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANISTION

ILO AND GLASS CEILING

Women in Professional jobs

Progress in gender equality in the labour market is reflected in women’s share of professional jobs. Women work in a variety of professional services all over the world. They are predominantly found in traditionally female professions such as nursing, teaching and administration, although they have also been infiltrating many of the male-dominated fields, particularly the ICT sector and judicial systems around the world.

There has been little change in women’s share of professional jobs over the last three to five years.

Women’s overall share of professional jobs in 2000-02 was highest in Eastern Europe and the Confederation of Independent States and in Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Brazil and Venezuela.

Women in managerial jobs

Management positions represent only a small proportion of the total workforce, although this job category has grown over the last few decades due to the growth in the service sector. The expansion of this sector has often given more employment opportunities to women and, although they remain under-represented, their increased participation in the sector has exceeded increases in their labour force participation as a whole.

The rule of thumb is still: the higher up an organization’s hierarchy, the fewer the women.

In general, countries in North America, South America, and Eastern Europe have a higher share of women in managerial jobs than countries in East Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East.

Valuing female employees

The continuing low global share of women in management jobs shows that some employers still have difficulty accepting that policies promoting women in the workplace make good business practice. The main reason for this is because women’s family responsibilities – maternity, child rearing and general household tasks – and paid work have as a rule been considered mutually exclusive. The standard and most cost-effective employee for companies has traditionally been male because men’s family or personal lives do not impinge on their work. Clearly, men generally find it easier than women to combine family and work because they rely heavily on women to shoulder family and domestic responsibilities. New policies and strategies for coping with family responsibilities need to be inculcated into all levels of workplace, not only so that a more equitable use of men and women’s time becomes the norm but so that employers’ perceptions of men and women’s abilities and willingness to devote time and effort to work are more attuned.

However, there is evidence to show that some employers have started to recognize that family-friendly policies benefit not only male and female employees by encouraging a better balance between work and family or personal lives, but also benefit employers by improving overall business productivity. Furthermore, the personal characteristics of integrity, diligence and sincerity, traditionally attributed to women, are increasingly viewed as qualities that can enhance a company’s image in a world riddled with corporate misconduct.

The philosophy of valuing both male and female employees is gradually permeating the workplace. Some organizations have introduced voluntary codes of conduct with built-in monitoring and verification systems aimed at creating a new “privatized” context in which workers’ rights are acknowledged. The codes, based on rights and labour standards set out in ILO and other UN conventions and declarations, have the advantage of extending and strengthening the application of labour standards including equal opportunity conventions across national boundaries, governmental jurisdictions, and international corporations. In addition, corporate acceptance of ILO standards through voluntary codes may help strengthen the authority of the ILO and the potential for international labour rights enforcement mechanisms. However, there are doubts about the value of voluntary codes of conduct and how to link global monitoring and

verification systems (based on rights and standards articulated in ILO and UN conventions and declarations) to the private sector.

Diversity management

Organizations are also introducing diversity management programmes that go beyond equal employment opportunity legislation and affirmative action. Diversity management recognizes that employees are not all the same and that their very differences and potential represent a variety of benefits and productivity improvements.

It aims to attract and retain employees and give them a sense of inclusion by maintaining a positive work environment with the introduction of fair practices in recruitment, selection, training, appraisals, etc. Equal opportunity is also an essential element to successful diversity management. All employees are provided with a package of benefits from which they choose those that best suit their situation. Benefits can include family-friendly options such as flexible working hours, tele- working, and job sharing. Diversity management provides all employees, regardless of race, creed and sex, with the opportunity to maximize their full potential, contribute to the achievement of an organization’s mission, and ensure all team members treat each other with dignity and respect.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) holds the National Work and Family Awards every year.

An interesting trend in Wall Street aims to improve efforts to recruit, train, promote and retain women in executive positions and narrow the gap between men and women executives’ pay and power.

Earnings gaps

Research has shown that established social or cultural attitudes and gender inequality in education, training and recruitment cause vertical and horizontal occupational sex segregation, and that this is the principal reason for the persistent gaps between men and women’s earnings. Institutional barriers and social attitudes towards women’s abilities also hamper the movement of professional women upward through occupational categories to increasingly responsible managerial jobs. High levels of vertical occupational segregation, where men and women work in the same job categories but men do the more skilled, responsible or better-paid work are considered to be a reason for the earning gaps between equally qualified male and female employees. Women remain concentrated in the lower levels of the job hierarchy: in the employment market, the company, and job category.

However, these are not the only reasons women earn lower wages than men. Women are likely to have shorter careers than men of the same age because they do not necessarily work full-time throughout their working lives. Many tend either to leave their jobs or work part-time typically between the ages of 25 and 35 to raise children and return to full-time employment at a later stage. This leads to slower promotion and less pay. In addition, managerial positions require longer working hours, a certain amount of traveling, or even relocation. Many women tend to avoid such jobs because of their family commitments.

Earning the same base rate of pay for doing the same job is only part of the equation. Differences in fringe benefits and bonuses offered to men and women also contribute to earnings gaps. The concept of equal remuneration for equal work does not necessarily include the same “perks” that are given to male managers such as access to company cars, mobile telephones and expense accounts, as well as allowances for specific skills, work-related travel, working in difficult conditions and compensation for working in distant or unpopular locations. Also, payments based on performance, bonuses, commissions, profit sharing, and negotiated retirement benefits are not necessarily a standard part of women’s remuneration package although they may well be part of the terms of an overall package agreed by men during recruitment.

Why are there earnings gaps?

Some reasons presented for the earnings gaps were that: women continued to choose occupations and industries where there is more flexibility in order to balance the needs of work and family, which results in occupational segregation. Even when working as managers, the data showed that they were in positions that required less education and were lower paid. They tended to work in areas with fewer career development prospects. They were 50 per cent less likely to have a college degree than their male counterparts, particularly in the finance sector. Also, when they opted for part-time work they lost healthcare, retirement and social security benefits but continued paying for part-time child care.

One school of thought suggests that only a small proportion of the pay gap can be blamed on discriminatory practices in education and recruitment. According to recent studies in various countries, childbearing and child rearing, which interrupt women’s careers and permanently slow down their earning power, can now explain an increasingly large part of the gap. This suggests a lack of policies in the workplace - and in society as a whole - to support working mothers. Furthermore, mothers tend to earn less than other women. According to recent research67 in several industrialized countries, one child could lead to a “penalty” of 6 to 7 per cent of earnings, and two children a penalty of 13 per cent.

ILO action

Over the years, there have been serious efforts at national and international levels to address the issue of gender equality in the world of work. However, much more still has to be done. Sex-based discrimination violates fundamental principles and rights at work, human rights and social justice. It weakens economic growth and the optimal functioning of enterprise and labour markets. This has been recognized by the international community, which is calling for gender equality to be integrated into development and poverty reduction initiatives. The ILO has an incontestable contribution to make in the attainment of these objectives.

ILO’s programme of work for 2004-2005 addresses a number of high-priority gender issues under four strategic objectives covering rights at work, employment, social protection and social dialogue. Gender analysis and strategies to address gender-based inequalities are essential in achieving these objectives.

The ILO is committed to strengthening the capacities of its tripartite constituents - governments and employers’ and workers’ organizations - to take effective policy and institutional measures to mainstream gender in order to promote gender equality at national, sub-regional and regional levels. This action does not directly address the phenomenon of the glass ceiling (vertical occupational segregation) and glass walls (horizontal occupational segregation) encountered by women. It does tackle the fundamental problems hampering their access to jobs with managerial potential by promoting activities at the workplace to eliminate sex discrimination in recruitment, selection, training, appraisals, remuneration and promotion.

For the first time, gender equality has been adopted as one of several key shared policy objectives of the ILO, which strengthens its integrated approach to equality issues in the world of work. The policy objective on gender equality is designed to build a solid knowledge base on gender issues through systematic collection and analysis of data disaggregated by sex. The objective states: “ILO constituents take positive action to increase gender equality in the world of work”.

FACTS ON WOMEN AT WORK

Today, women represent over 40% of the global labour force. Approximately 70% of women in developed countries and 60% in developing countries are engaged in paid employment. Over the past two decades, the growing participation of women in paid jobs has been driving employment trends. Gender gaps in labour force participation have been shrinking, and women’s entrepreneurship development has been impressive. Worldwide, more women than ever before are completing higher levels of education. Better job opportunities have increased many women’s independence and resulted in a new status and role in their families and society.

Yet progress on three key and inter-related indicators for gender equality is still inadequate: namely the “glass ceiling” (women in management in both private and public sectors), the gender pay gap, and the “sticky floor” (women in the lowest paid jobs and living in poverty). The dignity and rights of women are too often violated with practices such as obligatory pregnancy testing and sexual harassment. The lack of recognition of the critical role of unpaid work, mainly done by women, continues to obstruct equitable economic development. And macroeconomic indicators continue to ignore the “care economy” as fundamental to economic outcomes.

The burgeoning of the informal economy provides jobs for many women as well as men but at the price of being unprotected and poorly-remunerated. This means that many millions of women remain beyond the reach and coverage of ILO Conventions and national labour laws. They do not experience equality of opportunity and treatment, do not have access to decent work, and are discriminated against and abused not only because they are poor workers without rights, but also because they are women.

Informalization of work that was once protected is also increasing, particularly for women. And women still make up the majority of part-time, temporary and precarious workers around the world.

Much of this is related to the fact that labour markets in all countries, both in the formal and informal economies, remain highly segregated by sex.

This reflects different social roles assigned to women and men, with women performing the lion’s share of unpaid care work. This is largely due to sex stereotyping of both men and women from the day they are born. The latest employment data according to ILO’s Global Employment Trends (2003) show that women continue to have lower participation rates in the labour market, higher unemployment rates, and significant pay differences in most regions. In Latin America, Europe and North America there has been some reduction of gender pay differences. In a number of transition countries and some countries in Asia, unemployment rates for men are higher than for women and in some developed regions men’s participation rates are declining.

Participation rates for women in the labour market in East Asia are lower than for men, and this gap is not closing. In South East Asia, women still experience lower participation rates than men and where it is relatively higher, gender gaps have grown since the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990’s in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

For most countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, unemployment rates for women are higher than for men. Women have considerably lower rates of labour market participation than men. While this increased sharply in the 1990s, it has fallen off in recent years.

Many millions of women dwell in the so-called informal economy of the developing world: agricultural workers, home-workers, domestic employees, the selfemployed, unpaid family workers, and workers in unregistered enterprises. The informal economy makes up significant proportions of the total workforce in these countries, especially if agriculture is included. A striking example is India, where 93% of all workers are in the informal economy; other examples are 62% in Mexico and 34% in South Africa. Informal employment is generally a larger source of employment for women than for men. In the majority of 25 countries for which the ILO has data on nonagricultural informal employment, the proportions for women were higher than for men.

In addition to discrimination based on sex, many women are also discriminated against based on their colour, race, religion or ethnic origin, age, health status and disability. As a result more women than men are likely to live in poverty. Certain categories of women are especially vulnerable to inequalities in the labour market: rural women, those working in the

informal economy, migrant women, the young, the older, and the disabled. At both ends of the spectrum, the young and the aged face particular disadvantages in labour markets. Girls are more likely than boys to be victims of the worst forms of child labour, such as slavery and prostitution. Young women tend to have higher unemployment rates than their male counterparts. The HIV/AIDS pandemic has also increased women’s vulnerability given their limited access to social protection and economic security. Older women face continued discrimination in the labour market and often have to assume care-giving responsibilities within their families in addition to their work outside the home. Women and girls are also more often the victims of human trafficking. Even women who migrate legally as contract labourers often face exploitation, including sexual harassment and violence.

Despite the many advances made by women, relatively few are breaking through the so-called glass ceiling that blocks them from reaching top-level management ranks. The higher the position in an organization or company, the more glaring the gender gap – for example, women hold only around a mere 1% to 3% of top executive jobs in the largest corporations around the world.

In recognition of the vital role that working women play in family welfare and survival, many governments are now taking measures to overcome traditional, cultural and other forms of discrimination that bar women from access to equal opportunities at work. Similarly, in realizing that women’s skills and talent can be key for success in business, some private companies in both developed and developing countries are instituting programmes that promote the welfare, advancement and retention of their female workers.

Facts:-

Of the 192 countries in the world, only 12 have a female head of state.

Women constitute 70% of the world’s 1.3 billion poor who are living on less than one US dollar per day.

Time-use surveys show that women’s total time worked exceeds men’s by two hours or more in Australia, France, Japan, Latvia and the Republic of Korea. Women spend 50% to 70% of the time men spend on paid work, but about twice as much or more time as men on unpaid work.

Worldwide, women on average earn approximately two-thirds of what men earn.

Nearly 58% of women in Africa hold paying jobs, 64% in Asia, 46% in Latin America and the Caribbean, 69% in Europe, 73% in North America and more than 35% in the Arab world.

In countries such as Australia, Canada, Thailand and the United States, over 30% of all businesses are now owned or operated by women, with Thailand topping the list at almost 40%.

Women make up the majority of the world’s part-time workers – between 60% and 90%. In the European Union, 83% of part-time workers are women.

In some countries of sub-Saharan Africa, most of the female labour force is in the informal economy (for example, 97% in Benin, 95% in Chad, 85% in Guinea and 83% in Kenya).

The proportion of informal work over the last decade has increased dramatically. In Latin America the proportion has risen from 29% to 44%. Women have experienced a larger share of this, going

from 30% to 44% compared to men going from 27% to 35%. In Europe, women are the heads-of-household in 9 out of 10 single-parent families.

Worldwide, the employment rate for women with children in the home is 53%, and for women without children it is 68%.

In the last 20 years, the percentage of self-employed women in the non-agricultural sector increased globally from 28% to 34%as compared to the percentage of self-employed men which barely changed from 26% to 27%.

At the end of 2001, the total number of people living with HIV/AIDS was estimated to be 40 million; just under half were women.

Women in India

Some issues of concern relating to women in India

Some of the major issues reflecting gender biases and discrimination faced by women in India are as follows:

Declining sex ratios (especially child sex-ratios) Low female literacy levels (in spite of improvement of female

literacy rates during last decades substantial gender gaps still exists.) Women’s contribution to production / reproduction that is not

adequately recognised Non-recognition of women’s work Lack or poor levels of Skill / training for women workers Poor health conditions (evident from various gender-specific

indicators like MMR, IMR, TFR etc.) Poverty (Inequality, disempowerment, lack of opportunity & poor

access in different spheres) Absence of social security measures for women workers Unequal wages Gender dimensions of child labour Poor access to resources/ land/property (the issue of property rights,

access and use of common property resources, etc.)

Status of women in the labour market

The overarching issue that critically affects women’s position in the labour market is that of gender bias in defining ‘work’, which stems from the following reasons:

The social prejudices and patriarchal biases that influence women's participation

in the labour market, Women’s work finds itself in an inferior position Since house work is combined with economic work – women’s work

is often under or non- enumerated, their contribution ‘invisibilised’, many women work as unpaid household members or helpers.

If male workers perform the same work, he is likely to be reported as worker.

Women viewed as secondary or supplementary workers/earners. Tasks/jobs they do are often low skilled, monotonous, repetitive and

generally not capital intensive. The above arguments are used to justify the low wages paid to women

workers. This undervaluation manifests itself in wage disparities, in access to

or control over resources, in lack of infrastructural support and above all in great disparity in work burden.

Some trends and distributional aspects of the labour market structure are presented to highlight where women are located and the discriminations faced by them.

1: Structure and some broad trends

According to the nation wide sample survey on Employment & Unemployment undertaken by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) in India during 1999-2000, female workforce is estimated at 124 millions. This constitutes about 31 percent of total workforce of which more than 88 per cent belongs to rural workers. The female workforce participation rates are 29.5 for rural areas and 12.4 for urban locations.

A vast majority of women are working in agricultur al or land based occupations. Apart from this, other activities of the primary sector that employ women are related to animal husbandry, natural resource

management, and so on. Among activities of the secondary sector, women are predominantly involved in informal, homebased activities.

This work in most cases offers little or no social security, low wages coupled with poor working conditions. The trend of contractualisation / casualisation of work further paves the way for more exploitation, while circumventing even the few legislative measures that exist for workers’ protection. There are others sectors like construction, trading and services, which provide employment for women both in rural and urban areas. Most of the work they undertake within these sectors are categorised as unskilled, are low paid as well as insecure.

Among self-employed, many are very often underemployed. This is a residual employment avenue, since demand for their labour is not forthcoming from other sectors.

In the services sector, the majority of women workers are domestic service providers. Women are at the lower echelons of employment in both formal and informal sectors There seems to be ‘glass ceiling’ to women’s upward mobility in job hierarchies. It is still difficult to find women holding positions of power and authority.

In the organised sector, the women workforce is estimated at 17 per cent only. Even within this set, most are located in the lower rungs of the hierarchy. Here too, women’s share in actual numbers is reducing. During 1998 to 1999 about 80,000 women are out of the organised sector.

More over the increasing trend of casualisation has the tendency of camouflaging women’s work since it gets mixed up with household work. Some efforts have to be made to segregate household work from such mix- up.

2: Unpaid work of women and its implications for their participation in the labour market

As already specified in the section above, women undertake a lot of activities which fall within the domain of unpaid work. Such unpaid activities fall under both SNA93 and extended SNA93.

The Indian experience of time use survey conducted during 1998-99 (July-June) reveals many facets of burden of unpaid work and how the women in the society are bearing the maximum share of it. This calls for the need for more family friendly work policies, the policy for promoting skills and employment and possibly for compensation through financial incentives.

The results of these efforts made by the central statistical organisation in India is discussed in latter part of this paper showing how useful and important are these statistics in reflecting the contribution of women in work spheres, many of which are difficult to capture through conventional labour force surveys.

Table 2 : Percentage share of unpaid work (State Domestic Product) SDP

GENDER EQUALITY AND EQUITY

Key Concepts:-

Gender, in the definition given by the International Labour Organization, refers to the social differences and relations between men and women, which are learned, vary widely among societies and cultures and change over time. The term gender does not replace the term sex, which refers exclusively to biological differences between men and women. For example, statistical data are broken down by sex. The term gender is used to analyse the roles, responsibilities, constraints and needs of women and men in all areas and in any given social context. Recent research stresses that gender has moved beyond a ‘sex role’ framework to the recognition that gender involves power structures and economic relationships. Moreover, gendered identities are plural, divided and potentially unstable; gender always includes the dynamics of ethnicity and class.

Gender equality means that the rights, responsibilities and opportunities of women and men will not depend on whether they are born male or female. Gender equality, also defined in terms of an equal distribution of economic power, must be understood as a distribution of influence, power and opportunities based on parity.

Gender equity means fairness of treatment for women and men, according to their respective needs. This may include equal treatment, or treatment that is different but which is considered equivalent in terms of rights, benefits, obligations and opportunities.

Gender mainstreaming is the process of assessing the implications for women and men of any planned action including legislation, policies and programmes, in any area and at all levels. It is a strategy for making women’s and men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes in all political, economic and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally, and inequality is not perpetuated.

Gender analysis is a tool to diagnose the differences between women and men regarding their specific activities, conditions, needs, access to and control over resources, and access to development benefits and decision-making. It studies the linkages of these and other factors in the larger social, economic, political and environmental context. Gender analysis entails, first and foremost, collecting sex-disaggregated data and gendersensitive

information about the population concerned. Gender analysis is the first step in gender-sensitive planning for promoting gender equality.

The challenge of gender equality and equity

Six billion human beings live on the planet Earth, and more than half of them are women and girls. They constitute two-thirds of the world’s 876 million illiterates and 70% of the poor. Women and girls perform twothirds of the work in the world; they are paid one-tenth of all world income. In all regions of the globe and in every segment of society, in both developed and developing countries, women and girls are denied the opportunities to enjoy their human rights, which in turn deprives all men, women and children – societies as a whole – of valuable human resources.

Many schools of thought and theories have sought to explain the at times subtle, at times complex mechanisms of discrimination and exclusion that preclude women and men from taking part in societal and development processes on an equal footing. One key element in understanding the complexity of the problem lies in the distinction between sex and gender, two concepts that must be fully understood before undertaking any effective action in favour of gender equality.

Sex is the term used to refer to the biological differences between males and females. Gender denotes the social organization of sex differences. It is a socio-political definition of women and men as they function in societies; ethnicity, political status, economic power and social class influence gender. Gender roles evolve over time and vary from one socio-cultural environment to another; a gender identity may be unstable in individuals and is susceptible to modification through education and experience.

task The is to analyse and deal effectively with the unspoken, implicit hierarchies of ‘second’ and ‘first’ power roles, which often condemn women to the rank of ‘second-class citizens’ and assign ‘domineering’ roles to men. The challenge is to build societies where women and men can reach their full human potential and participate, as equals, in the development of their societies, sharing its wealth and benefits on the basis of parity.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Facilitating women’s progression to management and executive positions requires.

High-level commitment to change the existing culture within a firm or organization.

Equal employment opportunity policies which are transparent, objective, fair and closely monitored.

Family-friendly policies.

Enforcement of antidiscrimination legislation and implementation of nononsense sexual harassment policies.

There are still significant earnings gaps between women and men.

More decisive measures are needed to harmonize remuneration structures for both male and female employees.

Women’s high level of education is not directly reflected in the positions they occupy in the labour market.

Women students’ study choice is often influenced by gender role socialization.

Sex-stereotyped images should be eliminated from school curricula and discriminatory practices should be removed from teaching and vocational guidance.

Programmes are needed to improve the presence of female mentors and role models in the academic hierarchy.

Employers need programmes to help them recognize the benefits women can bring to their businesses.

Women want more people interaction.

Building rapport.

Change the Human Resource policies.

CONCLUSION

From the whole discussion of glass ceiling we can say this problem is very hazardous for the society. In our Indian culture we are saying for women Ardhangini (half body). So, why discriminate them. In the case of lower cast we are depend on this class in tams of labour work so, why we ignore them. Every person have a responsibilities minimize the gap between man and women at work place.

Equal access for young women and men to education, vocational training and on-the-job training is an essential prerequisite for women to obtain more highly skil led and better-paying jobs. Until a sufficient number of women have the qualifications and skills required for moving into “men’s” jobs, they cannot const itut e the critical mass in organizations needed to ensure that all women, not just the exceptional few, have the chance to advance. Yet gender-based study choices made by students, their families and employers will continue to be the norm unless special measures are taken to encourage different choices. Young women need to be encouraged to take up studies in non-traditional subjects and in areas of future job growth. Young men also need to be increasingly prepared for understanding changing gender roles and the implications for their own professional, social and family lives. This requires a multifaceted, well- integrated approach that involves education curricula, teacher training, vocational training advisory services, the media, and the setting of targets and legal obligations for employers. Once in a job, women should have equal access to continuous technical and professional upgrading so that they can compete for higher-level jobs later on.

NOTES

Rfreneces

Women in hierarchy, from ceiligs to cliffshttp://www.hinduonnet.com

www.businessline.com

www.thehindu.in

ILO and glass ceilinghttp://www.uno.orghttp://www.ilo.org

APPENDIX

Appendix - A

Women Executives and glass ceiling

1. “As a woman, you just aren’t listened to – or trusted – as much as a man would be” quoted Christine Comaford Lynch, a venture capitalist who was a CEO too.

2. Carlyn Fiorina, the chairman and Chief Executive of Hewlett Packard Co. was fired yesterday.

Some years ago, I had read a survey in a magazine, which showed the choice of employees for as their boss. And the outcome was that most of the employees want their boss as a man. Surprisingly the majority of woman respondent too want man as boss rather than woman. Something like glass ceiling is also quoted for the positions held by woman managers on the top.

Here Lynch seems to be dissatisfied with the social/corporate structure, which is male dominated and her efforts for the better business structure might have seen a lot of setbacks.

On the other instance Fiorina’s ability as a businesswoman has been exemplary. She is a school dropout, worked as receptionist, teacher and a saleswoman. Due to her marketing ability she rose to the position of the powerful businesswoman of US. She joined HP in 1999 and later on masterminded merger of HP and Compaq. But her decision was widely criticized including the founders of HP. It has been said that the merger have showed detrimental effect in the brand value of HP along with it’s printer business. The merger to the other top executive might have been seen as foresighted business strategy or her failure to uplift the HP brand value.

Although we can’t generalize the statement but women are found to be good managers at the root level, i.e. family level most of the time. Be it the human resource management or financial management. The logic is not to collect sympathy for them but to find out the natural/unnatural tendencies which prevent them to the top. I would like to quote one thing more here. Indira Gandhi, the former PM of India was said as she was the only man in her cabinet. Although, she was also visualized as a dictator during the period

of emergency. This kind of remarks or attitude towards women top most executive does suggest that the day is far away towards gender equality when it comes to administration or executive matter.

Why Indira Gandhi was called that she was the only man in her cabinet? Does that mean that only man has the right to rule the world and the executive ability is attached to a masculine personality?

At the basic form of group or organization, the family when formed let’s see what are the outcomes. The woman’s thought maturity is improved if compared to the male counterpart of the same age. The woman when gets married she seeks a man with higher/equal level of thought/position/standard than her. And as a cause/effect the man seeks the lower/equal level of thought/status/standard than him. Leave the issue of exceptional love among them but this is the trend followed around the world.

Now look at the job profiles which are mostly gender specific. The secretaries are mostly women; the nurses/air hostess can’t not replaced by male counter part. In crude politics they take part in less number (Mrs. Clinton’s future seems an exception). In country like India the woman reservation bill never got passed, I don’t think it need be passed and reservation due to mercy will be again harmful and there is possibility that the less qualified woman politicians will jump into passive politics after anchoring some male counterpart. The advocacy of giving them a chance is again the same thing. Of course leg pulling must not be done.

To each individual there are different levels of administrative abilities. Simply judging them on the basis of sex will be unjust. The are example of Shobhana Bhartiya, Kiran Majumdar Shaw, Parmeshwar Godrej and many more in India and across globe as good managers. There are chances as well as opportunities that the women will raise to the great height with her capacities. But on reaching the top most height her each breath seems to be under scrutiny without any productivity but to make her tense as well as the business. The share prices jumped instantly after firing off Fiorina. But the

stereotyped society (which comprises male and female both) will take long time to accept the glass ceiling and to solve the imbroglio over the top which is a result of all the stuff sucked at root level.

Women in power and decision-making

Monitoring women’s participation in decision-making in the public arena poses a challenge for statistical systems primarily because most of the relevant s data are held by decision-making institutions that do not normally compile and collate the information and are not formally required to report it. Those institutions include parliaments, political parties, state and local governments, the private sector and non-governmental organizations. Even information on the number of women and men occupying highlevel decision-making positions within national statistical offices, needed for monitoring the process of incorporating a gender perspective in statistics, is not systematically compiled or disseminated.

An additional difficulty has been the lack of data on lower levels of decision-making and on the processes that provide access to positions of power. Statistics are now generally available on women’s participation in parliament and at the highest and most visible levels of decision-making in the public sector and, to a lesser extent, in the private sector. However, data on women and men at the lower levels of decision -making, which provide the career path to the higher levels, are often still not readily available in many countries. For example, the Equal Opportunity Commission in the United Kingdom has noted the lack of a method to classify seniority so that women’s career progression (or the lack of it) can be compared with men’s.

The more subtle elements of human resource development, such as on-the-job training and mentoring, which contribute to access to positions of power and authority, provide a particular challenge. Monitoring those processes is essential for the development of intervention policies and programmes to overcome the exclusion of women early in their careers and thus have an impact on their access to the highest levels of decision-making. One way to monitor such elements is through better and more extensive use of qualitative data, microstudies and case studies. Qualitative data can enhance the understanding and analysis of quantitative data, while microstudies enable exploration of gender issues not covered by mainstream sources.