Maria Adamson

The quality of equality: thinking differently about gender inclusion in organizations

Purpose: This article suggests a shift in thinking about how to improve gender inclusion in organisations, as well as offering a number of practical action points. Design/methodology/approach: This article takes a perspective based on the authors’ own ongoing research as well as synthesis of existing insights into gender inclusion in organisations. Findings: In order to retain top talent and improve organisational climate, we need to re-think how we measure the success of organisational inclusion policies. Specifically, the article suggests moving from numbers and targets to looking at the quality of gender inclusion in the workplace. The article explains why this shift in thinking is important, and how to approach it. Practical implications: The article provides strategic insights into and practical thinking about ways in which progressive organisations can continue to improve gender equality. Originality/value: The article makes a provocative call for a change of perspective on gender inclusion in organisations based on cutting-edge research, and puts forward action points in an accessible format.

‘The Bottom Line Is That the Problem Is You’: Aesthetic Labour, Postfeminism and Subjectivity in Russian Self-Help Literature

This chapter explores the ways in which women are called upon to work on and manage their body, personality and sexuality in bestselling Russian self-help literature targeting a female audience. We argue that the aesthetic labour promoted in this literature needs to be understood as intrinsically embedded in the cultural and economic context where it is performed. Growing job insecurity, widespread gender discrimination, insufficient social protection and decreasing employment quality characterise the everyday life of a great number of women in Russia (Adamson and Kispeter 2017; Kozina and Zhidkova 2006). At the same time, the rise of the service sector and the demand for ‘aestheticised’ forms of labour (Walker 2015) have been accompanied by a growing rhetoric concerning the importance of self-presentation and ‘image’ (Cohen 2013) and an increasing emphasis on beauty practices as a crucial part of successful femininity (Porteous 2013). As we show in this chapter, women are encouraged to invest time and energy in aesthetic labour in the hope that mastering ‘the art of femininity’ will allow them upward mobility in a context where channels for mobility are increasingly constrained. We suggest that aesthetic labour is mobilised as a form of tactical agency (de Certeau 1984) to combat social and economic precarity. Through unpacking the elements of this labour we also suggest that this aesthetic makeover entails a profound transformation of subjectivity.

Book Review: Like Mother, Like Daughter? How Career Women Influence their Daughters’ Ambition by Jill ArmstrongLike Mother, Like Daughter? How Career Women Influence their Daughters’ Ambition. ArmstrongJillBristol: Policy Presss, 2017. pp. 232. £60.00 (hbk). ISBN 978-1-4473-3408-8.

Alexander, J. C. (1990) ‘Introduction: Understanding the ‘relative Autonomy’ of Culture’, in: J. C. Alexander and S. Seidman (eds) Culture and Society: Contemporary Debates, pp. 1–27. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Alexander, J. C. (1996) ‘Cultural Sociology or Sociology of Culture?’ Culture 10(3–4): 1–5. Alexander, J. C. (2003) The Meanings of Social Life: A Cultural Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press. Alexander, J. C. (2004) ‘Cultural Pragmatics: Social Performance between Ritual and Strategy’, Sociological Theory 22(4): 527–73. Alexander, J. C. and Smith, P. (1993) ‘The Discourse of American Civil Society: A New Proposal for Cultural Studies’, Theory and Society 22(2): 151–207. Mangham, I. L. (2005) ‘The Drama of Organizational Life’, Organization Studies 26(6): 941–58.

‘Female Heroes’: Celebrity Executives as Postfeminist Role Models: Celebrity Executives as Postfeminist Role Models

This paper explores the significance of contemporary celebrity businesswomen as role models for women aspiring to leadership in business. We explore the kind of gendered ideals they model and promote to women through their autobiographical narratives, and analyse how these ideals map against a contemporary postfeminist sensibility to further understand the potential of these role models to redress the under‐representation of women in management and leadership. Our findings show that celebrity businesswomen present a role model that we call the ‘female hero’, a figure characterized by 3Cs: confidence to jump over gendered barriers; control in managing these barriers; and courage to push through them. We argue that the ‘female hero’ role model is deeply embedded in the contemporary postfeminist sensibility; it offers exclusively individualized solutions to inequality by calling on women to change themselves to succeed, and therefore has limited capacity to challenge the current gendered status quo in management and leadership. The paper contributes to current literature on role models by generating a more differentiated and socially situated understanding of distant female role models in business and extending our understanding of their potential to generate sustainable and long‐term change in advancing gendered change in management and leadership.

Compositions of professionalism in counselling work: An embodied and embedded intersectionality framework

This article explores the embodied compositions of professionalism in the context of the counselling psychology profession in Russia. Specifically, we develop an embodied intersectionality framework for theorizing compositions of professionalism, which allows us to explain how multiple embodied categories of difference intersect and are relationally co-constitutive in producing credible professionals, and, importantly, how these intersections are contingent on intercorporeal encounters that take place in localized professional settings. Our exploration of how professionalism and professional credibility are established in Russian counselling shows that, rather than assuming that a hegemonic ‘ideal body’ is given preference in a professional context, different embodied compositions may be deemed credible in various work settings within the same profession. An embodied intersectionality framework allows us to challenge the notion of a single professional ideal and offer a dynamic and contextually situated analysis of the lived experiences of professional privilege and disadvantage.

The making of a glass slipper: exploring patterns of inclusion and exclusion in a feminized profession

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to deploy the concept of the “glass slipper” to unpack the construction of systematic patterns of inclusion and exclusion along the lines of gender, age and class in the emerging, female-dominated profession of psychological counselling in Russia. Design/methodology/approach – The study draws on an analysis of 26 in-depth qualitative interviews with practising counsellors in Russia. Findings – Drawing on the glass slipper concept, the article demonstrates how seemingly neutral discursive “rules” of professional conduct articulated by counsellors create an association between a collective professional identity and the social identities of typical practitioners, making this profession appear most suitable for middle-aged, middle-class women. The findings also show how certain embodied identities – in this case masculinity – may be able to “fit” into a slipper that was not made for them. Originality/value – The paper extends the understanding of the dynamics of inequali...

The Many Faces of Gender Inequality at Work

The collection of articles included in this first thematic issue addresses gender inequalities, a theme that has featured intensively in the public sphere in these past months, including high profile revelations about gender pay discrimination such as those at the BBC and others in the UK, the #MeToo and #TimesUp campaigns, and ongoing debates about gender inequalities in the global labour market. Our assembling of this particular issue also coincides with UK employers’ compulsory reporting, for the first time, on the gender pay gap and the solutions they envision for closing this gap, including plans around increasing the number of women in the upper echelons of organisations. In our view, all the articles in this issue have a link to this pressing problem, in that they highlight how solutions to gender gaps depend on factors that reside not only within the organisation, but also at family and societal levels. Moreover, these factors are constantly reshaped by changing economic contexts and national policies. The articles we present in this issue cover not only a variety of factors and contexts, but also document the sources and outcomes of gender inequalities across six countries from four continents, including a cross-country analysis. Together, they provide a snapshot of the rich empirical evidence available to researchers interested in further developing our theoretical understanding of gender inequalities.

Book Review: Like Mother, Like Daughter?:

This book explores the influence of full-time working mothers on their daughters’ career aspirations and ambitions. It is based on a solid sample of 88 interviews with 30 mother–daughter pairs, interviewed separately and together. All mothers worked in professional and senior managerial careers, and most of the daughters also worked or were pursuing a university degree. The book is well-structured with eight chapters focusing on specific themes...

Book Review: Like Mother, Like Daughter? How Career Women Influence their Daughters’ Ambition by Jill Armstrong:

Alexander, J. C. (1990) ‘Introduction: Understanding the ‘relative Autonomy’ of Culture’, in: J. C. Alexander and S. Seidman (eds) Culture and Society: Contemporary Debates, pp. 1–27. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Alexander, J. C. (1996) ‘Cultural Sociology or Sociology of Culture?’ Culture 10(3–4): 1–5. Alexander, J. C. (2003) The Meanings of Social Life: A Cultural Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press. Alexander, J. C. (2004) ‘Cultural Pragmatics: Social Performance between Ritual and Strategy’, Sociological Theory 22(4): 527–73. Alexander, J. C. and Smith, P. (1993) ‘The Discourse of American Civil Society: A New Proposal for Cultural Studies’, Theory and Society 22(2): 151–207. Mangham, I. L. (2005) ‘The Drama of Organizational Life’, Organization Studies 26(6): 941–58.