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CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
In all social institutions men historically dominate leadership positions while women seem to be marginalised in office holding or at best have token representation (Ridgeway, 2001). According to Chandler (2011), even though women continue striving to rise to the top as corporate leaders, heads of state and media practitioners, gender-based discrimination reinforces their subordinate status. Among the explanations that are given is the view that women do not make themselves available for leadership due to a number of pressures. For example, women leaders constantly have to navigate between professional and occupational duties and domestic and family responsibilities at home. These conflicting responsibilities make it difficult for them to compete with their male counterparts (Eagley & Karau, 2002).
In spite of these setbacks, some traditional African women played significant leadership roles in society and influenced society greatly. These brave and gallant women fought to become leaders in African traditional societies. An example is Nana Yaa Asantewaa of the Asante kingdom of Ghana who led the Asantes in a war against the British Imperial powers (Boahen, 2003). Queen Nzhinga, Queen of Ndongo and Matamba in Angola who made her mark as an outstanding example of female governance in Africa and showed a lot of political acumen, brilliant military tactics, diplomatic skills, ability to forge numerous strategic alliances, knowledge of trade and religious issues which served well in resisting Portugal’s colonialist aspirations (Onyebuchi Eze, 2013).
Broadbridge and Simpson (2011) denote that even though a lot of research has been carried out in the last decades on leadership and gender, there still persist challenges in the advancement of women to more senior positions and this needs to be further analysed. In many cases due to equal rights legislation, the problem of gender is often assumed to have been solved. The reality however is that there are still barriers for women such as the glass ceiling or the ‘hidden dimensions of power’ (Broadbridge & Simpson 2011:477) that undermine female careers. Eagly and Carli (2007) claim women are not well represented in managerial positions, however instead of discussing negative barriers like the glass ceiling, they prefer to introduce the metaphor of the labyrinth. The labyrinth concept represents a shift of paradigm which emphasises that “for women who aspire to top leadership, routes exist but are full of twists and turns, both unexpected and expected” (Eagly & Carli 2007:64).
A female’s ability to lead is often questioned in terms of how well she can handle leadership, compared to men. There is a plethora of literature on leadership that describes how males tend to rate themselves as better leaders than females, based on their perception of leadership an example is the study of Richardson and Loubier (2008). Often, women find themselves acting differently from prevailing female values in an attempt to comply with the male definition of leadership, which highlights charisma. For decades more females tend to underrate their leadership abilities and competencies compared to men in similar roles.
Doubts about women’s leadership skills have been attributed to the misconception people have on feminism. This has been linked to perceptions of incompetence and a devaluation or exploitation of women’s labour. Given the prejudice people harbour about women in authority, men may work well with female subordinates but become uncomfortable when working with female peers and
superiors, particularly in male dominated work settings (Chandler, 2011). This is because women
are viewed as suited to service tasks and subordinate positions which reinforce the impression of nurturance, dependence and lack of leadership ability (Chandler, 2011). Women have to deal with these responses of male peers and subordinates who may not welcome their entry into previously male dominated territory. This may explain why some women do not aspire for certain powerful positions and even if they do aspire, end up adopting male attributes and suppressing aspects of femininities (Kerfoot and Knight 1998 Wacjman, 1998).
The absence of women in senior positions of leadership and management at universities is well documented (Astin and Davis 1993, Fine 2003, Forster 2001, Kettle 1996, Petersen & Gravett 2000, Soldewell 1979, ), and many of these studies have also investigated the barriers that prevent women from advancing into senior leadership and management positions, but research to investigate what happens to women once they attain positions of leadership and management in organisations is less common, especially in African countries. Thus the story of women who have against all odds, ‘shattered the glass ceiling’ in the academic world is not well known.
The area of leadership and gender, roles in the workplace has focused on self-perception or subordinates’ perceptions of leaders’ behaviour. Particularly, these studies have relied on measures of behaviour and leadership styles that were rated by leaders themselves or subordinates. Though it is important to compare leaders’ self-perceptions and those whom they lead, it is also as important to examine leaders’ perceptions of other leaders, particularly female leaders. This is necessary to gain an understanding of whether females continue to be viewed as less effective leaders despite their abilities and successes, regarding competencies and abilities today, by their male and female counterparts (Eagly & Johnson, 1990).
Many women are also seen to undermine the authority of their superior women in leadership and this is because, the strategies they use with men are inappropriate for women. They find it difficult to react to their fellow women as bosses while it is easy for them to cope with men as bosses (Wacjman, 1998).
It is widely believed that most women working or in higher positions experience negative reactions from their subordinates (Ely,1994). This underestimates the abilities of women which negatively affect their choices, opportunities and relations. More research such as this dissertation is needed to establish the extent to which these views are supported by the experiences of women executives in Ghana.
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