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The Glass Cliff Essay

Decent Essays

There are many people who love to point out that there are a handful of women in professional settings that have “made it to the top”. They like to say that there are more female CEO’s now than ever before and that people should just be grateful for that. What these people fail to recognize is that many women are promoted to high positions so that they can be a scapegoat if something goes wrong. This is known as the “glass cliff”. There are many times when women are promoted to a CEO position when a company is in serious trouble. If the company fails, well then it’s the woman’s fault. If the company comes back and succeeds, well then the company is so forward thinking and generous to its female employees and they’ve done such a good thing “allowing” …show more content…

On the other hand, if men fail, anything other than his gender is used to explain it. This results in men getting second chances while women don’t, because apparently they weren’t supposed to be in that position in the first place. Where women are expected to be working are in secondary jobs, ones that benefit other people. These include healthcare, education, secretarial, accountants, etc. these types of jobs are centered around feminine gender role expectations, meaning that they are often sacrificial and serving. What people are finding within these jobs though is that as it becomes more socially acceptable for men to be in them, that men are getting promoted faster and getting paid more than the women that were originally expected to be in those positions. This is known as the “glass escalator”. For being a man, an applicant or employee may be given an extra boost in ways that women, and people of color, are not boosted. Research has showed that men are not only regarded as competent and promotable by male superiors, but also by female superiors. It’s a slippery slope that shows that female-gendered occupations are increasingly becoming more and more operated by a patriarchal

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