Handbook of Gendered Careers in Management. Getting in, Getting on, and Getting out Edited by Adelina M. Broadbridge and Sandra L. Fielden UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 518 pp. ISBN 978-1-78254-768-6

• Published date: 01 September 2016
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/cjas.1401
• Date: 01 September 2016
• Author: Gina Grandy

Book Review/Recensions de livre

Reviewed by Gina Grandy, Faculty of Business

Administration, University of Regina

Handbook of Gendered Careers in Management. Getting in, Getting on, and Getting out

Edited by Adelina M. Broadbridge and Sandra L. Fielden

UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 518 pp.

ISBN 978-1-78254-768-6

Women now comprise approximately 47% of the total

labour force in Canada, up from 37% in 1976 (Statistics

Canada, 2013, 2016). These statistics, however, paint a mis-

leading picture regarding the career “progress”of women. In

Canada, men are still two to three times more likely than

women to hold a senior management position (Conference

Board of Canada, 2011). In 2014, only one woman held a

CEO position in companies listed on the Canadian TSX

(Catalyst, 2015c), and only 20.8% of board seats at Canadian

stock index companies were held by women (Catalyst,

2015a). In the United States, women hold a mere 4% of

CEO positions and 19.2% of board seats at S&P companies

(Catalyst, 2015b). Globally, board seats held by women

hover at 12% (Deloitte, 2015). We are a long way from par-

ity and women continue to experience a “labyrinth”(Eagly

& Carli, 2007) of challenges in their careers.

The edited collection by Adelina M. Broadbridge and

Sandra L. Fielden, Handbook of Gendered Careers in Man-

agement, is concerned with these very issues. The handbook

offers a diverse range of perspectives and topics on “gen-

dered careers in management”(p. 1). With an impressive

line-up of international contributors, this handbook offers

contemporary thinking, developments and practices, as well

as future directions on issues affecting the careers of women.

It presents research grounded in both mainstream and critical

theories that highlight how gender considerations impact the

careers of women.

The 30 chapters are organized into three sections: Get-

ting In, covering issues that hinder women’s access (e.g., re-

cruitment, selection) to organizations and management

positions; Getting On, covering issues that persist to plague

women’s progress once they are in organizations; and, Get-

ting Out, covering issues that women confront as they f‌inish

or leave their managerial careers.

Following a short introduction, the f‌irst section Getting In

includes 10 chapters. Management educators in particular will

f‌ind Chapter1 relevant. The authors,Paris and Decker, present

pedagogical strategies centred upon communication,

connections, and competencies that can better prepare students

(women and men) for their careers. Chapter 2 offers a critical

perspective of the popularity of internships, arguing that intern-

ships are structured by “profound inequalities”(p. 31). The

author, Swan, indicates that most unpaid internships are held

by women. Further, she contends that the “unpaid intern”is a

subjectif‌ication process whereby “feminized ways”are inter-

nalized and normalized; that is, interns are expected to work

for free and love their work. Chapter 3 presents a provocative

account of preference theory and advocates for the consider-

ation of social and cultural contexts in understandings of

choice feminism. The next f‌ive chapters (4 to 9) explore the im-

plications of gender stereotyping in recruitment and selection

processes and decisions (including two chapters on executive

search f‌irms). These f‌ive chapters include a number of recom-

mendationsrelevant to HumanResource Managementand De-

velopment (HRM/D) practitioners and educators involved in

the design and delivery of diversity and women’s leadership

programs. Section one of the handbook concludes with a

novel, albeit somewhat prescriptive account, of understanding

gender and careers through a change management perspective.

Section two of the handbook, Getting On, includes 14

chapters highlighting various challenges that women con-

front as they develop their careers. These chapters cover in-

triguing topics such as: “vertical segregation”in feminized

occupations

1

(Chapter 11); the Career Pathways Survey to

examine opinions about glass ceiling (Chapter 12); the per-

ception of women’s risk aversion, its impact, and recom-

mendations for redressing this (Chapter 13); mentoring

(Chapters 14, 20); the experiences, challenges, and absence

of women in senior leadership roles (Chapters 15, 16, 18,

19, 20); unpacking the meaning of a successful career

(Chapter 17); women and international careers (Chapter

21); women in professional services (Chapters 22, 23);

and, women entrepreneurs’experiences of work-family in-

terface (Chapter 24). Two themes stand out vividly in this

section. First, to “get on,”women leaders have to do “gender

well and differently”(Mavin & Grandy, 2012, 2013 - see

Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences

Revue canadienne des sciences de l’administration

33: 257–259 (2016)

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/CJAS.1401

Can J Adm Sci

33(3), 257–259 (2016)Copyright © 2016 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 257