Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees

Evidence from research has repeatedly pointed to the small number of women managers sent on expatriation. The percentage of female expatriates during the 1990’s was as low as 14% of all expatriate managers (Windham/NFTC, 1997). Researchers found that, similar to the glass ceiling that prevents women...

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Main Author: Ghosh, Chandrika
Format: Dissertation (University of Nottingham only)
Language:English
Published: 2013
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/26323/
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author Ghosh, Chandrika
author_facet Ghosh, Chandrika
author_sort Ghosh, Chandrika
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description Evidence from research has repeatedly pointed to the small number of women managers sent on expatriation. The percentage of female expatriates during the 1990’s was as low as 14% of all expatriate managers (Windham/NFTC, 1997). Researchers found that, similar to the glass ceiling that prevents women from reaching top management levels, there seems to be another glass barrier that stops them from taking up international assignments. This subtle, invisible barrier has been referred to as the expatriate glass ceiling.The main purpose of this research is to identify expatriate glass ceiling barriers and also to investigate the perception of Malaysian female employees towards the same. This research will also examine the female employees’ attitude towards international assignments. The focus of this study is on female employees without past experience of expatriation, since they form the group of potential candidates for expatriation in an organisation. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with female employees from 4 MNCs for data collection. The results showed that, family and marital status, women’s willingness to accept expatriation, country of assignment, supervisor’s attitude, mentoring facilities and selection procedure, were perceived as barriers for female employees. It was also found that women managers hold a positive attitude towards international assignments, thus ruling out the possibility of their personal attitude working as a barrier to expatriation. These findings point to the need for strategies to break such barriers by putting in place more inclusive human resource policies and cultivating a general attitude to encourage women’s progress in the organisation. This research was only a small endeavour to uncover the female employees’ perception towards the expatriate glass ceiling. Therefore, further research is required, possibly with a wider and better sample, for an improved understanding of the finer details of this issue.
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format Dissertation (University of Nottingham only)
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institution University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus
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language English
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spelling nottingham-263232017-10-19T13:24:42Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/26323/ Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees Ghosh, Chandrika Evidence from research has repeatedly pointed to the small number of women managers sent on expatriation. The percentage of female expatriates during the 1990’s was as low as 14% of all expatriate managers (Windham/NFTC, 1997). Researchers found that, similar to the glass ceiling that prevents women from reaching top management levels, there seems to be another glass barrier that stops them from taking up international assignments. This subtle, invisible barrier has been referred to as the expatriate glass ceiling.The main purpose of this research is to identify expatriate glass ceiling barriers and also to investigate the perception of Malaysian female employees towards the same. This research will also examine the female employees’ attitude towards international assignments. The focus of this study is on female employees without past experience of expatriation, since they form the group of potential candidates for expatriation in an organisation. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with female employees from 4 MNCs for data collection. The results showed that, family and marital status, women’s willingness to accept expatriation, country of assignment, supervisor’s attitude, mentoring facilities and selection procedure, were perceived as barriers for female employees. It was also found that women managers hold a positive attitude towards international assignments, thus ruling out the possibility of their personal attitude working as a barrier to expatriation. These findings point to the need for strategies to break such barriers by putting in place more inclusive human resource policies and cultivating a general attitude to encourage women’s progress in the organisation. This research was only a small endeavour to uncover the female employees’ perception towards the expatriate glass ceiling. Therefore, further research is required, possibly with a wider and better sample, for an improved understanding of the finer details of this issue. 2013 Dissertation (University of Nottingham only) NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/26323/1/ChandrikaGhosh.pdf Ghosh, Chandrika (2013) Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees. [Dissertation (University of Nottingham only)] (Unpublished)
spellingShingle Ghosh, Chandrika
Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title_full Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title_fullStr Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title_full_unstemmed Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title_short Expatriate Glass Ceiling : The Perception of Malaysian Female Employees
title_sort expatriate glass ceiling : the perception of malaysian female employees
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/26323/