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Although parity in workplace representation and leadership roles for women has improved, culturally embedded structural barriers, practices, and policies within organizations remain. Organizations can improve inclusivity by understanding the characteristics and impact of unconscious gender bias and implementing related leadership development programs.

This brief examines women’s progress in the workforce and in leadership roles, reviews the characteristics of unconscious bias and its impact on women’s workforce representation, and identifies strategies for addressing gender bias through leadership development.

Leadership research and theory suggest the benefits of organizational training that entails both women-only and mixed-gender training, self-knowledge of leadership styles, examination of assumptions about masculine and feminine ways to lead, and the value of authenticity.

The brief offers practical insights into unconscious gender bias for human resources teams, managers, and leadership trainers by examining assumptions about gender and gendered leadership beliefs.

Personality traits impact how leaders are perceived and how leaders perceive themselves. These views are subject to gender biases and stereotypes. This practitioner study aims to integrate leadership theories with research on agentic and communal personality qualities and the Big Five personality traits to establish how these impact perceptions of leader effectiveness.

Behavioral leadership theory and personality trait research offer insights into gender biases related to perceptions of leaders and leaders’ self-efficacy. This paper examines the literature in these areas to show how it informs the practice of leadership and the degree to which gender stereotypes are changing.

The review examines salient leadership qualities for women and men, finding that agentic qualities are still largely associated with men and communal qualities with women. It also illustrates that conscientiousness, openness to experience and extraversion are associated with leadership emergence for both genders but impact leader self-efficacy in different ways.

This paper integrates research to draw conclusions about how personality traits are gendered and how gender impacts perceptions of leader effectiveness.

The benefits of gender diversity in the workplace are well-established. Consequently, many organizations have policies or programs in place to encourage hiring women. Despite this, the gender gap remains, particularly in terms of compensation and promotion and progress appears slow. This paper aims to examine the benefits of gender diversity and common approaches to enhance it. It then reviews lessons from global research and suggests applications.

This practitioner study reviews the literature to identify arguments for gender equality in the workplace, progress in gender equality and common organizational approaches to equality. It presents snapshots of two global studies examining gender equality. It draws implications and applications from these studies.

Gender equality remains elusive and difficult to achieve despite efforts on the part of leaders to encourage it. Insights from research provide compelling reasons in terms of organizational outcomes for female hiring, development and promotion. Additionally, insights into organizational culture help leaders identify barriers to gender equality.

This paper presents insights into the need for and benefits of gender equality in organizations. A review of two global studies provides compelling reasons for leaders to recommit themselves to their gender equality and address needed changes in organizational culture.

The COVID-19 pandemic impacted the workplace in significant ways, creating changes in the daily work routines of individuals globally, many of which are likely to be permanent. Women, in particular, were affected by increased childcare responsibilities and faced with decisions about the future of their careers. The purpose of this practitioner article is to present an overview of work-related challenges and opportunities resulting from COVID-19, introduces the concept of family supportive supervisor behaviors (FSSB), and shares ideas for application.

The concept of FSSB offers insights into the role of supervisors in the adoption of family-friendly approaches that not only mitigate the challenges women, and parents in general, face in the workplace but offers organizations the opportunity to assess the degree to which these practices are present and adopt relevant training and policies. The paper examines the literature on FSSB.

The review identifies ways in which organizations can apply FSSB to support women (and all parents) in the workplace. These include a better understanding of the supervisor role, the need to examine policies and practice and make supervisors accountable and direction for FSSB training.

The paper shares key outcomes of FSSB and provides practical ways for its implementation by leaders and managers. It links the challenges and opportunities of COVID-19 to enhanced FSSB practices.

Leaders typically want to be effective and be remembered for their achievements and positive influence. This practitioner study aims to examine theory and research on servant leadership to provide insights into how leaders can address current employment conditions and gender inequities.

This paper examines the key characteristics of servant leadership, compares them to other leadership models, discusses common criticisms and applies the theory to women’s career advancement.

The review identifies the advantages of servant leadership in terms of encouraging leadership development within organizations, particularly for women, to address the broken rung or lack of early career promotion.

The paper shares key characteristics of servant leadership, explores its differences to other leadership models and focuses on practicalities for developing others in the workplace with a particular emphasis on women.

This study offers a global comparative analysis of variables associated with job satisfaction, specifically work-life balance, intrinsic and extrinsic rewards, and work relations on job satisfaction for hotel housekeepers.

The study analyzes these variants across 29 countries using International Social Survey Program data.

Findings indicate significant differences in job satisfaction for hotel housekeepers across countries, lower job satisfaction for hospitality occupations compared to all other occupational categories, lower job satisfaction for hotel housekeepers than employees in other hospitality occupations, and a statistically significant positive impact of some elements of work-life balance, intrinsic and extrinsic rewards, and coworker relations on job satisfaction.

The hospitality industry is characterized by poor work-life balance, high turnover rates and limited rewards. Hotel housekeepers report lower levels of satisfaction than other hospitality workers in terms of work-life balance, pay, relationships with managers, useful work and interesting work. Housekeepers play an important role in hotel quality and guest satisfaction. As such, understanding and addressing factors contributing to job satisfaction for hotel housekeepers is critical for managers

Job satisfaction has positive outcomes for individuals and organizations. These include decreased turnover and conflict, increased productivity, improved work quality and creativity and innovation. Determinants entail work–life balance, advancement and development opportunities, relationships with co-workers and managers, working conditions and intrinsic and extrinsic rewards, among others. Understanding these determinants across workers and contexts is critical for effective management and the achievement of organizational goals. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

This study, based on data from the International Social Survey Program, examines the impact of various aspects of work-life balance, rewards and work relations on job satisfaction across occupations.

Findings indicate more differences than similarities among countries and occupations with workers in managerial and professional positions experiencing the highest job satisfaction levels.

Although extensive research has documented the benefits and determinants of job satisfaction, it has not focused on global comparisons across occupational categories.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to determine if job satisfaction increases with age, and if this is consistent across countries; and second, if individuals belonging to the same age cohort, who experience similar life conditions and events and have been posited to share common attitudes and behaviors, differ in terms of job satisfaction, and if this difference is comparable across countries.

The study provides a comparative analysis of the impact of age and generational differences on job satisfaction globally, based on non-panel longitudinal data from the most recent wave of the International Social Survey Program (Work Orientations IV, 2015).

Age has a positive statistically significant impact on job satisfaction (e.g. the older you get, the more satisfied you are with your job). However, the same analysis with each specific age cohort indicates that age is only statistically significant with the baby boomers. Statistically significant cross-generational differences exist in the levels of job satisfaction across generations and cross-generational differences in the determinants of job satisfaction. Most differences are seen between the silent generation and the other three age cohorts.

Previous comparative studies have found that job satisfaction across generations, even within the same or similar countries, shows little variation. Research measuring the relationship between age and job satisfaction indicates three key contradictory findings – satisfaction increases with age, decreases with age, or no relationship exists. The current large-scale, global study updates and extends previous research by exploring similarities and differences in job satisfaction and work quality characteristics by age cohort, with a global sample.