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The paper provides an invited “Viewpoint” from Professor Susan Vinnicombe, along with contributions from Professor Sharon Mavin, on women leaders’ progress on UK company boards and suggests areas for future research.

Draws on data from the annual UK The Female FTSE Board Report (2021) and The Hidden Truth Report (2022), tracking gender diversity on UK company boards. Professor Vinnicombe outlines reflections on progress, and jointly the authors highlight suggested areas for future women-in-leadership research.

The authors argue against the continued use of the business case for gender diversity and suggest a research agenda for future women-in-leadership research concerning: gender-aware Chairs of Boards and Chief Executive Officers and men allies; access and appointment to senior board roles; and bias in senior appointments. We suggest a return to examining barriers to women’s progress in middle management, the role of middle managers/leaders and the uptake and impact of established flexible ways of work at executive levels. New research is possible into how women leaders in top positions have a positive influence on gender diversity yet are discriminated against by various publics. The authors recommend further intersectional research as a priority for women-in-leadership research to enable further theorizing and feminist progress.

Professor Sue Vinnicombe has dedicated her academic career to questioning barriers to women’s progress in management/leadership and actively influencing organisational practice. Sue was influential in the field before her first co-authored papers were published in Women in Management Review (our predecessor) in 2001 and 2002. Professor Sharon Mavin is a previous co-editor of Gender in Management: an international journal. Her first papers were published in Women in Management Review in 1999 and 2001. Sharon is co-editor of the Special Issue, women-in-leadership research and feminist futures: new agendas for feminist research and impact on gender equality.

This study aims to deepen our understanding of how inclusionary practices are used within organizations and how they satisfy specific inclusion needs.

We adopt a qualitative research design, reporting on data from semi-structured interviews conducted with 15 diversity and inclusion (D&I) directors/leads and using a thematic approach to analysis.

Our study expands understanding of inclusion practices, showing that they are not uniformly implemented and that practices may satisfy both needs to belong and differences valued, with interviewees prioritizing belonging. Well-being and career development are seen as important inclusion practices demonstrating support and appreciation of difference, thus as inputs, not outputs, of inclusion challenging existing assumptions. Inclusionary practices are malleable, and their impact depends critically on the leaders involved and their commitment to EDI.

Our study shows how practices satisfy inclusion needs and that the implementation of practices varies depending on the leaders involved.

Personal conceptions of what constitutes a “successful manager” are important, as they influence an individual’s personal development and subsequent careers. This study investigates profiles of “successful managers” held by male and female managers working in ten European banks operating in Luxembourg. Respondents completed the personality attributes questionnaire (PAQ) and took part in semi‐structured interviews. Results are presented from the 66 managers as a group, and by gender. Next, responses are considered from individuals within three of those banks, chosen by position of the owning/originating country on Hofstede’s masculinity/femininity scale, to see whether differences in perceived successful leadership styles exist between the banks in accordance with Hofstede’s research. Results indicated that gender differences were more significant than nationality of the bank in determining perceptions of “the successful manager”.

This paper reports an interview study with 12 directors in a major international telecommunications company, to identify the career paths which they took to reach board level in their organisation. The aim was to ascertain whether there were gender differences in the career facilitators and barriers met en route to the top. The six male and six female directors were asked about the further obstacles which they perceived would have to be faced. Visibility through mentoring and challenge was the facilitator which led to success in their earlier careers. Using Kirchmeyer’s classification, evidence was found to support her four categories of barriers in this UK sample: human capital (lack of qualifications and languages in a globalised world); individual (being aggressive, being female, impostor syndrome); interpersonal (gaining entry to organisational politics); and family determinants. For both men and women, family roles impacted their energy levels at work. It was found that the career hurdles and facilitators were very similar for both men and women directors.

Females now comprise just over half of the workforce in the UK financial services sector. This paper aims to report on the current position relating to factors that are facilitating and inhibiting women from moving into middle and senior levels of management within the financial services sector.

A comparative analysis of four case studies from a cross‐section of the financial services industry is presented, each compiled using interviews with male and female senior and middle managers, and gender‐defined focus groups usually of employees who are in the promotion pipeline.

Despite progress in the case study organisations, both men and women concur that females encounter more barriers to career progression in the industry than men and that these relate primarily to a long hours culture and networking. This leads some women to exclude themselves from working in certain parts of the industry, such as corporate banking. Further, this aspect of the industry culture tends to permeate into areas of the industry where these activities are less important for fostering client relationships.

The research implies that the industry needs to do more to make networking events and activities more gender neutral. Additionally, as more women move up the career pipeline, they should be encouraged to access networks that tap into their equivalent “female networks”.

The paper provides a current picture of managerial working life in the UK financial services industry and provides empirical evidence of the managerial work cultures within the sector.

The purpose of this study was to determine if perceptions that women and men hold toward careers in information technology (IT) and toward women working in IT create potential barriers that may prevent women managers from pursuing careers in IT.

A field study was designed to test the hypotheses. The subjects were graduate students pursuing either an MBA or IT management degree.

The results revealed that males had greater self‐efficacy for IT occupations, greater passion for computing, and less positive attitudes toward capabilities of women in IT. Our prediction that career barriers would intensify for women who chose an IT management option was not supported. These findings suggest that traditional work role expectations concerning women's efficacy for careers in IT still persist.

This research was limited by its focus on subjects in the early stages of a management career. To gain a better understanding of the barriers that women face in IT career fields, longitudinal studies are needed to track these barriers throughout the career development process.

If organisations want to attract, retain, and advance women managers in IT fields, they must proactively address gender role biases and create work environments that build self‐efficacy expectations for women, as well as for men.

Much of the research on career barriers women face in IT is based on qualitative studies and anecdotal evidence. This study provides empirical evidence that barriers still exist for women in IT despite the enhanced demand for IT professionals and managers over the past decade.

Women have different managerial styles than men: they are more co‐operative, prefer creative involvement to administrative disengagement and are personal rather than detached … or such are the stereotypes. Now Dr Susan Vinnicombe has something more substantial to say about women's different qualities as managers. She reports here on research she conducted at Cranfield School of Management which reveals how women differ from men as managers.

This collection seeks to examine the various challenges women face in advancing their careers.

In the mid‐1980s, the phrase “glass ceiling” was coined and has since become an established part of our vocabulary. The glass ceiling refers to an invisible but impermeable barrier that limits the career advancement of women. During the last two decades, women have made progress: there are now more women in senior‐level executive jobs, more women in “clout jobs”, more women CEOs, and more women on corporate boards of directors. But real progress has been slow with only modest increases shown at these levels.

The slow progress made by talented, educated, ambitious women is now having some negative effects on women's views of management and the professions as a career. However, artificially limiting the career possibilities of women is a luxury organizations can no longer afford. Organizations are facing an impending shortage of qualified leaders. The aging of the workforce, a smaller number of new workforce entrants, and the war for talent, makes it imperative that organizations utilize and develop the talents of all their employees.

This collection examines the various challenges women face in their careers. The contributors come from a number of different countries, indicating the widespread interest in this topic in all developed and developing countries.