Int. j. econ. manag. soc. sci., Vol(3), No (6), June, 2014. pp.

343-347

TI Journals

International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences

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ISSN:
2306-7276

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Women Roles in Iranian Organizations

Maryam Akbaryan
M.A. in Women Study & B.S. in Midwifery, Tonekabon Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tonekabon, Iran.
*Corresponding author: M.Akbaryan@yahoo.com

Keywords

Abstract

Glass Ceiling
Organizational Power
Organizational Structure
Organizational Culture
Oriented Job Beliefs

The present study attempted to investigate the women roles in Iranian organizations. Thus, four main
variables (organizational power, organizational structure, organizational culture and job beliefs were
analyzed in forming eight correlation hypotheses. Also, based on the simple random sampling 21
organizations were selected as the samples of the study. The data collection was conducted using
validated questionnaires for measuring the glass ceiling and sociological analysis of the organization.
The data analyzed by Pearson correlation and regression methods. Inferentially, the results demonstrated
an incomplete and reverse sort of correlation between the glass ceiling situation and the professional
power, the open structure, the female-oriented organizational culture, and the superior-female job
belief. Further, there is correlation between the glass ceiling situation and the relationship power, the
closed structure, the male-oriented gender culture, and the supreme-male job belief. The regression
analysis also showed that although the four variables of closed structure, male-oriented culture, femaleoriented job belief, and male-oriented job belief, correlate significantly with the criterion variable of
glass ceiling; they are not significant enough to predict the dependent variable. However, the
organizational power, as the independent variable was valid enough for predicting glass ceiling as a
dependent variable.

1. Introduction
The matter of the active participation of the women in the process of the individual and social decision makings is an example of the
important discussion in the new millennium. Even though, there exists very much documentation historically in order to invoke in this
regards, the evidences show that there has been still remained unknown its extensive dimensions.
As we know, the purpose of the management in each organization is ever that it manages the individuals in such a way that they allocate the
maximum efficiency to the organization. Therefore, this legal authority is a part of the collection of the power which the manager requires
it in order to execute the affairs of the management.
Of the most important problems which the organizations are gotten involved it constantly, is that who must be in charge of the management
to be able to benefit from the administrative authorities and the power of attracting the cooperation of the others. Always a man and a
woman is the candidate of attaining the management position and generally, this weight locates in the scale try of the man and leads to his
victory. The fact suggests that the rate of the presence of the women in the managerial rank, whether macro management or
micromanagement, is very negligible. The available statistics shows that the women constitute about 32.08% of the employed personnel's
of the sector of being the subject to the law of the country employment. How the women is to be distributed in the ministries is in such a
way that 72.36% in the ministry of the education about 16.6% in the ministry of the health, and almost 11.04% in other ministries are
employing (The statistical calendar of the country). The accumulation of the women in tow ministries of the education and health (almost
90%) shows the lack of the diversity of the available occupation mobility of the women considering the limitation of the vocations of these
two ministries.
In order to describe this situation, the metaphor of the "Glass walls" has been used in the management literature which means the vertical
invisible obstacles and they are shaped based upon the gender separation of the occupations. On the other hand, there exists the
impenetrable obstacle in the organization which prevents from the promotion of the women beyond the determined limit which this status is
known as the "Glass Ceiling" idiomatically.
The women are prohibited extensively to ascend the high levels of the management because of the existence of this obstacle. The Glass
Walls prevent from the employing mobility, and the Glass Ceiling prohibited from the occupational promotion of the women in the
organizations.
The glass ceiling may act in each level of the organizational pyramid and prevent from the presence of the women in the ranks of the
operational, medial or high management. The more in creases the level of the management, the more becomes its importance in the policymaking and determination of the strategically policy and, following it, the glass ceiling becomes thicker and more impenetrable.
The existence of the walls and the glass ceiling has caused that the participation of the women in the managerial levels finds an abnormal
and sickly state. This issue has led to that the thinking and intellectual and professional powers and the managerial capabilities of the
women are not to be used appropriately and, thus, our developing society gets into the damages and losses[38].
The glass ceiling phenomenon is an example among the concepts which have been effective in the conceptualization of the obstacles of
achieving the comprehensive participation of the formal organizations, in clouding in the text of the formal organizations. On the basis of
the researches, the women being to grow and proliferate in keeping step with the men after entering into the organizations and pass the
different levels of the organization.
But, the more the women reach to the higher organizational levels, the more their growth speed and promotion reduce; So far as, the
invisible agents prevents them from gaining access to the high level occupations of the organization. These invisible agents are known as
"Glass Ceiling". This idiom shows the place in the organization which there is not a clear reason on that the women could not get access to
it; but, in fact, the gaining access of the women to it is not possible. Looking at the higher level of the organization from among this glass
ceiling, the deserving/ competent and powerful women observe the positions where they are competent to reach them. But, they are not able

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International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences Vol(3), No (6), June, 2014.

to break this glass ceiling because of the invisible domes. The identification of the nature of these invisible agents has been taken into the
consideration by the researchers in the recent decades. But, more conducted studies have tried to look at this phenomenon from the view
point of the individual psychology and the out-of-organization agents. In fact, these researches have emphasized on two basic domains. The
first approach is internal-oriented, centered individual and gender-oriented one and studies the internal viable of the women, themselves,
including the psychological-social agents.
The second approach is external and consists of those variables which are external compared to the individual, such as the structural and
positional agents[24&8&2].
In the internal approach, the studies such as the manager women, pay attention to the patterns of becoming sociable in the childhood and
reason that the women force them to show the attributes and behaviors which don't help their success and promotion to the managerial
posts[24&12]. On the basis of this view point, the women have become sociable to obtain the attributes which are in contradiction with the
managerial function[8&20]. Because the problem relates to the women, its solution for the women will be that they try to neutralize the
method of their inappropriate socialization and learn the behaviors that leads to the occupational improvement. This view point was
followed by the plentiful studies dealt with the gender differences among the female and male managers.
In the second approach, the vision angle becomes reverse. Here, the women are no more blamable; but, the external agents blame for the
sin.
The most famous appearance of this theory relates to the Kanter (1977). In his book, the women and men of the institute, he claimed that
the organizational structure defines the attributes and the behavior of the women and shapes it.
The Status of the individual in the organization space, the rate of the power they have in their own job and the quantitative distribution of
the women in these jobs are the sample variables which are construed as vital in the gaining access of the women to the higher levels.

2. Materials and methods

2.1 The theoretical framework of the research
As it is noted in the bases and principles, the discipline realm of the current research is the knowledge of the organizational sociology and it
has been tried based upon this approach so that the sociological analysis of the glass ceiling phenomenon is to be focused on the subjects,
including the structure of the organizational interactions, the gender culture of the organization and the job beliefs. The theoretical frame
works of the research have been made based on these orientations.
The available studies regarding the organizational power source show that two sources, namely, power based upon the profession and the
power based upon the relationship have had the most prominent effects on the glass ceiling phenomenon. The fourteen-fold division of the
power sources of the Morgan (1986), theory of the distinction of the power base and the power source of the Bacharach and lower (1980),
theory of the relationship of the production tools and power of Dahrendorf (1959), theory of the exchanging value of the power by Parsons
(1968), theory of the relationships of the individual attractions and power by Scott (1995) and the theory of the relationship of the
organizational power type and the nature of the societies by French and Raven (1968) have been the most principal theories in the
compilation of theoretical framework of the current research regarding the variables of the organizational power source and glass ceiling
phenomenon[11].
In connection with the organizational interaction structure and the glass ceiling phenomenon, the most important division is the
classification of the organizational interactions structure in two forms of the open and closed structure.
In this regards, theory of the effect of the mental method of the social interaction by max Webber (1947), theory of the tertiary divisions by
Presthus (1962) from the employees of the complex organizations, the combined theory of the internationalism and the local peoples of the
Merton and Gouldner (1957), theory of the influence of the gender on the organizational life by R. M. Kanter (1977), theory of the
interactional values of Helegson (1990), theory of the molded interactions by Mumby and Putnam (1992), the theory of the mechanical and
organically systems by Burns and Klaussner (1961) have been the most principal theories in the compilation of the theoretical frame work
of the current research regarding variable of the organizational interaction structure and the glass ceiling phenomenon.
In connection with the gender culture relationships of the organization and the glass ceiling phenomenon, the most predominant approaches
are based upon the female-oriented gender culture and the male-oriented gender culture. The theory of the quadruple factors of the cultural
distinction of Hofsted (1994), the theory of the importance of the cultural phenomenon in the analysis of the organizational culture by
Schein (1996) have been the most principal theories in the compilation of the theoretical framework of the current research regarding the
variable of the gender culture of the organization and the glass ceiling phenomenon[9].
In connection with the relationships among the occupational beliefs depending on the gender and the glass ceiling phenomenon, the
supreme female and male gender beliefs have been reported as one of the most prevalent dualities. In this regards, the findings of the Bass,
Krusell and Alexander (1971) regarding the effect of the stereotypes on the behavior, the theory of the stereotype of the supportability of
the women by the Ott and Shafritz (2000), the theory of the effect of the prejudgments on the introduction of the groups of Larwood,
Guttek and Gattiker (1984), Morisson (1992), the theory of the inevitability of the stereotypical perceptions of the Sherman and et al (1998)
and Kawakami and Dovidio (2001) and the theory of the distinction of the style and the ability of the female and male leadership by the
Master (1989), Trujillo and Sanchez (1992) have been the most theoretical framework of this variable.
In this research, four variables, namely, the organizational power source, the organizational interaction structure, the organizational gender
culture and the gender-oriented job beliefs were generally taken into consideration as the main variables of the analysis from the view point
of the organizational sociology and according to the theoretical bases of the research. The main purpose of the research has been the
consideration the relationships among the organizational variables with the glass ceiling.
2.2 Method
The research is descriptive, of the correlation type. The governmental organizations and their managers were selected as the research
society. On the basis of the Morgan's table and by using the simple random sampling, 21 organizations and 360 managers were chosen as
the sample of the research. In this research, two tools, namely, the questionnaire of the assessment of the glass ceiling ( = 0.84) and the
questionnaire of the sociological analysis of the organization ( = 0.82) have been used in order to collect the data.
The indexes of the central statistics have been used in order to analyze the data descriptively, and the regression analyses have been used to
analyze the hypotheses of the research inferential.

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International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences Vol(3), No (6), June, 2014.

3. Results
The descriptive finding are estimated and reported in table 1.
Table1. Descriptive Statistics of the research variables (N=21)
variables
Mean
Std. Deviation
GC
72.32
10.27
OPP
9.63
4.75
OPR
9.88
4.87
OIO
9.55
4.86
OIC
10.44
4.86
OGCF
9.38
4.95
OGCM
10.61
4.95
GJBF
9.75
4.60
GJBM
10.27
4.64
According to the data of the table 1, it has been reported in the organization that the average glass ceiling is 72. 32 which is follow by the
standard deviation of 10.28.
According to the data, the means of patriarchy variables are high. But it is necessary that the inferential analyses are to be done in order to
estimate the signification of these differences.
The first hypothesis: There are relationship between the components organization and the glass ceiling phenomenon.
This general hypothesis consists of 8 sub hypotheses. Considering that we are faced with two attached interval variables of the correlative
type in all hypotheses, the Pearson statistics was used in order to test the hypotheses of the research. Table 2 indicates a summary of the
result of the operations relating to the correlative analysis of 8 sub hypotheses of research.
Table 2. A summary of the Pearson correlation statistics, (N= 21)
The independent variables
Pearson correlation coefficient
organizational power resulting from the profession
-0/927
organizational power resulting from the relationship
-0/927
open organizational interaction structure
-0/910
closed organizational interaction structure
-0/910
Female-oriented organizational culture
-0/914
Male-oriented organizational culture
-0/914
Superior-female job belief
-0/863
Superior-male job belief
0/861

Sig.
0/000
0/000
0/000
0/000
0/000
0/000
0/000
0/000

The dependant variable: Glass Ceiling

In this table, the quantity of the obtained p-values is < 0.05 in the all cases.
There are an incomplete and negative correlation between the organizational components and the glass ceiling situation of that
organization. Therefore, it can be interpreted that the rate of the glass ceiling will be decreased relatively by increasing the rate of
organizational components.
The second hypothesis: It seems that the sociological factors of the organization which have been studied in this research possess the
required ability to predict and explicate up to a limit the glass ceiling phenomenon.
After estimating the separate correlations of the independent variables and dependant variable of the research, It was necessary, according
to the fifth hypothesis of the research, the ability of the prediction of the dependant variable based upon the in dependant variables is to
calculated in the whole condition and by the simultaneous entering of the variables into an appropriate statistics. Certainly, the most
appropriate statistics for the accomplishment of this purpose is the regression equation.
In the second step, on the basis of the customary method of ENTER , the research variables entered together into the regression equation in
the separation of the variable criterion and predictor table No 3 shows the criterion variables and the predictor entered into the regression
equation.
As it is noted, according to the enter mode, of 8 eight variables of the sociological analysis, five variables have entered into the model and
three variable have omitted from the model.

Model
1

Table3. The entered and removed variables

Variables Entered
Variables Removed
GJBM, OIC, OPR, OGCM, GJBF
OPP, OIO , OGCF

Method
Enter

Dependent Variable: GC

Therefore, the analysis of the regression equation is to be conducted on the five remained variables. Table 3 displays the criterion variables
and the predictor entered into the regression equation and table 4 shows the summary of the analysis.

Model
1

R
.938a

Table4. A summary of the analysis of the regression equation

R Square
Adjusted R Square
.880
.840

Predictors (Constant): GIBM, OIC, OPR, OGOM, GIBF

Std. Error of the Estimate

4.10808

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346

International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences Vol(3), No (6), June, 2014.

According to the data of the table 6, the quantity of the estimated regression shows that about 94% of the dispersion observed in the
criterion variable, i.e., the glass ceiling, is to be explicated by the predictor variables. The specifying coefficient of 0/880 also indicates that
the suggested model based upon the variables of the research is of a good proportion. But, it is necessary that the meaning fullness or the
significance of the model is to be calculated.
In the process of the regression analysis, the most appropriate statistics in order to estimate the significance of the predicted relationships is
the analysis of the variance. The ANOVA tables test simultaneously a few equal null hypotheses. Firstly, there is not a linear relation
between the criterion variable and the predictor variables in the desired society. Secondly, all the separated regression coefficients are zero
in the desired society and, finally, the quantity of the multiple regression square roots is zero in the desired society. Testing of these
hypotheses is too conducted on the basis of the ratio of the average square of the regression and the remained average which is determined
by the F proportion. The table 5 shows the data of this estimation.

Model
Regression
Residual
Total

Table5. The analysis of the variance of the total regression coefficient

Sum of Squares
df
Mean Square
F
1858.794
5
371.759
253.145
15
16.876
22.028
2111.938
20

Sig.
.000a

a. Predictors (Constant): GIBM, OIC, OPR, OGOM, GIBF

b. Dependent Variable: GC

Considering that the observed significance level is less than 0.001, we can deny this hypothesis that there is not a linear relation between
the criterion variable and the predictor variables and, at least, one of the regression coefficients of the society is not zero. Considering the
rejection of the null hypothesis, it is necessary that the related quantity is to be estimated to evaluate the share of each of the variables in the
suggested model. The Beta coefficient is the best statistical model for the achievement of this purpose. According to this model, the greater
numbers show that a unit of the change has an intense effect on the criterion variable in the predictor variables. Table 6 indicates the data
resulting from the estimation of the share of the variables. According to the hinted table, the relationships among the quantities of t and sig.
refer briefly to the effect of each one of the predictor variables. In fact, greater t and the lower p, show that the predictor variable has the
more intensive effect on the criterion variable.

(Constant)
OPR
OIC
OGOM
GIBF
GIBM

Table6. The Coefficients for the variables which predict the variable of the glass ceiling
Unstandardized
Standardized
t
Coefficients
Coefficients
B
Std. Error
Beta
122.826
162.533
.756
2.309
.988
1.069
2.338
-.806
1.731
-.382
-.466
1.374
1.733
.663
.793
-3.550
8.155
-1.590
-.435
-4.474
7.960
-2.023
-.562

Sig.
.462
.034
.648
.440
.670
.582

Dependent Variable: GC

The inserted data in the table 8 show that, of 5 predicting variables which have entered into the equation of the regression analysis, 4
variables, namely, the closed organizational interaction structure (t = 0.466), the male-oriented organizational culture (t = 0.793), the
superior female job belief, (t = -1.590) and the superior male job belief (t = -2.023) are not benefited from the reliable level to predict the
dependant variable, even though they have the significant correlation with the variable of the glass ceiling criterion. But, the dependant
variable of the "the organizational power resulting from the relationship" is a reliable predictor for the variable of the "glass ceiling" by t
being equal to 2.338 in the significance of 0.05.

4. Discussion and Conclusion

The idiom of the "Glass ceiling" was used for the first time in order to refer to the invisible obstacles, which create the obstacles in the
improvement of the women at their occupational situations (Baker and lighter, 2001). After developing this idiom, the other concepts such
as "the Glass Wall", "the Glass Crag" and "the Glass Fence" have been added to the literature of this phenomenon as well. In the recent
years, this phenomenon has been studied extensively from the view point of the political and social dimensions and taken into the
consideration as an important index to evaluate the development of the countries in the report of the international assemblies. In our
country, the researchers of the studying domains of the women have been interested in the "Glass Ceiling" phenomenon as well and the
valuable researchers have been conducted in this regard. Most of these studies have been focusing on the governmental organizations, and
the private organizations have been less taken into consideration. On the other hand, it seem that the studies which have conducted in the
country have been lacked the well-organized and coherent approach in this regard. The evidences show that the most of these researches
have been organized by the political motivations which have admitted since earlier.
Within the recent decades, very much research has tried to explicate the glass ceiling phenomenon and some researchers have reported
similar results which are oriented together with finding of the current research. For example in relation to Organizational Power
Saroukhani (2005) , Saroukhani and Amir panahi (2006), Kanter(1997), Wajcman(1998), Sinclair (1988); in relation to Organizational
Interaction Structure Kanter (1977), Saroukhani and Rafatjah (2004), Purezzat and the colleagues (2007), Gholamabbas Tavassoli (1997),
Catalyst (1993), Riger and Galligan (1988); in relation to Gender Oriented of Job Belief Baas, Krusell and Alexander (1971),Zahedi
(2003),Gholipour and the colleagues (2007) Seyed Javaddin and the colleagues (2008); and in relation to Gender Culture of Organization
Hofsted (1993), Gholipour (2007), Smith (1990), Poston (1989), Mudler (1983) and Sayre (1986), Zahedi (2003).

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International Journal of Economy, Management and Social Sciences Vol(3), No (6), June, 2014.

Although overall findings of this study has many similarities with the findings of other researchers, but the differences can be observed
both in terms of methodology and explanation that makes it distinct from other research findings.
Methodologically, far less study has been reported that organizational sociology approach studied the phenomenon of the glass ceiling. The
study has also compiled a variety of organizational variables simultaneously, which in turn is closer to reality of multivariate social science
studies. On the other hand, the findings of this study also reported that the correlation between these variables with the glass ceiling
phenomenon is significant, and at the same time shown that the most important variable in defining the glass ceiling phenomenon is
organizational power source.
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