Of being a container through role definitions: Voices from women leaders in organisational autoethnography
Journal of Organizational Ethnography
ISSN: 2046-6749
Article publication date: 13 August 2018
Issue publication date: 26 September 2018
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to reflect critically on the roles that women leaders in higher education institutions (HEIs) take on. Therefore, a systems psychodynamic view is used from a theoretical stance, while an autoethnographical methodology is applied to provide an in-depth emic view of, and reflections on, women leaders’ roles in the described context.
Design/methodology/approach
The study draws on the authors’ personal and organisational autoethnographical experiences as women leaders in HEIs in South Africa. Two women of different background reflect on their roles, and on becoming “containers” for certain issues within the described context over a period of time.
Findings
The autoethnographies show the roles women leaders take on within the organisations and how this relates to becoming a container for issues and underlying anxieties and fears that arise within the South African higher education system. The women leaders take on roles which contain fear and insecurities with regard to racial belonging, segregation and inclusion, national belonging, gendered roles, marginalisation and connection through self and others, authority and decision making.
Research limitations/implications
The study is limited to autoethnographic experience descriptions of two academic women working in post-apartheid South African HEIs.
Practical implications
Presenting the self-described roles of two academics, the paper provides a critical perspective on issues of racialised and gendered roles, marginalisation and inclusion, authority and decision making, workplace stereotyping, gendering and racism, and thereby increases awareness about the impact of roles within the system’s context.
Originality/value
Presenting the self-described roles of two academics, the paper provides a critical perspective on issues of racialised and gendered roles, marginalisation and inclusion, authority and decision making, workplace stereotyping, gendering and racism, and thereby increases awareness about the impact of roles within the system’s context.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank all of the authors’ (previous) colleagues who were part of the authors’ reflections, ideas and experiences in the organisational contexts the authors describe. The authors would like to thank all of them for sharing their systemic insights, for discussing and containing the authors’ thoughts and feelings on meta-cognitive levels and in critical and in-depth ways.
Citation
Mayer, C.-H. and May, M. (2018), "Of being a container through role definitions: Voices from women leaders in organisational autoethnography", Journal of Organizational Ethnography, Vol. 7 No. 3, pp. 373-387. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOE-10-2017-0052
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited