Women as organisational change agents

Abstract

This is a book about women, their work organisations, and change. It focuses on the strategies which women develop in order to survive, develop and progress in gendered organisational life, and by which women may become organisational change agents. The increasing movement of women into the labour market is in itself a significant source of change. Just by ‘being there’ women inevitably bring new and different perspectives on employment issues and so become catalysts for change within their organisations. In this book our main exploration is of women’s own agency: ways in which women themselves assess their position and role in their work organisations, how they cope with gender politics and work out and negotiate ways and means of progressing their own, and perhaps a wider, more ‘women-friendly’ organisational agenda. Our enquiry is set within the context of recent significant restructuring of work and work organisations; the product of wider social, political and economic changes. Thus change, and the opportunities and challenges it offers to women and men, supplies the main underpinning theme throughout the studies in this book. However, the book’s major concern is with the impact of women as active ‘change agents’ within organisations.¹