Herminia Ibarra: Identity and transition in professional careers

The 2017 Clarendon Lectures in Management were delivered by Herminia Ibarra, Professor of Organisational Behaviour and Charles Handy Chair in Organisational Behaviour at London Business School.

Ibarra used this lecture to turn an identity and transition lens to the apparently intractable problem of ensuring a better gender balance at the top of organisations.

She said that we are bombarded with images that suggest that women do not look like leaders. There is even a ‘bronze ceiling’ – a survey of commemorative statues in the UK revealed that women are only featured in statues if they are naked muses, royalty (mainly Queen Victoria), or the mother of God. ‘Wherever we look, we are confronted with the issue that women are not the prototypes of leaders. In business, even though women are entering most industries in large numbers, often 50-50, there is still a big drop-off in the middle.’

Ibarra said that the three approaches for making transitions into more senior roles – redefining work to be more strategic, managing networks, and being more playful with a sense of self – correspond almost exactly to the elements that come together to form second generation bias against women. This is not explicit discrimination – but that ‘something in the water that you can’t quite put your finger on’.