Metaphors and meaning

Describes how women can be penalized for showing traditional leadership qualities (e.g. assertiveness) and/or advocacy for the advancement of women.

Explains how women can face obstacles obtaining entry-level leadership and subsequent managerial positions, even though the top may be visible or within reach.

Applies to unfair and unwelcoming workplace environments that undervalue and restrict women who show behaviours such as assertiveness, while celebrating or promoting men for similar behaviours.

Refers to “codes” that are required at various layers of the organization (e.g. employment, informal relationships, and advancement) to navigate the limited opportunities for progress in women’s careers. This speaks to the challenges of different marginalized communities and the multiple layers of their identity.

Illustrates an invisible barrier that limits, hinders, and/or prevents women’s advancement beyond a certain level within an organization.

Addresses how women are often promoted into leadership during precarious times. For example, when companies are struggling, they will assign a woman to the top where the chances of success are minimal.

Describes the (often invisible) barriers that women experience when applying for roles, and the challenges they face even before they are hired by an organization.

Explains how men have more opportunities and a fast track for promotion in fields typically performed by women (e.g. nursing and teaching), while women face slow and lengthy opportunities for promotion in the same fields.

This metaphor is commonly used in two ways: to describe how employees with less education at lower levels of the organization have fewer opportunities for promotion (and is typically gendered, affecting women); and how people of privilege (white men in particular) are less likely to fall to lower positions.

Describes how women have fewer opportunities for horizontal movement across the organization, affecting their ability to change roles and access new opportunities.

Speaks to the challenges women face navigating traditional career trajectories while simultaneously experiencing shifting patterns in their careers and personal lives.

Applies to the multiple challenges women experience in career advancement and the number of barriers they face at every step.

Examines how women leave at different stages of their careers and/or academic journey (particularly in STEM), resulting in overrepresentation of men at the higher levels of their fields. This is often paired with little discussion on the lack of support for the personal lives of women (e.g. no maternity leave, limited childcare resources, fewer opportunities for advancement).

Speaks to challenges pregnant women and mothers face in both hiring and promotion based on a bias or assumption that they will be less committed to their organization and career due to caregiving responsibilities.

Based on a biblical reference, it illustrates how individuals who experience early success and advantage disproportionately gain access to more advantages and opportunities over time. In the workplace, initial privileges enjoyed by men contribute to increasing inequality, perpetuating and amplifying further advantages for men in the future.

Pertains to women who, once in a position of power, may act as barriers that prevent other women from entering leadership or achieving success.

Explains the unequal balance of work and unpaid labour that women perform in the home.

Describes the extra scrutiny women often experience compared to male counterparts who perform the same role.

Refers to the phenomenon of women being held back at low-paid positions, with limited opportunities for advancement.

Considers career advancement as a series of increasingly competitive promotions that disadvantage women who lack early success and participation in the kinds of high-visibility initiatives that are crucial to progression. As a result, women are often restricted to consolation prizes (ie. May be promoted, but never to the top; may get a raise, but never highest paid).