Think crisis - think female? An evaluation of psychological and structural processes behind the glass cliff effect.

This paper will examine the social and psychological processes underlying the glass cliff phenomenon.This describes the tendency to preferentially place female managers in positions that have an elevated likelihood of failure. It will put forward existing evidence within the literature to challenge the notion, put forward by Judge (2003), that women are placed in desirable leadership positions and are responsible for the subsequent downfall of the company, or that they voluntary elect to hold positions which are doomed to failure. Further evidence that the glass cliff exists due to various underlying processes will be provided by an interview with a senior academic from the University of Exeter who was placed in a glass cliff position herself. The paper discusses each proposed underlying process in turn and debates the merit of each, before concluding by offering a number of solutions to the problem.