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categories of challenges exist that inhibit the opportunities, perspective, and
willingness of some women to step into leadership positions. I have character-
ized these categories of career perception factors as cultural, individual, and
organizational ( Figure 3.1 ). These categories have an individual and synergistic
impact on our likelihood for pursuing and achieving leadership goals in a career.
Additionally, the degree to which each factor will impact a woman's career
varies from a societal, organizational, and individual perspective. The key is to
recognize and manage these factors. This pyramid of career perception factors
(see Figure 3.1 ) must be managed throughout the life of your career, and each
will require varying levels of focus depending on the phase of your career path
you find yourself in in a given season. These three categories can be further
defined as follows:
Cultural factors that influence our perspectives are feedback, relationships,
and experiences in our environment (country, region, and home). This includes
observations and our exposure to those factors that represent the cultural
norms for the environment.
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Individual factors are a function of our personality, our responses to the cul-
tural factors, experiences, and feedback we received for select behavior. This
is the area where we have the most control if we recognize that our perceptions
are not working to support the attainment of our goals.
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Organizational factors are a function of the career environment (e.g., aca-
demia) that we select and the career path within that environment (e.g.,
administration) to determine the organizational culture and how it will
impact our career goals. To understand organizational factors, they should
be studied with an in-depth view to fully understand the perception and
align with opportunities that you will be seeking in your tenure within the
organization.
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While a vast body of knowledge exists to provide an understanding of how
to mitigate the impact of the conditions created by the organizational, cultural,
and individual categories, we will briefly discuss each and focus most of our
energy on the category that we have the most control over - the individual
factors.
Organizational
Individual
Cultural
FIGURE 3.1 Career perception factors
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