Exploring Career Pathways: Black Women Business Executives Recount Their Journeys to the Top.

摘要

This qualitative phenomenological study focuses on 13 Black women business executives to understand how they ascended to the C-suite in spite of disparities in corporate America. This study documents their vocational journeys inclusive of career failures and advancements from their own perspectives by asking the question of "how they made it." It also explores more deeply the nuances of career success factors that influenced and shaped their vocational progression in business. This approach allowed the participants to share their experience from their point of view (Moustakas, 1994). This study's semi-structured inquiry allowed the 13 Black women business executives to share their stories in an authentic way of how they achieved, while also offering them a chance to disclose their perceptions of the roles that educational credentialing, networks and social capital, mentorship, sponsorship, and organizational politics success factors played in establishing their executive leadership and climb to the C-suite. Collectively, the 13 Black women business executives represented the following prestigious positions: president, chief financial officer, chief operating officer, vice president, and senior director within the public, private, and governmental sectors. The key findings reveal that these Black women business executives' career paths were very diverse and complicated, yet they committed to their career journeys and endured many personal sacrifices to reach their ultimate executive career goals. The participants divulged new insights into the specific strategies and tactics they used to reach their goals by articulating the necessity for them to: earn multiple degrees, learn multiple languages, foster strong relationships, establish strong performance reputations, build social capital through volunteerism and fellowships, implement multifaceted jobs, develop supportive mentorship and sponsorship from a cross cultural standpoint, and have strong faith and value systems. Even more, the participants' account of perseverance that inspires, encourages, and motivates other talented Black women leaders to have a vision and plan to guide their career goals were paramount for this study.