The Phenomenon of Women in Managerial Positions in Public Cultural Institutions

Abstract

The purpose of this paper was to explore the organisation of a support system for the professional development of women in public cultural institutions. The deliberations in this paper are based on qualitative research. The research included biographical interviews with ten women who currently work in managerial positions in public cultural institutions in Poland. This research strategy made it possible to get to know the experiences of women who reached managerial positions in their professional career in culture and to attempt an explanation of the observed phenomena as they are seen by people who were part of the system. Research has shown that the support system for the professional development of women in public cultural institutions seems to be largely based on informal solutions initiated within the personal support networks of women who are part of the system, its foundation being interpersonal relations. The main contribution of the paper is the interesting dataset gathered. Moreover, the proposed rhizome metaphor enriches the field of organizational research by suggesting new ideas that contribute to expanding on how we can see and perceive the complexity and variation in organizational phenomena of women in leadership positions and therefore opening up new interpretations and directions.