An early view of the barriers to entry and career development in Building Engineering

Abstract

The construction sector plays an important role in the global economy since it generates approximately 10% of the world GDP and employs around 7% of the workforce. Professional profiles for building engineers and barriers they may encounter when accessing the labor market as well as in their career development in the sector are researched. Having identified some variables as relevant barriers, this empirical research is exploratory in nature and adopts a descriptive and inferential approach, in order to analyze the influence of gender in the perception of barriers in two Spanish universities. Results show more difficult working circumstances for women, which allows us to reflect on the consequences of these early perceptions on the career development of the next generation of both male and female building engineers.

Inequalities in the Exercise and Continuity in Building Engineering in Spain. Factor Analysis Including Gender Perspective

“…Globally, the construction sector is one of the most important at the economic level. It represents about 10% of global gross domestic product (GDP) and 7% of worldwide job positions [2]. In a European context, the GDP rate stands at around 5% in almost all countries in 2019 [3].…”

“…However, despite endeavors to reach gender equality into the labour world, research shows that there is still a long way to go in order to attain this aim [2,4,7,[12][13][14]. At a global level, it is one of the sectors with the lowest women's participation rate [4,7,8,13,15,16].…”

“…This approach associates the work in the construction sector with men, because of the strength, whereas jobs related to childcare are strongly associated with women because of affection, care or empathy, features deemed "distinctive and innate" among women [10,15,[22][23][24]. What is feminine, linked to care, finds no expression on the construction site, a place considered rough and dirty, that is, an inappropriate place for women and femininity [2,4,13,25]. The assignment of roles is a learning process that has taken place since childhood and has implications in the choice of hobbies and field of studies.…”

“…Research highlights most of these barriers as being related to the unique characteristics of the construction sector. These characteristics, that are adjusted to a work-life balance model suitable for those without domestic and family responsibilities, include long working hours, inflexible work schedule, face-to-face work format and nomadic nature [2,6,13,22,25]. Family life, maternity, reconciliation of family life or double working shift (on the one hand, the unpaid domestic labour; on the other, the gainful professional experience) represent one of the biggest impediments for women in the exercise and continuity in this profession.…”

“…These responsibilities will involve career breaks as women feel the pressure to choose between their professional career or starting a family. Furthermore, the fear of losing their job or the fact of lagging behind in their professional development are incurred by these breaks [2,10,13,22,27,28].…”