Gender‐Related Opportunities and Turnover: The Case of Medical Sector Employees

Abstract

This study examined the relationships between gender, objective and perceived work-related opportunities, and turnover behavior. This was achieved using an interdisciplinary approach that combined the macrolevel perspective on opportunities in internal and external labor markets, with the micro-level perspective of individual perceptions of opportunities. The results revealed that the opportunities-turnover linkage is gender-specific rather than gender-neutral. Women's turnover behavior was affected by their 'perception' of employment opportunities in the organizational and local labor markets. By contrast, men's turnover behavior was affected by 'objective', organizational and local labor market conditions. These findings indicate that the objective opportunities of the work market may be compatible with men's, but not women's, work needs and hence question existing assumptions of a 'gender-neutral' effect of opportunities on turnover decisions.Keywords: gender, turnover, subjective and objective opportunities G ender differences in work patterns and outcomes have intrigued social scientists for the greater part of the present century. Abundant research repeatedly suggests that unraveling the differential impact of gender-related and work-related factors on employee turnover is difficult due to the complex interrelations among these factors. Gender is a broad proxy for a host of employment-related components such as the nature of the work, the work-family fit, and the structure of work-related opportunities. Indeed, many studies have emphasized that women are more susceptible than men to withdraw from their positions due to family responsibilities, lack of flexible work schedules, and/or their dissatisfaction with work conditions (e.g.

‘The Best Time is Now!’: The Temporal and Spatial Dynamics of Women Opting in to Self‐Employment

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Female Perceptions of Organizational Justice

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