The Consequences for Women in the Academic Profession of the Widespread Use of Fixed Term Contracts

Abstract

Women have been disadvantaged within the academic profession due to its gendered nature. Some commentators have alleged that temporary contracts may create opportunities for women and that women exhibit a stronger preference for such contracts than men. Over recent years, there has been a sharp rise in the proportion of academic staff employed on fixed term contracts in UK universities. This article examines whether the consequence of this has been to create a bridge for women, leading into and upwards within the profession, or a trap. Drawing on new empirical evidence gathered from academic staff, the conclusions are that segregation is decreasing slowly, but not because of fixed term contracts, and that fixed term contracts create traps and profound disadvantages for both sexes. Women are slightly disadvantaged by forms of patronage that operate to permit some fixed term staff to gain more secure posts. Moreover, relative to men, these professional women neither gain nor perceive any comparative benefits from fixed term contracts as opposed to open-ended contracts.

Invisible but Essential: The Role of Professional Networks in Promoting Faculty Agency in Career Advancement

“…Consistent with previous research on the importance of professional networks (Bilimoria et al 2008;Blau et al 2010;Bryson 2004;O'Meara and Niehaus 2013;Ryan et al, 2012;Sagaria and Dickens, 1997;Williams and Williams 2006), we found that perceived network capital overall was a significant, positive predictor of agency in career advancement, both in perspective and behavior. This study builds on and contributes to the discussion of the importance of faculty networks by exploring how the relationship between perceived network capital and agency in career advancement may differ based on network location and career stage.…”

“…These types of networks are related to a wide array of career outcomes, including employment opportunities (Brass, Galaskiewicz, Greve, and Tsai 2004;Ibarra and Deshpande 2004), career advancement (Brass et al 2004;Ibarra and Deshpande 2004;Seibert et al 2001), power and influence (Brass et al 2004;Ibarra and Deshpande 2004), higher salary (Seibert et al 2001), and cognitive flexibility in thinking about one's career (Higgins 2001). Within academia, networks have been found to influence faculty research productivity (Blau, Currie, Croson, and Ginther 2010;Bryson 2004;O'Meara and Niehaus 2013;Sagaria and Dickens, 1997), grant productivity (Rawlings and McFarland 2011), and advancement on the tenure track (Bilimoria, Joy, and Liang 2008;Williams and Williams 2006).…”

Compliance or pragmatism: how do academics deal with managerialism in higher education? A comparative study in three countries

“…As a consequence of socio-economic and political developments, such as budget constraints, accountability for quality, 'massification' and decentralisation (Bryson 2004), universities throughout Europe have adopted organisational strategies, structures, technologies, management instruments and values that are commonly found in the private sector (Aucoin 1990;Deem 1998). This trend of public organisations copying techniques from the private sector is 'one of the earliest features of New Public Management, and remains one of the most enduring' (Boyne 2002, 97), and may even go further back than the actual term 'managerialism' (Hood 1991(Hood , 1995Pollitt 1993).…”

Whatever happened to the F word in higher education?

“…Entry level academic applicants are now expected to come to a position with a pre-existing publication list, and often with a book contract (Roy 2010). My fixed term entry position as a Teaching Assistant, one of four within the faculty, was funded by a pot of money existent pre economic austerity, but as far back as 2004 (Bryson 2004) and 2007 (Newman 2007) there was recognition of a shift towards the casualisation of the academic workforce in the UK, and that has continued apace, gathering even greater momentum; it is now most uncommon for early career academics to enter the academy on permanent contracts of employment (Roy 2010).…”