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The Female Way to Happiness at Work: Happiness for Women and Organisations

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Abstract

In recent years, greater attention is being paid to happiness in the workplace. Previous research has revealed that the happiness of employees and organisations is closely related to working conditions and climate. Gender inequality in employment opportunities, work-life imbalance, the gender pay gap and the existence of the glass ceiling are a workplace reality and generate failures that can reduce women’s happiness at work and affect the happiness of organisations. This chapter seeks to understand workplace happiness through women’s advancement and leadership. Specifically, it explores how organisations can increase women’s happiness in the workplace and the effect that women leaders can have on the happiness of organisations. An exploratory and descriptive analysis is carried out in a set of Spanish and Latin American multinational companies based on information published in their annual reports and websites. Qualitative and quantitative techniques are used. The findings reveal that the implementation of organisational practices to reduce existing gaps and create fairer and more equitable workplaces can increase women’s happiness at work, and greater female representation in leadership positions can contribute to organisation happiness and sustainability. Important practical implications are derived for the management of human resources and female talent.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Some data were not available and some measures found were not comparable—much reporting remains idiosyncratic and largely non-comparable (Grosser and Moon 2008; Langer 2006). For example, variables related to illness or accidents were measured by some companies as rates, frequency indexes or number of cases. The measures referring to occupational diseases or accidents were thus eliminated from the analysis. Some companies showed their general turnover rate and others only the voluntary turnover rate. Regarding salaries, some companies also published the difference in the remuneration of men and women who perform the same function and are in the same position (as percentages), while other companies offered the ratio of women’s to men’s remuneration. To standardise the information, data were transformed to show the pay gap as a percentage for all companies.

  2. 2.

    On the one hand, training programmes and promotion of female talent are aimed at increasing the presence and representation of women in certain positions, favouring women’s access and promotion—for example, through objectives and quotas—and reducing the gender pay gap. On the other hand, practises related to work flexibility and the reconciliation of family and work life may contribute to improving the quality of life of women and reducing their absenteeism rates. Finally, diversity and inclusion practices also affect female empowerment and the cohesion of work teams, which can improve the work environment and reduce voluntary turnover rates.

  3. 3.

    This may be due to the adoption or not of some initiatives or public policies related to gender equality. In Spain, there are gender quotas and/or corporate governancecodes that include several gender recommendations for management and supervisory functions within companies to combat the still insufficient presence of women (see, for example, the Good Governance Code of Listed Companies approved by the Board of the Comisión Nacional del Mercado de Valores). Latin American countries like Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Peru have not adopted any legislation in this regard; Colombia has, but only for state-owned enterprises (Deloitte 2017).

  4. 4.

    This may be due to the fact that the general turnover rates and the voluntary turnover rate cannot be compared, and the idiosyncrasy of each sector depends on their dynamism and employment opportunities.

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Acknowledgement

Financial support is gratefully acknowledged from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (RTI2018-097447-B-100).

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  1. Rey Juan Carlos University, Madrid, Spain

    Irene Campos-García

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  1. Irene Campos-García
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Correspondence to Irene Campos-García .

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  1. Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Seung Ho Park

  2. Universidad EAFIT, Medellin, Antioquia, Colombia

    Maria Alejandra Gonzalez-Perez

  3. Universidade do Vale do Itajaí, Itajaí, Brazil

    Dinorá Eliete Floriani

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Campos-García, I. (2021). The Female Way to Happiness at Work: Happiness for Women and Organisations. In: Park, S.H., Gonzalez-Perez, M.A., Floriani, D.E. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Corporate Sustainability in the Digital Era. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42412-1_37

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