Avoiding The Glass Cliff

The term “glass ceiling” is well known—an invisible barrier that prevents women from rising beyond a certain level in an organization.;But the term “glass cliff” is not as common—the phenomenon in which women are more likely to break the glass ceiling during periods of crisis or downturn when the risk of failure is high.

The term is based on 2005 research that found that companies appointed women to their leadership teams and boards when their performance was poor (see The Glass Cliff: Evidence that Women are Over-Represented in Precarious Leadership Positions).

The recently released study . . .