Date of Award

6-1989

Degree Name

Doctor of Education

Department

Educational Leadership

First Advisor

Dr. James R. Sanders

Second Advisor

Dr. J. M. Keenan

Third Advisor

Dr. Charles Warfield

Abstract

A case study has been used to examine women administrators managing subordinate women managers in an educational organization. This study focused on four women administrators in a community college, including the president, vice-president, two deans, and subordinate women managers who report to the four women administrators.

Participant observations, interviews, and document analysis were supplemented by use of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) to investigate the research question: How do individual characteristics relate to management relationships of four women administrators working with subordinate women managers? Interviews, informal observations, and document analysis were also used to investigate the second research question: How do a subset of skills of management enacted by four women administrators, managing subordinate women managers, differ across individuals? The management skills investigated in this study were human skill behaviors related to motivation as defined by Argyris (1960), Herzberg (1959), and McGregor (1960) and human skill behaviors related to effective leadership as defined by Bennis (1982), Burns (1978), Josefowitz (1980), and Kanter (1987).

All four women administrators lacked a strong father figure during their childhood years. In contrast to the absence of a strong father figure was the appearance of a strong mother figure.

Data appeared to support the concept that opposites on the Myers-Briggs tend to have a more positive management relationship than do similar Myers-Briggs types.

The skills of management of the four women administrators who were studied did not appear to differ across individuals.

This study focused on four top level women administrators in one community college and their relationships with women who were their immediate subordinates. Men did exist in the setting of the study as immediate subordinates to the top level women, but were not included in the study. The study did not attend to female-male managerial relationships.

The case study examined the life-world of four women administrators managing subordinate women managers in order to examine the management of women by women and to generate hypotheses for further study. Further study of management of women by women is recommended in order to better understand this manager:subordinate relationship.

Access Setting

Dissertation-Open Access

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