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Aims of the Dissertation
This dissertation will aim at analyzing how women are impacted negatively as a result of employment discrimination in the telecommunication industry in Europe and Middle East. Discrimination in this sense means that there isn’t gender equality when it comes to employments of persons as men are favored more than women in the telecommunication industry in both Europe and Middle East.
In researching on this matter further, the dissertation will answer the question of whether the discrimination against women employees in the telecommunication industry is justified or unjustified. Presently, the telecommunications industry in Europe and Middle East has not fully taken advantage of female talent.
This is negative for the sector and negative for those women who could create new jobs for themselves and their families within the telecommunication professions, which are known to offer better remuneration and career paths than most other sectors.
According to an article written by Meryl Bushell, published the January-February issue of Global Telecoms Business, women account for only 12 percent of the top teams of a sample of leading operators.
Women are engaged in various professional services all around the globe, though they are mainly concentrated in traditionally-female professions like nursing, teaching and administration leaving out professions such as telecommunications and ICT careers to their male counterparts.
Cultural and social attitudes towards what constitutes “male” or “female” professions leads to both horizontal and vertical professional segregation, although the extent of the problem varies from country to country, and from profession to profession.
Though, women daring into non-traditional professions can face some restraints at work, not least of which are segregation, limited access to mentoring and female mentors, and sexual harassment.
The reason for studying the employment discrimination trend in the telecommunication industry in both Europe and the Middle East is to get information about the issues or disputes arising in the telecommunication industry in matters related to employment especially the gender balance and if discrimination is largely experienced in Middle East as opposed to Europe over the last decade.
In addition the telecommunication industry in both Europe and Middle East is very advanced therefore playing a major role in the social-economy of both their States. A number of discrimination claims again women seeking employment in this industry have increased.
Nevertheless, there hasn’t been an improvement in trying to balance out the gender issue when it comes to employing women especially in the Middle East Industry.
However on the other hand, Europe has for the last decade initiated laws, policies and framework intended to address the issue and ensure gender balance is achieved across all forms of employment. The paper will also tackle some of the most often encountered issues in employment law as related to discrimination disputes in both continents (World Bank 2004).
In addition, it will examine whether discrimination against women working in the industry has a negative impact on them. Thus, this research will endeavor to answer the following research questions:
- Are there any laws requiring a minimum gender ratio be of a particular gender?
- What percentage of females compromise of the women employees in the telecommunication industry?
- Does religion, culture and political aspects influence the employment rates of women in both Continents?
- Are discrimination levels reducing in light of technology, education and globalization?
- What are the similarities in employment trends in both continents?
- What are the differences in employment trends and cultures in both Continents?
- Are there any labour laws applicable to the Telecommunication
- Do local laws in both Continents provide an advantage to the Male employees only as opposed to the female employees instead of offering an equal platform for all genders? (Delmon, 2010)
Methodology
Based on the research topic, the researcher will use secondary sources of information as the main form of information for the research. The researcher will use his discretion which will enable him to go through very large volumes of relevant data both primary and secondary and subsequently select the most appropriate data from published sources which came from books and official websites.
The data will be collected from official websites and industry sources in order to add credibility and reliability to the research findings, additionally qualitative data will be used to analyze the results and support discussions (Jones and Lin 2001).
The primary data collection method to be used will be conducting interviews and questionnaires. I intend to conduct interviews, via phone, with the class of sources involved, therefore I will conduct 16 interviews, whereby 8 of them will be in the Middle East and the remaining in Europe.
Since the aim of the research is to investigate the negative impact on women arising from their discrimination in telecommunication in Middle East and Europe, it will be crucial to interview a sample of women working in telecommunication industry from both Europe and Middle East (Michael,2011).
This will aim to get first hand information from the sources which is, the perspective of the women themselves regarding the subject. An interview will be an effective methodology of collecting information since it first establishes a close relationship between the interviewer and the interviewees. Through interviews, it will also be easy to make follow up when looking for finer details of any interesting piece of information.
In addition, the research will send out questionnaires to employees, labor Union representatives and employers (human resource department) in both Europe and Middle East. The questionnaire will be 100 hundred in total, thus they will be 50 questionnaires among each Continent which will have a total of 70 questions and will be distributed evenly across the study group involved.
Therefore due to the large amount of information collected by both interviews and questionnaire data collection methods, they will enable one to conclusively determine if there is discrimination, why it’s there and make comparisons between the Middle East and Europe (Spender 1997, 141).
In to ensure that the interviews and questionnaires are evenly distributed, I will use sampling method whereby I will randomly pick of a group of people, both males and females in both countries who will be used in the data collection process. The countries and population from which the samples will be taken include Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, and Lebanon and Central Europe.
The sample will include wide range of women and men including employees of operators, vendors and intermediaries. The technique to be used in the research to identify the sample will be picking employees who have worked in the industry for at least two years. In addition, through the interviews, women will be capable of suggesting ways through which they feel that their ratio in the industry can be increased (Spertus 1991).
There are two types of interviews that will be used. The first type of interview will be structured interview whereby a questionnaire will be given out to the respondents to fill out the information (Sweetman 2000, 102).The other type will be an in-depth interview which does not involve any rigid questions to be answered.
The study will use the structured questionnaire to get answers for some specific questions in order to get uniform results from several respondents. In-depth guided interviews on the other hand will give the respondents a chance to answer questions freely and hold discussions. For the sake of collecting ample information, the research will conduct individual interviews several times via the telephone.
The choice of qualitative data collection as the methodology to be used is backed by the fact that qualitative research has the capacity of providing detailed information regarding the way a group of people experiences an issue that is being researched. This type of methodology presents the human part of an issue such as the beliefs, opinions or even the expectations of different people.
The methodology fits in well with the aim of the research of identifying the negative impacts on women that result due to denying them a chance to lead in the telecommunication industry.
A woman being denied leadership opportunities in the telecommunication industry is a sensitive issue that would require closeness in trying to understand the negative side of the issue towards them. Such closeness with the respondents in collecting information can only be achieved by using qualitative methods such interviews.
Data analysis is a crucial part towards completion of a study. In this research, data analysis will involve carefully looking at the results from the interviews conducted. From the data provided by the interviewees, the researcher will try to identify the reasons behind discrimination against women employees in telecommunication industry.
The analysis will involve identifying some of the ways suggested by interviewees of eliminating the discrimination. In the analysis, the practicality of the research outcomes in solving the real problems in the field will also be evaluated.
Its common for research undertakings to present challenges and this research is no exception. The first challenge that might surface is that some of the interviewees may be biased and provide information which is not reliable.
This may be as a result of personal dispositions or general unwillingness among some interviewees to participate in the interviews. Another challenge is the financial cost of the research. Although the initial budget has been factored, additional cost may spring up while the research is in progress and this will be a challenge for the researcher.
Feasibility
Doing a feasibility of the subject is an important part in research work. Feasibility study involves ascertaining the viability of the study and uncovering its strengths and weaknesses. For the research to be successful, the researcher will plan adequately prior and ensure the subject matter is well handled (Thas, Ramilo and Cinco 2008).
The researcher estimates the research process will cost about US$ 800 this will facilitate the travel costs, facilitations costs and telephone costs. This research will be partly funded by the campus and partly from the researcher’s savings. The researcher will work within the stipulated timeline.
The online materials are readily available online and from the respective libraries. Any travel arrangements will be made prior the actual data collection and the interviewees will give a time when they can be available to be interviewed and this will be done within the timeline.
How Your Work Fits Existing Published Work
Presently, the telecommunications industry in the Europe and Middle East has not fully taken advantage of female talent. According to an article written by Meryl Bushell, published the January-February issue of Global Telecoms Business, women account for only 12 percent of the top teams of a sample of leading operators (World Economic Forum, 2005).
UN (2008) reported that the total employment growth for women in telecommunication companies to be around 3.7 percent per year from 2002 to 2007 whilst the equivalent for men to be only 6.2 percent.
This is negative for the sector and negative for those women who could create new jobs for themselves and their families within the telecommunication professions, which are known to offer better remuneration and career paths than most other sectors (Ubaru 2008).
Women are engaged in various professional services all around the globe, though they are mainly concentrated in traditionally-female professions like nursing, teaching and administration leaving out professions such as telecommunications and ICT careers to their male counterparts.
Cultural and social attitudes towards what constitutes “male” or “female” professions leads to both horizontal and vertical professional segregation, although the extent of the problem varies from country to country, and from profession to profession (Spertus 1991).
Conversely, in Europe and Middle East women are infiltrating into the non-traditional telecommunication field and sources tell that employers are beginning to endorse women more systematically and to introduce family-friendly procedures so as to retain them (Wagner et al 2005, 104).
Though, women daring into non-traditional professions can face some restraints at work, not least of which are segregation, limited access to mentoring and female mentors, and sexual harassment.
As seen, professions in telecommunications industry are traditionally reserved for men in most parts of the world, although according to statistics from European and Middle East Universities, the proportion of women graduating in ICT or computer science is still very low, young girls are encouraged to move out of the shadow and seize the opportunity.
Although the number of IT-related courses graduates increased “considerably across Europe from 150,960 in 1998 to 320,950 in 2004, its annually growth rate is decreasing exponentially from 60 percent in 1998 to 10 percent in 2004.
This situation is rather dissimilar to the Middle East’s where the percentage of first year college students listing telecommunication as their favorite major has inclined from almost 1% to 4%” (Ubaru 2008). Though more and more women are finding their way to the decision-making level in major telecommunications firms but are still under-represented.
A survey made in 2007 on 160 European firms in the Telecommunications industry sector recorded that the average percentage of women on boards of directors was 6 percent (Van Welsum and Vickery 2005).
Salehi-Isfahani (2004) opines that opening up the telecommunication industry by utilizing more the women talent is essential, especially at a time when employment is so valuable and when Europe and Middle East are pressured to lift their competitiveness and reputation to the world.
Sale-Isfahani also notes that telecommunications employing more women in customer care and sensitive positions showed more customer satisfaction, since more have more work attributes than men (UN 2008).
Why You Are Doing This Topic
The first and most important thing that should be done before a researcher decides to research on a dissertation is to identify the topic. The principal reason behind the choice of this topic is my interest in it. Apart from the obvious reasons of doing research to earn academic credentials, conducting research on a particular topic is important in making changes to various sectors.
The choice of the topic of this research is informed by the fact that there has been discrimination against women in the telecommunication industry in Europe and the Middle East.
The research to be conducted will be important to firms as it can be used to come up with strategies of increasing the ratio of women to men employed in the telecommunication industry. Insights from the research may also inspire firms to take initiatives that will ensure that women secure more employment positions in telecommunication industry as it is one of the fastest growing sectors in Europe and Middle East.
Timing Mileposts
References
Delmon, 2010. Telecommunication. Delmonitl, Web.
Jones, C. L. & Lin, L., 2001. A Comparison of Attitudes Toward Women as Managers in China and in the U.S. California State Polytechnic University, Pomona Web.
Michael, D., 2011. Qualitative Research in Information Systems. Auckland. Web.
Salehi-Isfahani, D., 2004. Labor and human capital in the Middle East, studies of markets and household behavior. Doha: Garner Publishing Limited.
Spender, D., 1997. The Positions of Women in Information Technology – or Who Got There First and with What Consequences? Current Sociology. p. 135-147.
Spertus, E., 1991. Why Are There So Few Female Computer Scientists? people.mills.edu Web.
Sweetman, C., 2000. Gender and technology. New York: McGraw Hill.
Thas, A. M. K., Ramilo, C. G, and Cinco, C.,2008. Gender and ICT. UNDP-APDIP, Elsevier Web.
Ubaru, M., 2008. Joint ECA-ITU-Issues Paper on the impact of ICTs on employment and poverty alleviation in Africa (Opportunities and challenges). UNECA. Web.
UN, 2008. World population prospects. UN. Web.
Van Welsum, D. and Vickery, G.. 2005. New perspectives on ICT Skills and Employment. Paris: DSTI Information Economy Working Paper, STI/ICCP/IE(2004)10/FINAL, OECD. Web.
Wagner, D., et al, 2005. Monitoring and Evaluating ICT in Education Projects: A Handbook for Developing Countries. Washington, D.C.: Info Dev, Mainstreaming ICT and Education Series.
World Bank, 2004. MENA development report – Gender and development in the Middle East and North Africa. World Bank. Web.
World Economic Forum, 2005. Women’s empowerment: Measuring the global gender gap. World Economic Forum. Web.
Do you need this or any other assignment done for you from scratch?
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You can choose either format of your choice ( Apa, Mla, Havard, Chicago, or any other)
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NB: All your data is kept safe from the public.