The Workplace Experiences of African, Asian and Caribbean (AAC), British, Professional Women: Understanding Women’s Workplace Experiences and Well-Being Implications

Abstract

This thesis considers the workplace experiences of British professional African, Asian and Caribbean (AAC) women, to better understand the holistic nature of their organisational experiences and any consequences for their well-being. The thesis is grounded in social identity theory, intersectional theory and identity work scholarship and examines women’s experiences at the intersection of multiple identities, in doing so it demonstrates the importance of understanding the nature of intersectional, social differences within groups, such as “women” and what this might mean for organisations. The thesis’ research questions are: What are the workplace experiences of British professional women of African, Asian and Caribbean ethnicities? And, what are the implications for African, Asian, and Caribbean ethnic women’s well-being? The thesis extends intersectionality and some intersectional identity-work scholarship beyond its original focus of non-prototypical multiple identities constituting multiple-disadvantage. The thesis also considers ways in which intersectional identities may be a resource due to the uniqueness or originality of such an identity (in the UK context), thus allowing professional British African, Asian and Caribbean women to leverage particular opportunities and navigate certain challenging workplace experiences, particularly issues of stereotyping and “otherness”. The thesis engages with a qualitative exploratory methodology, which adopts a non-traditional methodological approach to conducting real-time semi-structured online written interviews with British professional AAC women. The empirical studies include a sample of 50 British professional AAC women across all studies. The findings reveal how intersecting identities are leveraged within daily organisational encounters, with the main themes to emerge being, (a) experiences of identity imposition and, (b), the use of strategic identity flexing to navigate organisational inter-personal exchanges. This thesis makes a methodological contribution to intersectional and racio-ethnic identity research, which to my knowledge is one of the first to utilise a document sharing word processing platform to conduct web-based written interviews. Furthermore, from the research in this study, it is now possible to take a strength-based approach to the study of African, Asian and Caribbean (AAC) ethnic women (racial and ethnic identity relations), rather than solely a deficit-based approach.