The Network Trap Why Women Struggle to Make It into the Boardroom

This book makes a significant and distinctive contribution to the literature on women in the boardroom by developing the concept of the ‘network trap’ to explain both female underrepresentation in board-level roles and also why current efforts to improve the situation are likely to be of limited value. It features extensive interviews with UK FTSE 250 board Chairs, boardroom aspirants and head-hunters, allowing for uniquely high levels of empirical rigour. The book begins by outlining the difficulties women experience in achieving board-level roles. It then investigates a range of theoretical explanations for these difficulties, and in doing so it identifies the particular potency of network-related explanations. The empirical analysis the book provides enhances our understanding and advances current debates and theorisation within the literature, as well as offering a range of practical and policy implications.