Female sport administrators’ experiences of organizational fit in the workplace

Abstract

Gender inequality in South African sport has been legislated against by a number of constitutionally binding Acts. Although these policies have done much to address the general absence of women in leadership positions in sport, this absence is undoubtedly linked to gender inequality in sport. This is a reflection of the realities which shape women’s understanding of their organizational experiences in the workplace. The purpose of this study was to report on female sport administrators’ experiences of organisational fit in their places of work with regard to their experiences of resistance and exclusion, decision making, the absence of women in leadership positions and tokenism in sport. A qualitative method was used to explore organisational fit as experienced by participants in their places of work. Candidates were purposively selected to reflect the cultural and historical diversity of the women in leadership positions in sport in the Western Cape. Data was collected by using semi-structured interviews and analysed using thematic analysis. Reflexivity and trustworthiness were ensured by doing member checks, clarifying researcher bias and peer review and debriefing. A key finding of this study was that the experiences of these participants are not that of token members in sport and in their sport organisations. Findings in this study also show that there are differences in how men respond to the women’s entry into sport. Further conclusions and recommendations are offered.

Keywords: Organisational fit, decision making, leadership, tokenism, women in leadership.