Book: Men and Women of the Corporation

Overview

Rosabeth Moss Kanter uses detailed empirical observation of a large U.S. corporation to show how organizational structure, not individual traits, shapes the experiences and outcomes of men and women at work. She moves attention away from explanations that focus on personal deficiencies or preferences and toward the systemic arrangements of jobs, authority, and networks that create unequal power dynamics and career patterns.
Drawing on interviews, personnel records, and workplace observation, the analysis traces how positions, group sizes, and formal rules interact with informal practices to produce predictable patterns of advantage and disadvantage. The narrative combines case evidence with theoretical claims about how organizations function as social systems that distribute opportunity and constraint.

Power, Proportions, and Tokenism

A central idea is proportionality: the share of a demographic group in a work unit affects status, behavior, and expectations. When women are numerically small in a unit they become "tokens, " whose visibility is heightened and whose behavior tends to be constrained by performance pressure, stereotyping, and social isolation. Tokens are subject to exaggerated performance scrutiny and often experience role encapsulation, where they are expected to represent their entire group rather than act as individuals.
Kanter shows that tokens face distinct microprocesses, heightened contrast, visibility, and polarization, that distort workplace interactions and limit influence. Conversely, groups that achieve critical mass gain more normalizing dynamics, greater informal connections, and broader access to resources and authority.

Career Systems and Organizational Opportunity

Careers are shaped by the architecture of job ladders, promotion criteria, and the allocation of desirable assignments. Kanter documents how organizational practices, such as the concentration of key assignments in certain departments, patronage networks, and opaque promotion norms, systematically advantage some employees while marginalizing others. Access to mentors, sponsors, and organizational "symbols of power" matters as much as individual competence.
The book details how lateral moves, token placements, and dead-end jobs function as structural barriers, producing patterns of stagnation rather than isolated incidents. Kanter emphasizes that changing individual behavior is insufficient without redesigning the institutional channels that mediate opportunity.

Gendered Roles and Cultural Symbols

Beyond formal structures, Kanter analyzes how culture and symbolism within organizations produce and reinforce gendered roles. Job titles, office locations, committee assignments, and everyday rituals become markers of prestige or marginality that signal who belongs and who does not. These symbolic dimensions help naturalize unequal treatment and justify differential access to authority.
Stereotypes and expectations infuse daily interactions, shaping how competence is read and how behavior is rewarded or punished. Women who deviate from role expectations can be penalized, while those who conform are often confined to limited spheres of influence.

Strategies for Change

Kanter advocates altering organizational structures to create more equitable conditions. Practical levers include increasing proportional representation in work units, redesigning jobs to broaden exposure to key tasks, making promotion criteria transparent, and creating formal mentoring and sponsorship pathways. Institutionalizing mobility and access to high-visibility assignments reduces the isolation and performance pressures that sustain inequality.
She emphasizes leadership responsibility for reshaping norms and incentives so that informal networks and symbolic markers do not reproduce disadvantage. Structural interventions, she argues, are more durable and effective than exhortations aimed solely at individual adaptation.

Legacy and Relevance

Men and Women of the Corporation reframed debates about workplace inequality by focusing on systemic features rather than individual shortcomings. Its concepts of tokenism, proportionality, and organizational symbols have become foundational in studies of diversity, inclusion, and organizational design. Many contemporary diversity strategies trace intellectual roots to Kanter's insistence that shifting structures and routines is essential to creating genuinely equitable workplaces.
The book remains influential for managers, scholars, and advocates because it links empirical detail to actionable recommendations while offering a durable framework for understanding why inequality persists and how organizations can be redesigned to expand real opportunity.