For years, we’ve read about the struggles of women in climbing the corporate ladder and reaching the top. Much has been written about why it occurs and what we can do about it. I offer a different view, namely that the whole notion of a career ladder is an assumption – a mythology – that can limit who and how we are in organizations.
When we assume that a ladder exists and that it’s the path to success – when we treat these assumptions as “truths” about “the way it is” — we can easily mistake ladder-climbing as our journey and a top rung