Although blatant sexism persists in the workplace, there is a subtler type of sexism that is not often discussed. Some of the harmful outcomes that concern organization employees and leaders include decreased job satisfaction and morale, increased stress and turnover, damaged workplace relationships, barriers to career development for women, and decreased feelings of safety in law enforcement employees. Subtle sexism is often disguised as friendliness or chivalry, and therefore is difficult to detect, so it is often ignored or trivialized. The harms are cumulative and compound over time. The purpose of this qualitative, phenomenological study was to gather data about how women experience subtle forms of sexism in the National Park Service (NPS) workplace. Semistructured telephone interviews assisted with the gathering of data from 12 women employed by the NPS. Feminist theory and critical theory guided the research process. Moustakas’s phenomenological method was used as an approach to data analysis. The findings that emerged included: (a) impacts on workplace culture, (b) harmful effects on individuals, (c) coping with subtle sexism, (d) organizational impacts, and (e) organizational change. The study promotes positive social change by providing a more nuanced understanding of how women experience and perceive subtle sexism. The results could help organizations to find more effective ways of dealing with this type of sexist behavior and decrease the negative outcomes.

The purpose of this study was to determine how higher education administrators, faculty, and staff are able to identify subtle sexism, and indicate how they perceive it in the higher education workplace. Past research has also shown micro-aggressions lead to hostility and uncertainty in the workplace (Swim et al., 1995, 1997; Tougas et al., 1995). The design of this study does not allow for casual inference but data from the pilot study indicate that contemporary sexism in the workplace impacts men, women, and the LGBTQ community.This was a mixed methods study that included a survey and one-on-one interviews. There were a total of 232 participants and 12 one-on-one interviews. The majority of participants were heterosexual, white women. Three new measures of sexism were identified during data analysis: attitudes and behaviors of sexism (Historic Sexism Scale and Contemporary Sexism Scale) and identifying cases of subtle sexism (“man to woman” cases across the five scenarios on the Gender Neutral Sexism Scenarios). Quantitative results indicated that women identified more instances of sexism than men. Overall, participants did not strongly identify instances of subtle sexism. Additional research is needed to determine the results. Interview participants indicated that trainings and professional development regarding appropriate behavior and language in the workplace are needed in order for employees to understand and recognize subtle sexism. / Educational Leadership