Black British female managers—The silent catastrophe

The researcher examined the experiences of Black British female managers (BBFM) who worked for Children and Young People's Services (CYPS) operating in the UK. The following research questions guided this study: How do Black British female managers experience racial microaggressions and how do they cope with it? Purposive and theoretical sampling were used to recruit 10 BBFM who worked for CYPS and who had similar demographic characteristics (i.e., racial/ethnic background and managerial experience). Interview transcripts were analyzed using constructivist grounded theory (Charmaz, 2006a). Over 200 codes were identified and extracted from individual interview transcripts. Organizing the codes into categories resulted in five themes that highlighted the challenging practices that BBFM perceived thwarted their careers (i.e., The Organizational Culture, On the Outside Looking In, Stereotype Threat, Prejudice, and Discrimination and Institutional Racism and Espoused Practice vs. Reality), and one theme that described their coping strategies (i.e., The Silent Catastrophe). Although the study is centered on a multisectorial sample, two main conclusions can be drawn from this study. First, gendered racism curtails the career development of BBFM in ways that are not experienced by their White counterparts. Second, BBFM perceive that their experiences in CYPS was fundamentally negatively disproportionate and aversive. The implication is that CYPS leaders must give racial and gender equality, diversity and inclusion greater priority.