EXPERIENCE OF SALESWOMEN IN PAKISTAN

Abstract

Women in Pakistan still struggle to get a good job due to omnipresent challenges, including domestic restrictions, gender-based discrimination, harassment and work-life, family-life and mobility issues, which expand to the workplace. This research focuses on these issues faced by saleswomen in their everyday work-life and the way they tackle them. The Equal Rights Campaign has spread in almost every part of the world but Pakistan is still lagging behind, making it all the more important to focus on the difficulties faced by women working in the salesforce, as saleswomen constitute a big component of the overall female working force in Pakistan. Keeping these factors in mind, this study carried out an extensive exploratory research on saleswomen in Pakistan for which both qualitative and quantitative data were collected using questionnaires and semi-structured qualitative interviews. In order to get more holistic data, the questionnaires were further divided into five main themes; individual, family, organization, culture and state so that in-depth understandings can be developed about how different societal factors affect the work-life of saleswomen and the ways they tackle them. 

Key findings

An analysis of saleswomen at the workplace across individuals, organizations and cultural levels highlighted both the systematic and non-systematic forms of discrimination. Although the sales sector centers on the incorporation of women in the sales force, it fails to eliminate the institutionalized barriers at the organization level that could sustain these women across time. Despite the state’s gender-sensitive policies such as EOBI, maternity leaves etc., the corporations can circumvent the policy framework by adopting selective recruitment policies to hire young women as means to generate sales and saving up on employee benefits. Although, the participation of women in Pakistan sales sector is positive as more women are entering the salesforce, but the lack of bargaining power at women’s end, absence of a healthier work-life balance and the issues of mobility has made sales work an unsustainable profession for women.

Implications

The lack of upward reporting suggests the flaws and inadequacies of our corporate and state-level policies. Women incorporation into the sales force is unlikely to bring positive change to our society as long as the underlying structural and non-structural constraints are not overcome. Thus, in order to bring gender equity within the salesforce, it is important to develop a relational lens that creates awareness about gendered issues at the workplace amongst both saleswoman, salesmen and their management.