Wijdan Nahari

Nested with the Department of Work and Employment’s Equality and Inclusion research theme, My PhD research focuses on employees’ experience of transitioning to a gender integrated wok environment in Saudi based organisations.

Saudi Arabia’s culture roots are embedded in Islamic law and these have shaped Saudi Arabia traditions and relationships in public, work and private lives. In the work environment, for example, gender segregation has been a long-established cultural practice across all public and private organisations. Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 heralds transformation and change and, since 2016, Saudi Arabia culture and society have been undergoing considerable reform. Vision 2030 calls for gender integrated workplaces to provide equal opportunities for both male and female employees so that they can actively participate in the growth and success of the country. As a result, many Saudi organisations are now in the process of transforming their segregated workplaces to a mixed gender working environment. 

 Research to date has focused on many of the key benefits or opportunities that exist for Saudi organizations who wish to promote gender-mixed environment in their workplaces. However, while steps are being taken to promote gender mixing at the workplace and overcome the stereotype challenges, there remains limited or no empirical evidence that captures the experience of the Saudi workers as they transition into this gender integrated environment, or measures the impact it is having on workers as they adapt to this new work culture. My PhD study addresses this gap directly by focusing both on the experience of the Saudi workers as they transition into in a gender-mixed environment, and subsequently evaluating the impact of this gender integration on their social identity. 

 Combining elements of symbolic interactionism and transition theory to form my conceptual framework, I chart the lived experiences of Saudi workers as they transition from a segregated to a mixed-gender environment, and in so doing, investigate the impact that this experience is having on their social identities. My study is qualitative and quasi-longitudinal in nature and includes data from diaries, in-depth interviews and participant observation, gathered over a 12-month period.  

 Understanding the transition experiences of both women and men into a non-traditional working environment in Saudi Arabia is essential so that the country can achieve its Vision and support its people in this period of significant transformation.