It means there's a (mostly invisible) limit to how high you can go. The expression is used mostly in a corporate environment. Some women find that they can't get promoted beyond a certain level of management, for example--there seems to be no place for them near the top. That would be a company that has a glass ceiling. Another example might be a company with a parent organization outside the U.S., in country X, with the top people in the U.S. offices all being nationals of country X. It's not that they won't promote any American-born managers; it's just that to qualify for the top slots, you have to pass a written test...and the test is in the language of country X. That's a glass ceiling too.
From Wikipedia:In economics, the term glass ceiling refers to situations where the advancement of a qualified person within the hierarchy of an organization is stopped at a lower level because of some form of discrimination, most commonly sexism or racism. However, since the term was coined, "glass ceiling" has also come to describe the limited advancement of the deaf, gays and lesbians, blind, disabled, and aged.
Women (APEX)
In economics, the glass ceiling suggests that there is a limit to how far you can go on the corporate latter. For instance, there is a good chance that an individual that has just started working for a company may not receive the role of a manager until they've been with the company for quite some time.
glass ceiling
the glass ceiling
stacked from floor to ceiling
The term ceilings refers to the top part of a room. This is known as the ceiling. People also use this term when referring to the top of something, they may call it a ceiling.
The term "glass ceiling" was thought to first used to refer to invisible barriers that impede the career advancement of women in an article by Carol Hymowitz and Timothy Schellhardt in the March 24, 1986 edition of the Wall Street Journal.
Glass ceiling.
The phrase The Glass Ceiling is best described as when the advancement of a person in an organization stops due to discrimination or politics.
Vault ,or curved ceiling
The cast of Through the Glass Ceiling - 1995 includes: Molly Orr as Alice Lacey