RISE after interruption: an intersectional framework for women's career interruption and reintegration

Purpose This integrative literature review examines how women, particularly those with marginalized identities, experience, navigate, and recover from career interruptions. Using intersectionality as an analytic framework, the study investigates how multilevel structural, organizational, interpersonal, and individual factors shape women's workforce exit, reintegration attempts, and long-term career outcomes. Design/methodology/approach Following a systematic search across seven academic databases, 45 peer-reviewed studies published between 2019 and 2025 were included. An integrative thematic synthesis was conducted to identify cross-study patterns, mechanisms, and intersectional moderators influencing career interruption and reintegration processes. Findings Four interrelated themes emerged: (1) caregiving demands intersecting with gender and socioeconomic position; (2) economic disparities and deskilling, particularly among immigrant and racialized women; (3) workplace inflexibility and institutionalized gender bias constraining reintegration quality; and (4) mental health strain and professional identity disruption. Synthesizing these findings, the study introduces the RISE model (Reintegration through Intersectional Structures and Equity), a process-oriented framework that explains how women move through three parallel reintegration pathways, career continuity, partial exit, and full exit, shaped by multilevel intersectional moderators. Research limitations/implications Although limited to English-language peer-reviewed studies, the review provides a foundation for future longitudinal and empirical research to test and refine the RISE model across sectors, institutional contexts, and national settings. Originality/value This review advances career and HRD scholarship by operationalizing intersectionality as an analytic framework for understanding reintegration processes rather than treating women's interruptions as homogeneous or crisis-specific. The RISE model offers a novel theoretical contribution by explicating the mechanisms through which intersecting identities and structural conditions produce divergent reintegration trajectories.