Another Harsh Reality for Women Entrepreneurs
Last year, my friend met with an advisor. She assumed the meeting was meant to to catch-up and discuss the growth of her company or so she thought.
“Instead, this meeting turned into an unpleasant interaction that highlighted the big elephant in the startup room: sexism.”
The encounter began with her advisor stating he was frustrated with things happening within her company. As she awaited to hear constructive criticism on where to improve, she found herself being berated on her personal life instead. The advisor wasn’t thrilled that she got married, told her that she shouldn’t have taken a honeymoon, and the next time he’d see her she’d probably be pregnant. After his comments, he started talking about another startup and how thrilled he was that the CEO (male) was finally settling down.
The other day I grabbed lunch with a male mentor. I expressed my frustration about that encounter. For the first time since the countless sexist interactions we’ve had as female entrepreneurs, a little light was shed on the alternative perspective whether that be investor, advisor, etc. My mentor pointed out that the harsh reality is that there have been, are, and will be women who give up on their businesses whether that be to have a family or because it got tough. This isn’t exclusive to women but since there’s only 3% of women starting companies within the tech space, the impact of one jumping ships seems more dramatic. Unfortunately, women after them bear the brunt of the negative perceptions of women entrepreneurs based on a few bad experiences. This is problematic when women are already fighting to gain only 2% of outside equity that go to our startups while our male counterparts receive six times more capital.
Like our male counterparts, women entrepreneurs live and breathe our startups. Women led companies are actually more capital efficient and perform better with a 35% higher return on investment. It’s frustrating to be judged by other people’s decisions, but it is something that many minority groups deal with. We have to break down stereotypes that have been set, and not let them slow us down or affect our businesses. Just because a woman gets married or has children does not mean that she cannot successfully run a company. Sheryl Sandberg, Marissa Mayer, Ursula Burns, Indra Nooyi, Mary Callahan Erdoes, Angela Ahrendts, Susan Wojcicki, and Mary Barra, are just a few proving that women that choose to have families can still run a company just as well or better than their male counterparts.
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