Empowering Female Leaders

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sheryl sandberg, Facebook COO, author, and founder of the

Lean In movement has sparked a fi re in today’s boardrooms

sheryl sandberg, COO, author, and founder of the

Lean In movement has sparked a fi re in today’s boardrooms

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Featuring

GLOBAL PERSPECTIVEFemale entrepreneurs are breaking the cycle of poverty

WARREN BuffETTMentoring the next generation of female leaders

July 2013

3FACtsABoUt todAy’sWomen In BUsIness

ANSWERING“YES”

EMPOWERING FEMALE LEADERS

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CHALLENGESthe san Francisco Bay Area has become a breeding ground for women entrepreneurs seeking to grow micro-businesses into million dollar enterprises, and was recently ranked the number 1 city for female leadership and entrepreneurship.

Colleagues, not competitorsnetworking needed to succeed. Through support networks and micro-loans, it is women who are helping women produce income in other societies.

By the numbersEven though women college graduates in the U.S. equal or out-number male graduates, fewer women make it to upper man-agement, and many choose to leave corporations. On this 50th anniversary of Betty Friedan’s book, “The Feminine Mystique,” it’s shocking to see there are still only 21 women Chief Execu-tive Offi cers among the Fortune 500 companies in the U.S. Still only 16.6 percent of corporate board seats of the F500 are held by women (Catalyst, 2012). The number of women in C-suite positions slightly lower. But women corporate directors today are reaching back to bring other women into the board rooms.

The National Association

of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) reports about 8 million women own companies, with 1.3 of them in California. They pro-vide jobs for employees and for themselves, helping to rebuild the economy. NAWBO is the platform where women entrepreneurs help others grow their companies.

Thanks to women, other women have motivation and access to resources. Companies have created women’s affi nity groups to retain women and stem the exodus.

A call for all womenMadeleine Albright said there’s a special place in hell for women who do not help other women, and women have realized if we are going to enjoy the fruits of our labors, we must help other women do the same. Yes, there are cynics, newspaper articles and voices try-ing to convince us that the over-arching Queen Bee competition between and among women is alive and well. But women today are tearing down and pulverizing that former roadblock. Empow-ering Women Leaders calls for women to light the way for other women, for the sake of the econ-omy, the country and the world.

BETSy [email protected]

“There’s a rising tide of women today who seek to achieve their full potential.”

EMPOWERInG FEMALE LEADERS, FIRSt EDItIOn, JULY 2013

managing director: Janel Galluccieditorial manager: Sara QuigleyLead designer: Alana Giordanodesigner: Samantha Gabbey

Contributors: Kristen Castillo, betsy berkhemer-Credaire, Joanne

bradford, Elisa Camahort-Page, Susan Duffy, Lesa Mitchell, Judy Patrick,

Rosina Racioppi, Laura hunter, Peggy Wallace, Andrea Zurek

send all inquiries to [email protected].

distributed within: San Francisco Chronicle, July 2013

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Women mean business: Three secrets to success for female entrepreneurs and more exclusive content at:

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wE RECoMMEnd

Betsy BerKhemer-CredAIrePast Statewide President and Current board Member, national Association of Women business Owners-California (nAWbO-CA)

There’s a rising tide of women today who seek to achieve their full potential. Today’s women gradu-ates of business

schools, colleges and universities believe that empowering women as a global population, one tribe, actually works. Women today see the benefi ts of treating each other as colleagues, not competitors. It is women who provide other women with tools, mentoring and

1FACt

FeWer Women thAn men mAKe

It to UPPer mAnAgement

PosItIons

Businesswomen by the numbers

■ 21 women CEOs among the For-tune 500 companies in the U.S.

■ 16.6% of corporate board seats of the F500 are held by women.

■ 8 million women own businesses.

■ 1.3 of women who own businesses are in California.

StAtIStICS

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CHALLENGES INSPIRATION

TODAY’S LEADERS SHARE THEIR BEST ADVICE

What was the best business advice you were ever given?Q Challenge yourself each and every day to

confront the diffi cult questions. Don’t be

intimidated to reach for goals that seem

outside of your qualifi cations as you

perceive them to be. Go with your gut

and ignore the voice inside of

your head that says you

are not capable.

CAroLIne ghosn

CEO AnD CO-FOUnDER, LEVO LEAGUE

Always be aware of risks; just never afraid to take them. The more

you go for it, the luckier you get.

rACheL thomAs PRESIDEnt, LEAnIn.ORG

Challenge yourself every day. If you’re not uncomfortable, you’re

not learning and growing. It really is true, if you do something you love, it never feels like work!

AndreA ZUreK FOUnDInG PARtnER, XG VEntURES

When assessing partners and/or investors: Prioritize People, Terms, Valuation. Work with trustworthy people who get you. And don’t sacrifi ce fair business terms for

pie-in-the-sky valuations.

A great organization cannot be built by hiring people just like you. Create a culture that allows many types of people to work and thrive. Great leaders surround themselves

with people who are different from them.

Peggy WALLACe MAnAGInG

PARtnER, GOLDEn SEEDS

[email protected]

with people who are different

JUdy PAtrICK, PRESIDEnt AnD CEO WOMEn’S FOUnDAtIOn OF CALIFORnIA

Surround yourself with people who aren’t like you. look for

unlikely allies. And when hiring, select people with skills and work

styles you don’t have.

GOLDEn SEEDS

FOUnDInG PARtnER, XG VEntURES

JoAnne BrAdFord PRESIDEnt, SAn FRAnCISCO ChROnICLE AnD bOARD MEMbER, CARE USA

Be confi dent, even if you’re unsure.

Don’t be scared and if you are, don’t tell

everybody.

eLIsA CAmAhort PAge CO-FOUnDER AnD COO, bLOGhER


INSPIRATIONTiPS

Fostering a relationship with a mentor

■ Be prepared: This is a criti-cal step that must be done before you seek a mentor.

■ Be intentional: Outline how you will work with a mentor.

■ Assess potential men-tors: Identify those individuals possessing the perspective needed to support your develop-ment.

■ Be open to learning: An eff ective mentor will challenge your thinking in ways that help you grow as a leader.

■ value mentors: Provide your mentors feedback on how you are using their guidance and insight.

reAd more on oUr dIgItAL CAmPAIgn sIte

ROSINA [email protected]

W arren Buff ett, who is considered by many to be the most suc-

cessful investor of the 20th cen-tury, has added a new title to his prolifi c resume—mentor. Work-ing closely with Levo League, the leading social media net-work dedicated to helping Gen Y women build connections to elevate their careers, the advo-cate of women’s advancement in the workforce will serve on the site’s roster of mentors and share a lifetime’s worth of business experience with up-and-coming female leaders.

While Mr. Buff ett’s conversa-tions are sure to span a plethora of career-related topics, here, he addresses a few questions that most aspiring female leaders can relate to:

Q. how do you deal with fail-ure and what is your advice to young entrepreneurs like me especially with regards to failure?A: If you fail, you really do dust

yourself off and get right back in. You’re going to fail in some things. You’re going to have some human relationships that don’t work out. You know, a fairly sig-nifi cant number of people get

divorced. That’s a very big decision to have turn out badly. I think if you study almost everybody and read you’ll see that every-

body fails at some things — partic-ularly when you’re younger. You have less experience in evaluat-ing humans and knowing about whatever it may be. It isn’t fatal. If you’re healthy and particularly

living in this country, there’s going to be an opportunity that comes along.

Women of Gen Y get social with Warren Buffett

[email protected]

vIsIt sItes.medIAPLAnet.Com/emPoWerIng-FemALe-LeAders

For the eXtended versIonbadly. I think if you study almost everybody and read you’ll see that every-

Warren BuffettChairman and Chief Executive Offi cer, berkshire hathaway Inc., Levo League MentorPhoto: BerKshire hathaWaY inC.

ROSINA RACIOPPI

site’s roster of mentors and share a lifetime’s worth of business experience with up-and-coming


NEWSINSPIRATION

San Francisco was recently named by NerdWallet.com as one of the best cities for

female entrepreneurs. And a new report by The Gender Global Entre-preneurship and Development Index (GEDI) at the GEDI Institute, sponsored by Dell, fi nds the United States ranks number one in world-wide female entrepreneurship.

Despite these rankings, experts agree, there’s room for improvement.

“Only three percent of startups are female entrepreneurs,” says Ruta Aidis, GEDI project director and also senior fellow at George Mason University. “That’s an area that really could improve.”

The GEDI report revealed there’s no “single recipe for success.”

According to Aidis, female entre-preneurs face internal and external factors including women second-guessing themselves; and the need for outside capital from fi nanciers who are used to investing with men.

role models are neededWomen entrepreneurs need to be inspired and supported by their peers.

“They just need role models. Examples of ‘If she can do it, I can do it,’” says Shaherose Charania, CEO, President and Co-founder of Women 2.0, a media company that focuses on female entrepre-neurship and technology. “The idea is to inspire women and show them that other women are doing it.”

Find a mentorWomen 2.0 off ers frequent con-ferences and twice a year startup competitions to empower women to meet entrepreneurial goals.

Examples of Women 2.0 competition success stories include one woman who started Foodspotting, a popular food

app; and another who developed Hearsay, a company combining social media and sales and wrote a book on the topic.

stay focusedAccording to a Dow Jones report, “for start-ups with fi ve or more females, 61 percent were success-ful and only 39 percent failed.”

Aidis encourages women to not give up.

“The most important thing is to not beat yourself up if it doesn’t work the fi rst time,” she says. “Through failure, you learn a lot about what needs to be improved the next time around.”

San francisco: City of female entrepreneurship

KRISTEN [email protected]

“The most important thing is to not beat yourself up if it doesn’t work the fi rst time. Through failure, you learn a lot about what needs to be improved the next time around.”

46.9%

4.2%of the U.s. labor force, a mere

are Ceos.

While women are

30% Women own

OF ALL bUSInESSES WORLDWIDE.

13%in the past decade.

Women-led fi rms in the San francisco Bay Area grew by

sourCes, toP to Bottom: nWBC 2012 annual rePort, reCent artiCle BY forBes.Com, CataYlst

STATISTICS

A ccording to the World Bank, women work two-thirds of the world’s working hours,

but earn only 10 percent of the world’s income and own less than one percent of its property. Women like Gloria Nkhoma in Malawi are breaking the cycle of poverty by starting their own businesses with microfi nance loans from a Village Savings & Loan Association (VSLA).

It starts with a dreamGloria always knew she wanted to be a self-reliant woman. Growing up in the tiny village of Kasungu, Gloria dreamed of one day being able to provide for her family and give her children a better life than what her parents were able to provide. After getting married, Gloria moved to Mphongo Village with her husband, however every time she visited her old home, the women would mock her for not

wanting to be a farmer. While it pained her, she refused to let go of her dream. Today, with the help of

a VSLA made possible by Join My Village, a program of the humani-tarian organization CARE, Gloria is able to mentor other women to become entrepreneurs while real-izing her career goals and caring for her entire family.

taking action“I have never thought of start-ing a small business in my life, but the VSLA program has taught me how just a little amount of money can change the whole family,” said Gloria in a quiet voice. Gloria, a baker and a pro-prietor of a small grocery shop, credits a policy that requires members to borrow within three months as inspiring her to start her business. The policy allows for equal usage of the money by all VSLA members and ensures that funds are invested and rein-vested into small businesses.

In 2011, soon after sharing out their fi rst circle of savings, the group embarked on a second round of lending and Gloria was more than prepared to become one of the most successful par-ticipants, succeeding in saving $110 USD by the end of the year. With that money, Gloria was able to do some critical home improve-ments before the rainy season and reinvest in her business.

While the profi ts are small by U.S. standards, in a country where the vast majority of people earn less than a dollar a day, VSLA mem-bers are helping lift themselves and their families out of extreme pov-erty by saving, lending, and sharing their business and leadership skills with others in their groups to cre-ate direct and lasting solutions.

Female entrepreneurs are breaking the cycle of poverty

nEwS in BRiEF

Current contributionsWe know that women entrepreneurs make significant contributions to economic growth and poverty reduction.

■ In the United States for example, women-owned fi rms are growing at more than dou-ble the rate of all other fi rms, and have done so for nearly three decades. They contrib-ute nearly $3 trillion to the U.S. economy and are directly responsible for 23 million jobs.

■ In developing countries, there are about 8 to 10 million formal SMEs with at least one woman owner. These businesses are contributing to economic growth and poverty reduction.

Although these numbers are impressive, evidence has shown that women-owned businesses tend to be smaller, newly established, and less profitable than male-owned businesses.

■ Women entrepreneurs are more likely to cite access to finance as the first or second barrier to developing their busi-nesses.

■ On average, women have less access to basic banking services such as banking and saving accounts. They are more likely to rely on internal and infor-mal sources of funding such as their own savings, or loans from family/friends, church, microfi -nance institutions, etc, to start a business.

SARAH [email protected]

SOuRCE: WORLD [email protected]

INSPIRATION

Women In ChArge1. gloria nkhoma (close up) and other committee members 2. village Agent rose Chidzawawa from tembwe village buying her shares on her groups’ meeting day. 3. vsLA women transacting their business.Photos: henrY mhanGo/Care

1 2

3

34 centsfor every dollar earned by male entrepreneurs.

female entrepreneursin Ethiopia make


female entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka make


female entrepreneurs in Bangladesh make

sourCe: WorlD BanK

STATISTICS


In 2011, soon after sharing out their fi rst circle of savings, the group embarked on a second round of lending and Gloria was more than prepared to become one of the most successful par-ticipants, succeeding in saving $110 USD by the end of the year. With that money, Gloria was able to do some critical home improve-ments before the rainy season and reinvest in her business.

While the profi ts are small by U.S. standards, in a country where the vast majority of people earn less than a dollar a day, VSLA mem-bers are helping lift themselves and their families out of extreme pov-erty by saving, lending, and sharing their business and leadership skills with others in their groups to cre-ate direct and lasting solutions.

Female entrepreneurs are breaking the cycle of poverty

INSPIRATION

In 2011, soon after sharing out their fi rst circle of savings, the group embarked on a second round of lending and Gloria was more than prepared to become

ticipants, succeeding in saving $110 USD by the end of the year. With that money, Gloria was able

ments before the rainy season and

While the profi ts are small by U.S. standards, in a country where the vast majority of people earn

bers are helping lift themselves and

erty by saving, lending, and sharing their business and leadership skills

breaking the cycle of poverty

8 · July 2013 An Independent supplement by medIAplAnet to sAn frAncIsco chronIcle

INSPIRATION

Leaning in, standing up, and answering yes:Sheryl Sandberg’s message to today’s women

The keynote speaker at the Professional BusinessWomen of California Conference,

looked around the room of 4,000 women and asked this question: “Have you ever said out loud, ‘I am going to be CEO of my company’”?

Some women said yes, oth-ers said no. More women should say “yes,” according to keynote speaker, Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer of Facebook and author of “Lean in: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead.”

“I want to give everyone not just permission, but encouragement to stand up next time someone asks you if you’re going to be CEO,” she says, noting when women are leaders in the workplace, everyone benefits from better policies and smaller pay gaps.

“I believe that a world where more women were running more organizations, where women ran half our companies and countries and men ran half our homes would be a better world.”

Forging aheadNicole Soluri is president and board chair of the Professional Business-Women of California, the group that hosted the San Francisco conference where Sandberg spoke in May. She was inspired by Sand-berg’s message “to forge ahead and continue to take risks.”

As a new mother and a success-ful attorney, Soluri knows she doesn’t have to sacrifice her profes-sional life for her personal life.

“Just because you’re making choices to have a family doesn’t mean your career has to take a back seat,” she says.

Leaning inSandberg is also the founder of LeanIn.org, an organization she started after her book was pub-lished to give women inspiration and support to achieve their goals.

“This is not just about equality, even though equality is hugely important,” says Sandberg. “This is about economic growth and creat-

ing opportunity.”Rachel Thomas, president of

Lean In, who calls Sandberg’s book “anecdotal and accessible” explains over 225,000 people have joined the Lean In community so far.

“We’re an informational resource

for women in the workplace and empowering women,” says Thomas.

The group is committed to three things: community, education and “circles,” which are discussion groups of eight to 10 women.

The website has free educational content such as lectures on how to negotiate and how to work within a team; and discussion guides for each lecture, as well as Lean In stories from women sharing their stories of how they faced adversity and chose

to “lean in” instead of “lean back.”“There is this sense you’re not

alone,” says Thomas, noting, “It’s really learning from each other.”

Sandberg wants women to learn from their peers and believe in themselves too.

“Next time someone asks you, ‘Do you have the skills to be CEO?’ she says, “Your answer is ‘Yes,’ because you do.”

InvestIng In Women Keynote speaker sheryl sandberg captivates and inspires 4,000 professional business women at PBWC’s annual conference, which was held at moscone Center in san Francisco on may 23, 2013.Photo: Professional BusinessWomen of California

[email protected]

“Stand up next time someone asks you if you’re going to be CEO.”

2FACt

When Women Are LeAders In the

WorKPLACe, everyone BeneFIts From

Better PoLICIes And smALLer

PAy gAPs

An Independent supplement by medIAplAnet to sAn frAncIsco chronIcle July 2013 · 9

INSPIRATION

to “lean in” instead of “lean back.”“There is this sense you’re not

alone,” says Thomas, noting, “It’s really learning from each other.”

Sandberg wants women to learn from their peers and believe in themselves too.

“Next time someone asks you, ‘Do you have the skills to be CEO?’ she says, “Your answer is ‘Yes,’ because you do.”

PANEL OF EXPERTS

AMBITION 101: Entrepreneurial lessons from renowned leadersLeaning In requires more than thought, it requires action. the problem women face is not decid-ing what they want to do, it’s figuring out how to do it. genuinely ambitious intentions—pursuing an mBA, pushing for a big promotion, or launching that new venture—often fizzle in the quest for a perfect plan. you can avoid ambition inertia by taking a few lessons from successful entrepreneur-ial leaders.

Lesson 1: Stop Thinking. Sure you need to conduct basic research, but all too often the complex issues we face involve the unknowable. No amount of additional exploration will get you any closer to your goal. Lesson 2: Start Acting. By tak-ing one small, carefully designed step forward and seeing what happens, you generate your own “data.” What you learn from tak-ing even the smallest action will determine your next move. Lesson 3: You have everything you need. At the Center for Wom-en’s Entrepreneurial Leadership,

we support women to accomplish their next big thing by showing them they already have every-thing they need to be successful:

■ Enough desire to get started. Forget the master plan, compre-hensive resource strategy or unri-valed innovation. All you need is the aspiration to begin.

■ Resources you already have. Start with the means at hand: who you are, what you know, who you know. Pay only what you can afford to lose: consider time, energy, and money. Enroll others in your jour-ney: who might be helpful?

■ The will to act. Take whatever step #1 and #2 above suggest. It will likely be small, yet you will be amazed at how motivating it is to have forward motion. Once you

take this “affordable loss” action, you learn from your experience and start the cycle over again.

As a business woman, you have the potential to change the world. Don’t wait for the perfect mas-ter plan to fulfill your destiny, launch a “pilot project” today. Once you take the first step, you’ll be amazed at how quickly you get where you want to go.

SuSAN G. Duffy

[email protected]

Bobbi dangerfieldChief Customer Advocate and Vice President, Commercial Sales Operations, Dell

Kay matthewsWest Region Managing Partner, EY LLP

every future leader needs mentors, indeed, but what is especially critical for women is sponsorship. Sponsors recognize potential and proactively work to provide the opportunities and experiences that are criti-cal to developing women into leaders. That’s a great benefit of the EY Entrepreneurial Win-ning Women program. It provides both spon-sors and mentors to help women take their businesses to the next level.

there are many leaders but few really good leaders and even fewer great leaders. As a leader, my responsibility is to constantly strive to be better, to clearly articulate our goals and strategy, to develop other leaders around me and to create a culture that enables those goals to be accomplished.

In one of my first leadership roles, I was given responsibility for a business unit that had challenges. It was a big promotion and rapid improvement was expected. I sought advice from a senior partner. Acting on that input, we achieved quick results and I learned asking for help can be a great strength.

While mentorship is important, I’ve found networking and sponsorship are even more critical as you nurture and empower your community.

Being a leader means taking people (your team) to places they never thought they could get to. It is about enabling human potential.

the biggest hurdle I’ve faced in my career is self-confidence as I tackled each new opportunity. As I’ve taken on many roles there were certainly moments of self-doubt, a fear of failure. I had to get to a place where I could say, “Yes, I can really do this”.

how important is mentorship in developing female leaders?

What does being a leader mean to you?1 What is the biggest hurdle

you’ve faced in your career?2 3

Despite a growing pool of women with advanced degrees and programs to mentor and support them, women still fall behind men when it comes to founding high-growth busi-nesses—those companies that create jobs that could signifi-cantly strengthen the economy.

did you know?


INSPIRATION

Entrepreneurship

IndustryDisruption

Wharton MBA for Executives Philadelphia | San Francisco

You come to Wharton to do

something bigger.

join us at an eventJoy Quinn

Owner & PresidentQuintessential Solutions, LLC

or

whr.tn/exec-mba-events

Higher education: Get closer to your dreams with an MBA

Joanne Medvitz has loved snowboarding since high school but it changed her life

a few years ago when she literally jumped off a cliff during a snow-boarding session.

“There was so much freedom,” she says, explaining it inspired her to make a career jump as well.

Jump start Medvitz combined her passion for the sport with a practical need for more fl attering snowboarding clothing.

“I thought, ‘I’m a little more fun than a suit and a little more sophis-ticated than bright pants,’” she says,

noting she didn’t love her full time job working in the energy industry.

The result? A new business ven-ture for Medvitz, a 2012 graduate of an Executive MBA program in San Francisco, and her husband, Tim. The couple co-founded Pop Outerwear, a San Francisco apparel company that produces fashionable and Made in America clothing for snowboarders and other outdoor enthusiasts.

mBA benefits Medvitz admits it was tough to leave her corporate job to start her part-time MBA program (called an “EMBA”) and launch her business.

“It’s scary but it’s so worth

it,” she says, crediting the MBA program with growing her confi -dence and giving her insight into running a business.

“We believe it would create even more opportunities for women,” says Michael Desiderio, execu-tive director of the Executive MBA Council, an organization that advances executive education, not-ing that in 2012, women accounted for only 25 percent of students in EMBA programs.

“We’d love to see that number substantially higher,” he says.

KRISTEN CASTILLO

[email protected]

5 TiPS

Choosing an mBA program that fits your needs

LAuRA [email protected]

■ think about your sched-ule. For part-time programs, there are many options regard-ing weekends, online, face-to-face, and distance learning. How much time do you want to be in a physical classroom, and how frequently? How much does fl ex-ibility factor into your decision making process?

■ determine the ideal dura-tion. How long do you want to be in the program? Some MBAs are quickly completed in less than 2 years, others can be drawn out on a part-time basis for more than 4 years.

■ Crunch the numbers. How available are scholarships and

fi nancial aid? Additionally, ask your employer what the tuition reimbursement/sponsorship policy is.

■ Consider class size. How big are the classes, and how much personal interaction will you have with your classmates and profes-sors, and how important is that in your graduate school experience?

■ Look into off-shore options. Are there off -shore classes where you can fulfi ll your course credits in various countries overseas?


INSPIRATION

More needs to be done

Ample new research showing the contributions of women entrepreneurs and the barriers they face isn’t translating to more support for this untapped source of economic growth.

In 2000, I stood on a stage at a New York conference focused on supporting women entre-

preneurs and announced that this would be the decade of the woman high-growth entrepre-neur. The Kauff man Foundation has partnered with organiza-tions like Astia and Women2.0 that provide support and resources to women starting high-growth companies, and the Foundation has funded a lion’s share of research trying to understand the barriers and opportunities that might allow women greater entrance and growth as entrepreneurs.

Women have outnumbered men in college enrollment since the late 1980s. Today, a greater proportion of women than men receive advanced degrees at U.S. universities; however, in 2012, only 10 percent of Inc. 500 companies and 13 percent of Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year fi nalists are women-led companies.

growing challengesSheryl Sandberg’s Lean In, which calls for empowering women and highlights the fi nancial dispari-ties between the genders, is a New York Times Best Seller, but data show venture funding of women-led companies seems to grow more challenging by the day. New studies continue to be released documenting the serious gender bias that negatively impacts the ability of female-led startups to raise venture funding.

The Dow Jones 2012 “Women at the Wheel” report notes that only 6.5 percent of the privately held companies in the dataset used for the report were led by a female CEO. If this data point isn’t bad enough, the report also found that only 1.3 percent of privately held companies have a female founder.

“the woman effect”New fi rms are able to scale if they have access to strategic custom-ers or partners, allowing them to grow their fi rms without outside funding. If that isn’t possible due to the type of fi rm (capital require-ments drive much of this), then fi rms receive

a monetary boost from fam-ily and friends, angel funders or venture capital. Because it is extremely diffi cult to collect

data on the former (fi rms that scale without outside funding) but possible to collect it on the latter (fi rms that scale with fund-ing), I will use the following as a proxy of measurement: Between 1997 and 2000, women-led busi-nesses received only 6 percent of the $18.5 billion in venture capi-tal invested during that period. But, the Dow Jones report found that companies have a greater chance of going public, operat-ing profi tably or being sold for more money than they’ve raised when they have females acting as founders, board members, C-level offi cers, vice presidents and/or directors. At successful companies, the median propor-tion of female executives was 7.1 percent; at unsuccessful com-panies, 3.1 percent. This is what one writer called “the woman eff ect” in a recent Forbes article about the fi nancial success of women-led fi rms that was aptly titled, “The Mysterious Success of Female-led Firms.”

I have to wonder, does anyone care about the data? While the macro-level statistics are bleak, examples of women and men supporting female-backed entre-preneurs can be found in every pocket of the world.

More needs to be done. The hope is next time I am on stage giving a talk about the “decade of the female-led entrepreneur,” the words will not ring hollow.

LESA MITCHELL

[email protected]

INSIGHT

10% Proportion of Inc. 500 companies that are women-led.

number of women-led high-growth companies still lag

vIsIt sItes.medIAPLAnet.Com/emPoWerIng-FemALe-LeAders

For the eXtended versIon

6.5%Only

of privately held companies that received venture capital funding had a female CEO.

sourCes: national Center for eDuCation statistiCs, the ameriCan Bar assoCiation, anD the assoCiation of ameriCan meDiCal ColleGes

STATISTICS

Women advancing in these fi elds

More women than ever are earning advanced degrees in fields that qualify them to found high-growth firms and/or serve on their boards. And they have access to a grow-ing number of programs that support and advise them on everything from overcom-ing social, economic, and political barriers to becoming founders, to building door-opening networks to grow their companies.

medICIne LAW

PERCENT Of TOTAL MDfEMALE

GRADuATES

PERCENTOf TOTAL

JDfEMALE

ENROLLMENT

2011-2012

47.8 46.7

BUsIness sCIenCes

PERCENT Of fEMALE

GRADuATES

bachelor’s

master’s

doctorate

2010-2011

48.8

45.8

40.6

48.8

45.8

40.6

40.2

38.8

31.9

3FACt

onLy 1.3 PerCent oF PrIvAteLy heLd ComPAnIes hAve

A FemALe FoUnder

LesamitchellVice president, Innovation & networks, Ewing Marion Kauffman

[email protected]

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Empowering Female Leaders