January’s Women’s March gained international attention and ignited action, but what can we do daily to really impact women we know in business? As International Women’s Day and the Day Without Women strike kick off Women’s History Month, I would like to present ways we all can support women in building companies, consulting or breaking their glass ceiling throughout the year.
Before we can help, we need to realize when and why this type of support is needed. Helping both men and women notice when women are overlooked — or worse, pushed down — in professional settings and perhaps why it happens will make it easier to remember how we can help.
When it happens
As a management consultant and advisor to executive women pursuing career changes or starting a business, former corporate executive and Pipeline Angels investor of women-led startups, I frequently hear comments like these from my clients or team members across industries:
Corporate meetings: “When I suggest a solution in a meeting, the idea is often not acknowledged, but when a man subsequently brings up the same idea, all of a sudden, everyone agrees.”
Consulting: “Other women in my practice tend to be competitive and sometimes prefer alliances with male peers. Clients, even if they are female, prefer to hire male consultants rather than female consultants. Why don’t we support each other like men do in the old boys’ club?”
Startups and entrepreneurship: “When I send my pitch deck outlining a business model that addresses common problems women face, most of the investors just don’t relate or appreciate the value of the business in addressing these problems. I can’t even get my foot in the door to pitch.”
Why it happens
As of 2015, more women (50 percent) than men (41 percent) earned at least an associate’s degree. However, women make approximately 70 cents to the dollar earned by men and are not rising up the corporate ladder with the same speed and ease. According to National Women’s Business Council research, “women-owned businesses are receiving only 2 percent of equity funding (as opposed to 18 percent for men-owned businesses).”
- Perhaps existing criteria do not consider what women bring to business: multi-tasking, empathizing with the customer, relationship/alliance building and team building.
- Perhaps we have not successfully figured out how to mobilize, collaborate and amplify our voices collectively.
- Perhaps we were not yet taught practical ways to support women in business.
How we can help
Below are some practical tips to offer your capabilities or networks to help women in business. I have also asked my fellow entrepreneurs, executives and angel investors at Pipeline Angels to offer advice.
1. Amplify women whose voices are unheard.
Women feel unheard when they suggest ideas in meetings and then feels frustrated when subsequently a male colleague claims the idea as his and gains the support of the team. Actively attributing ideas to the originator helps to bring attention to this situation.
The female staffers in President Obama’s administration initiated “amplification” as a strategy to support each other….