Female Business Owners are Primed to Take Over the World
Rolling back the calendar to 1948, only one-third of American women worked outside the home compared to 87% of men. As the decades rolled by, the gap has steadily narrowed as men’s employment rates declined and laboring women increased. Back in August, 2014, men had dropped to 70% and women have raised to 57%.
When it comes to education, women now dominate American college enrollment. For younger workers ages eighteen to thirty-three, women are much more likely to have a bachelor’s degree than men are. They also receive 50% more masters degrees.
The fast growth in female employment and education is over. Growth still exists but the trends have slowed considerably. There is some great news, however. The next huge opportunity for massive growth is female entrepreneurship!
Women are currently underrepresented in high-growth entrepreneurship. Even though women own about one-third of all businesses, they only own 16% of businesses that employ others. When it comes to high-growth companies, female founders usually account for less than 10% in any given business segment.
When you put the puzzle pieces together, the growing strength of working women and the glut of highly-educated women, it seems clear that the future growth of entrepreneurship is in the hands of women.
Recent studies suggest that women entrepreneurs are making gains in fields previously dominated by men, but there is still a significant gap in fields such as information technology, manufacturing, construction, and transportation. These gaps are important to understand because these industries provide fertile ground for both revenue generation and employment opportunities.
This gap has sparked many federal, state, and local programs that target women who are primed to launch their own businesses or to boost their existing businesses into higher growth. Why is the government so interested in the huge potential growth of female-owned businesses? Because it is a great way to boost our local and regional economies!
Studies have shown that female potential business owners struggle in two key areas. The first is that they lack mentors and advisers to help guide and motivate them into successful business ownership. The second is that they struggle more than males in obtaining outside funding sources. Both of these situations are fixable, especially if we encourage governments at all levels to join with the business community to help fill these gaps. It will pay off for our communities!
In the meantime, if you’d like a free (really) eBook on How to Fund Your Business, you can get your copy at www.HireSelf.com/free-chapter And yes, it has lots of ideas, regardless whether you are a male or female!
I hope you found this article interesting and helpful. If you have questions or suggested topics you’d like to see in this column, please contact me at Author@HireSelf.com
#FireYourJob #HireSelf #FemaleBusinessOwner #ADC #StartYourOwnBusiness
Copyright © 2015, R. Scott Alvord
You hit all of the right points to both challenge and encourage. Nice.
I do have a question though. Since the two things that females struggle with the most are finding mentors and getting funding, it seems we need solutions to these two needs. I downloaded the ‘how to fund a business’ ebook and it is excellent, truly. However, the article doesn’t address ideas on how to find mentors to coach the ladies. How would you, or anyone else reading this, suggest they go about doing it?
I can think of three solutions off the top of my head:
1. Ask trusted friends, “Who mentors you?” Get details. Find out if they’d highly recommend them and why. If you don’t have a trusted friend, talk to a leader in your field and see if they’d share this information. Your local chamber of commerce might have someone they’d recommend.
2. Join a LinkedIn Group in your business category and start listening carefully. Respond to questions and post your own. See who tends to provide the best advice. Then contact that person to see if they are interested in helping do a little coaching with you.
3. Directly approach people you respect and admire that are in a similar line of work. Compliment them on their abilities and tell them you’ve been looking for someone to discuss ideas and to receive some personal coaching and mentoring. Many people will be honored that you asked and some might take you up on it, maybe even without charge. …but you should definitely pay for the lunch or coffee!