Women need to think outside the box to get their foot in the door, a skill that, developed over time, is extremely useful for entrepreneurs

If you’re a woman in tech, you know the story. You’ve probably lived it. Despite your talent, credentials and bulletproof ideas, you face roadblocks in getting ahead.

You’re not alone; the numbers back you up, across the globe.

As a female startup founder, you’re less likely to get VC funding than male entrepreneurs. In the U.K., men are 86 per cent more likely to get VC backing and 56 per cent more likely to get angel investment than are women, and that’s just one example of many stats that prove women and minorities fall far short of equal status in technology and entrepreneurship.

TechCrunch analysts Allyson Kapin and Craig Newmark concluded that the global tech industry is not the meritocracy it’s touted to be, but instead a “mirrorcracy”: made up of male power players funding entrepreneurs who look like them, instead of backing women and minorities based on talent and capacity for innovation.

On that point, Kapin and Newmark cleverly compared Silicon Valley to a college fraternity. In California, and in European tech hubs like London, Berlin and Amsterdam, women and minorities not only rarely win a lucrative investment, they are less likely to get an audience with investors to begin with.

An analysis of Swedish investors assessing 125 pitches over two years found systemic inequality between treatment of female and male entrepreneurs. This study was published earlier this year, and the embedded bias was particularly surprising, given Sweden’s reputation as a progressive society.

Two-thirds of all university degrees in Sweden are earned by women. One-third of Swedish businesses are owned by women. The government explicitly states gender equality is a hallmark of Swedish society.

But the study painted a more disturbing picture of the relationship between gender and entrepreneurial success. The Swedish investors used predominantly negative language to refer to female founders 58 per cent of the time, compared to 28 per cent for men. The entire applicant pool was unbalanced, 79 per cent male and 21 per cent female. As Michael J. Cohen wrote in Quartz in response to the study:

The gender disparity is astounding when you look at the data, not only in Sweden or the U.K. or Silicon Valley, but globally. But instead of compiling stats, most researchers would need only talk to some women who’ve started companies or tried to advance in the male-dominated technology industry.

Sexual harassment in the workplace

If you’re a woman in tech, you also know the stories of day-to-day harrassment and discrimination, and you’ve probably lived those as well.

Heidi Roizen, CEO of T/Maker, told Fast Company she was sexually assaulted by an associate over dinner during the conclusion of an important business deal. While Roizen was assaulted more than 30 years ago, her story still resonates with women who today face systemic barriers to achieving respect, dignity and equality.

Perhaps you can relate to some of these experiences. You’ve been excluded from a company networking event because it’s “just for the guys.” You’ve been the CEO in a meeting where the male intern is invited into the conversation while you are ignored. Male leaders have failed to make eye contact with you while men are welcomed into discussions.

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You’ve had your opinions dismissed during pitch sessions while less-qualified male colleagues receive deference and praise. You’ve been labelled “too passive” or “too bossy.” You’ve been subject to sexually charged jokes or demeaning language in the workplace. You’ve had to survive in a culture where that environment of discrimination is just accepted and rarely challenged.

This reality runs counter to the idea that everyone, regardless of identity, has a place in startup boardrooms. Gender bias runs deep, and there’s objective evidence that it poses a distinct barrier to women who should be judged solely on the quality of their work. In 2016, a study found that computer code written by women was viewed more favorably than that written by men, but only when gender was concealed. When gender of the coders was revealed, that same work was judged inferior to code written by men.

It’s clear, therefore, that we have some work ahead of us. In fact, we’ve already been doing the work. By our very presence in this room, we’ve already had to rise against perceptions that we’re less capable or less deserving of a place at the table. In leadership, entrepreneurship and on-the-ground technology building, women and minorities are fighting a constant battle to demonstrate their value.

Thriving, not surviving

But here’s the good news: Women are winning this battle.

We’re not only surviving, we’re thriving. Some of the most successful companies worldwide are run and founded by women. In fact, that all-important data clearly shows women who lead don’t just achieve success on the same level as men. We do better. We’re better innovators. We have longer-term success. We make more money.

A recent study by First Round Capital found that companies with at least one female founder performed 63 percent better than those with only men in charge. First Round’s analysis was based on 10 years’ worth of data from portfolio companies. The same analysis found that women were present in high positions in every single one of First Round’s top 10 performing companies.

So multi-year analysis shows companies with female founders do well over time. But this isn’t just a matter of a slow march to profitability. Women-run companies also grow faster than businesses started by men. According to the 2017 Annual Start-Up Report from TINYPulse, companies with more than 200 per cent growth were 75 per cent more likely to have a female founder.

Again, this phenomenon is global. The 2016 BNP Paribas Global Entrepreneur Report found that women-run companies earned 13 per cent more revenue than those run by men. Women surveyed in that report were optimistic about the future success of their enterprises, with almost 90 per cent predicting stable or increasing revenues the following year.

So, why are funders not taking notice of these trends? If VCs want to make money, it would seem that putting money on women is a safe bet. As it turns out, VCs are finally coming around, and more smart investors are willing to take the bet. Most prominently are organisations with the intent to bolster female and minority entrepreneurs.

While so far in 2017 only 17 per cent of startups have a female founder. Shops like Astia Angels and Golden Seeds have a mandate to back female-led companies and offer investment training. That’s just two examples of organisations stepping-up to serve the unmet needs of female founders.

Susan Lyne of BBG Ventures, one such organization, noted that the real issue when it comes to the dearth of female founders is access to capital and not a lack of women starting companies.

Women and minorities creating organisations to help each other is a great start and an exciting development in VC tech funding. But it barely starts to address the issue of systemic inequality faced by our communities.

Smashing the institutions

Individual women and members of minority groups fight their own battles each day in order to achieve their markers of success. We just can’t afford to wait for generational change to result in full equality regardless of gender, racial or cultural identity before we embark on our entrepreneurial endeavours.

Here’s where we’re at. We know women and minorities have faced systemic and overt discrimination as entrepreneurs and participants in the global tech industry. Women who lead, however, are women who succeed over and above their male counterparts. There is a growing network of organizations dedicated to fostering and promoting startups that are founded by women and minorities.

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So what can you do today to support and promote your own success as a founder or tech entrepreneur?

As it turns out, the very fact of navigating the complex world of tech as a woman or minority is our greatest source of strength and the root of our capacity for innovation. It could be the very reason why we achieve such extraordinary heights of success, despite seen and unseen challenges that come our way.

So, I’d like to give you three tips that I’ve drawn from my experiences as a technology entrepreneur. My life may be very different from yours, but my guess is that we’re more alike than different, so I invite you to take this advice to help you along the rocky and rewarding road to becoming a successful entrepreneur.

Be Resourceful

As an entrepreneur for most of my life, a minority and a female CEO, I’ve become extremely resourceful — a skill I developed without realising it. Like many women, for years I had been finding workarounds to counter the effects of discrimination and invisible barriers to advancement. Workarounds seem like a burden while you’re having to come up with them, but over time they train you to think differently. They train you to think like an innovator.

By constantly dodging hurdles that came my way, I found new ways to achieve my goals. I got that meeting, secured that sale and scheduled that call with the ideal investor. I became an agile and resilient entrepreneur, able not only to respond to the unexpected but to create new pathways of innovation.

This is one of the invaluable benefits of challenges on the way to startup success. In becoming so accustomed to doing things your way — because you’re excluded from the mainstream, accepted way of doing things — you automatically conceive of ways of doing things differently.

Without us even knowing, except in retrospect, we’ve trained ourselves to think outside the box, be creative and to not give up.

It just so happens that this kind of creativity is precisely one of the prerequisites of an agile leader, as defined by commentator Jeffrey Hayzlett. Hayzlett wrote in Entrepreneur that innovators are people often described as “difficult to manage” but have the ability to view a situation from many different angles.

Women and minorities have been forced to be innovators just to get a seat at the table. Once they reach the top, they’re much better prepared to get the job done than those who didn’t have to fight as hard to reach the same place.

Surround Yourself With the Right People

There’s one truth in entrepreneurship, no matter your level of ambition: You can’t do it all, and most of the time, your company is better off if you let go and find the right people who have talents outside of your own toolbox.

I have always surrounded myself with people who excel in areas in which I may be unfamiliar. As I built AngelHack, in the early stage I found people with a whole range of skill sets, from web design to outreach to marketing.

Barbara Corcoran, who founded and eventually sold the multi-million dollar New York real estate firm The Corcoran Group, has said a company with two founders with complementary skill sets has a much greater chance at long-term success than one run by a single individual.

Now, you may not want to bring on an additional founder, but it’s important to ensure your ego doesn’t impede your company’s success. The key is that the business has the best talent in all areas, and you can be the one to source and nurture that talent — you don’t have to do every job yourself.

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Corcoran tells an interesting story about a fortuitous interview she conducted with a woman named Esther Kaplan. Kaplan wanted a sales job, but she and Corcoran became business partners, a relationship they had for more than three decades.

Corcoran saw value in Kaplan because she had skills Corcoran simply did not, and she knew their partnership would bolster the company overall. As Corcoran told Entrepreneur, “What Esther provided for me was the opposite side of my personality that I didn’t have.”

As a female CEO, I have found that you can’t be an expert on everything. And in an industry built on innovation, you don’t want to be an expert on everything — you want to take full advantage of the creativity and unique perspectives of others who will partner with you.

There’s another reason you must surround yourself with the right people. Challenging the status quo as a female or minority entrepreneur is exhausting! In order to stay energetic and motivated, work-life balance is key. It’s fundamental to share the opportunity with others so you all achieve success together.

The Silent Trick

In business, it’s inevitable that conflicts or tension arise. Such situations are often healthy, as they can lead to an honest and productive exchange of ideas. But it can also turn ugly very quickly. Debate is productive, but disagreement may cause damage, and you often want to resolve the dispute as quickly as possible.

As a female CEO, I’ve learned to use the Silent Trick to achieve this. It’s helped me to navigate challenging events without losing my position of power. It helps me to deescalate a situation and keeps me in control from a personal and managerial perspective. It also contributes to a healthier work environment.

So how does it work? Anytime I’m on a tough call or meeting where there may be a disagreement of ideas, I refrain from arguing. I sit back and listen for as long as the other person will speak. This immediately disarms them, making them more receptive to a quick resolution.

Peter Bregman wrote about using silence in a May, 2015, Harvard Business Review article. Bregman pointed out that arguing tends to make people more committed to their positions. Joining an argument right away only makes it more likely you’ll end up at an impasse. Instead, Bregman promoted the idea of listening to everyone else first and then speaking last in order to achieve consensus. He wrote:

While you may not be after the truth, you do want to actively engage with colleagues, business partners and adversaries in a way that results in pushing your business forward. You should never surround yourself with “yes men” or “yes women,” but you must always remain the arbiter of analysis and points of view. After all, at the end of the day, you’re the founder or CEO, and the company should reflect your vision.

Women and minorities have a long way to go before they are full participants in the tech economy. As leaders in the startup movement, it’s essential that we push past roadblocks and curate strong relationships with those who can contribute to our success.

Regardless of the challenges, it’s essential to remember your unique strengths as a female or minority entrepreneur.

In a competitive marketplace, those skills you’ve honed as you’ve fought your way to the front of the pack are what make you stand out. Your uniqueness is what makes you valuable and destined for success as a founder or CEO.

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