People can never be Get down to one word to describe what’s happening to women and minorities in the enterprise. Are such founders overlooked or under-sought? underestimated and underrepresented? marginal? against discrimination? Or just ignored?
The excuses used to justify these nicknames are evenly distributed. Women received only 1.9% of all venture capital funds last year because they only start beauty and wellness companies; there is a proven lack of track record; It’s too early, they’re too risky, and there’s a pipeline problem. Maybe he’ll get married, start a family, and leave the job behind.
And Black founders raised 1% of venture funds because there wasn’t enough pitch; they make up a minority of the population and therefore deserve a minority of the funds; their products and markets touch something that only their communities can relate to; there is not enough traction, they are not qualified; or, as a Twitter user He wrote that they were not “male, pale, and from Yale.”
Ah yes, that explains it all. Women are too emotional to run companies. One female founder told TechCrunch she heard an investor say she wouldn’t invest in a company founded by women “because it’s frustrating.”
Men, on the other hand, aren’t bothered. They are competent and qualified, and as we all know, sexism and racial discrimination puff gone after the civil rights and third wave feminism movements. Since then, decisions for people and women of color have been purely quantitative and based on provable facts. Clearly.
“You can’t say you support women in tech without supporting mothers.” Suelin Chen, founder
Indeed, investors’ fact-based due diligence often ignores that companies founded by women generate higher returns than companies founded by men. The rest of the data on bias in the startup industry is so vague that much of it is hard to tell. Without transparency, it is difficult to determine exactly how many people of color and women make sales pitches, making it difficult to assess how much the disproportionate funding actually goes to these groups. Still, there is a way to separate some common misconceptions.
First, women (especially Black women) are more likely than men to start a business (and continue to open increasing amounts of companies), meaning that the notion that there aren’t enough women to invest in is completely false.
