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Despite companies like Bumble, Eventbrite, 23andMe and Stitch Fix setting an example as far back as 2006, female founders still face a glass ceiling.
In the U.S., just 2% of venture capital (VC) funding was awarded to female-founded start-ups in 2023, while their counterparts in Europe received just 1.5%.
In fact, female founders face such significant obstacles that as of 2022, just 15% of U.S. technology businesses were led by women, according to research by Startup Genome.
It’s undeniable that tech remains male-dominated, and programs and initiatives to support women in entering, developing and staying in the industry are crucial.
Lori Laub, CEO and founder of employee reward platform TruCreative, agrees. “Today, there’s a heightened focus on STEM, inclusion and equality compared to ten years ago. More women are pursuing higher education, advancing in their careers and occupying leadership roles than ever before.”
But there’s more work to do. “Despite these advances, there remains considerable scope for further progress, and the journey towards improvement has not been linear.”
Laub says the doors to the tech industry are increasingly open to women, and these options continue to expand. “The question now centers on how women leverage these opportunities to enhance the workplace for the generations of women who will follow.”
Savvy investors
Laub doesn’t agree that female founders aren’t taken as seriously as their male counterparts, though she acknowledges it may have been the case in the past.
She says that modern investors are savvy, and though there are inherent differences between men and women, these differences can both offer advantages and disadvantages.
“Venture capitalists seek leaders with compelling ideas and a team they can trust,” she begins. “They’re betting on you; if they perceive you as committed and equipped to succeed, gender should not matter. And if it does, are they really the kind of investors you want on your team?”
While the numbers are nowhere near equal, some investor firms do have explicit mandates to invest in women-led startups and tech serving primarily women customers, and really are putting their money where their mouth is. But more funds need to follow suit, if true equality is to be achieved.
Dating game
Laub says that every opportunity to meet with a VC is what you make of it. “I like to think about it like dating. I’m looking for funders who understand what we do, why we are spending our lives doing it, why we are passionate, and who want to be partners in the success of what we are working so hard to achieve.”
On the flipside, she stresses that potential funders have many motivations and unknown criteria. “[They] are looking for whatever they’re looking for. Sometimes it’s specific and easily describable, sometimes they just ‘know it when they see it.’ The trick is to find a match on as many key attributes as possible.”
Laub continues, “Most of us have had good dates and bad dates. Sometimes, you know right away it’s not a match. Sometimes, you think it’s a match, but the other party isn’t sure. Sometimes, you get stood up. Sometimes, they’re rude. Sometimes, they don’t call you back. Sometimes, they’re only interested until something better shows up. And then… sometimes… it’s a match.”
Her advice to those who’ve secured meetings? “All you can really do is be as prepared as you can be, get out there, make a great first impression, tell your story and be authentic… over and over until you and the right funder find each other.”
Ready to make a leap into a more equality-focused organization? Visit the VentureBeat Job Board, which contains thousands of job openings in progressive companies in the U.S., like these three.
Whisker
Whisker is a leading innovator in pet tech and accessories, and works to solve problems and provide insights to pet parents. Based in Auburn Hills, Michigan and Juneau, Wisconsin with over 500 team members, the organization continues to grow. Recent roles on offer include a CX Workforce Planning Lead, Quality Engineer, Senior Software Engineer, Software Architect and Director of Program Management. Check out available roles here.
Oracle
Setting its values clearly on the table is Oracle, which values integrity, customer satisfaction, mutual respect, quality, teamwork, fairness, communication, innovation and ethics. As a large multinational, a broad variety of roles are almost always on offer, including recently advertised jobs like Java J2EE React JS Sr Developer, Principal Data Scientist, Sr Software Engineer, Site Reliability Developer and so on. See current job ads here.
DigitalOcean
With its headquarters in New York City and 15 data centers spread around the world, DigitalOcean offers cloud infrastructure-as-a-service to developers, start-ups and SMBs. Its DEIB goals are current; by 2025 it aims to at least be representative of the population of underrepresented groups in the areas that it operates, using the U.S. census and other data sources as indicators. The company has recently advertised for a Software Engineer (Machine Configuration), Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Cloud Ops Admin, Data Center Engineer, and many more besides. See what’s new here.
Find your next role in tech today via the VentureBeat Job Board.
