National Post (National Edition)
PANDEMIC PUTS EXTRA PRESSURE ON WOMEN AT HOME AND AT WORK.
`More challenging to be a woman CEO and founder'
Jordan Wimmer's story is an all too common one for women entrepreneurs: the chief executive and cofounder of Toronto-based Thrive Savings Inc. had her fair share of struggles in finding the resources to take her college shopping app to the next level.
“It's much more challenging to be a woman CEO and founder. We have to work that much harder than men,” she said, adding the pandemic has only made those challenges even greater. “There is such an increase in pressure on women to be home and take care of things.”
Indeed, Wimmer was on the verge of securing US$2 million in seed funding for her company when COVID-19 struck. The closing was postponed as a result of the ensuing lockdowns. When September came to restart the fundraising, her baby was born.
Despite the challenges, she has been more successful in securing support than a lot of women. Angel investors were instrumental in the launch stages of her business, she said, allowing it to be built on the back of those funds.
Wimmer has also worked with accelerators such as the Founder Institute and Techstars, and connected with the DMZ, Ryerson University's business incubator, and the Futures Ventures venture-capital fund.
“DMZ and Techstars made all the difference in the world in getting crucial meetings with investors,” she said.
Technology ecosystems can also help entrepreneurs gain that initial success, as Caitlin MacGregor, cofounder and chief executive of Plum Inc., a human resources company in Waterloo, Ont., experienced with Communitech, where she found her first funding in 2013.
She estimates she received 100 noes in her company's first two years, which she believes is at least partly due to it being led by a woman.
“Because it takes women longer to get the first million, it has a compounding effect,” MacGregor said. “Women will always appear to be a riskier decision in the eyes of investors because they don't tend to fit the standard definition of what success looks like.”
But funding is far from being the only challenge for women entrepreneurs. MacGregor believes much of her success can be attributed to aligning herself with support groups that help women get their ideas in front of the right people.
“Mentorships only take you so far,” she said. “You need people who will be activators, and who will push people to take meetings with you.”
There's a narrative that success equals raising money and winning market share, said Vicki Saunders, founder of SheEO, a global community of women activators building a $1-billion perpetual fund to support women entrepreneurs. The activators also provide networking and advisory support.
“Our model was born for a crisis like COVID, because we can have all hands on deck,” Saunders said.
Saunders believes finding funding is a narrow definition of success for women entrepreneurs, since the vast majority also need to get customers.
“If women entrepreneurs can get into a community, they will find other people that want to support them,” she said. “We now have 2,500 activators who have literally paid to support women entrepreneurs as well as be their customers. That's the key piece.”
The ecosystem approach is behind the federal government's decision in 2018 to launch the Women Entrepreneurship Strategy.
The nearly $5-billion investment is intended to double the number of women-owned businesses by 2025 by helping them with access to financing, talent, networks and expertise. Its Women Entrepreneurship Fund provides up to $100,000 in federal funding to help women business owners grow and reach new markets.
The program has also partnered with Ryerson University to create the Women Entrepreneurship Knowledge Hub, a source of research and resources on women entrepreneurs in Canada. It has 10 regional hubs and a network of more than 250 organizations, reaching more than 100,000 women.
Other government programs for women entrepreneurs include Export Development Canada's Women in Trade, and the Business Development Bank of Canada's Woman Entrepreneur Strategy Ecosystem Fund and Capital Women in Technology Fund.
There are privately funded organizations, too, such as the Startup Canada Women Entrepreneurship Fund, a not-for-profit that has partnered with the CocaCola Foundation, which offers micro-grants for entrepreneurs in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
There are also a number of networking groups that can help women starting out to build their community and influence, said Nouhaila Chelkhaoui, lead of the DMZ's Incubator and Woman Founders program.
“I know for a fact a lot of women founders have benefited from exposure to industry events,” she said.
MacGregor strongly advises women entrepreneurs to connect with local innovation or small business centres, many of which have specific programs for women.
“Their efforts for women and diversity have had a massive impact,” she said.
Other go-to resources include the local chamber of commerce and economic development council.
Wimmer said any of the local innovation hubs across Canada can be invaluable when navigating options for help.
“They're an efficient way to crack the code for where to go rather than trying to find it out yourself,” she said. “These communities exist and put out phenomenal startups.”