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How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

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Re: How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

#4
Shelley Prevost has never been a startup operator. Her background is in psychological counseling, and she serves that role (in what looks like a team-coach or leadership-coach kind of role) at an incubator.

That doesn't disqualify her from having opinions about how women should handle gender-based bias, team dynamic, and motivational challenges in startups. But it doesn't automatically qualify her, either.

Meanwhile, I read this piece twice and it seems like it's full of platitudes. Maybe women leading startups face problems that are not best addressed by "Find other ways to get support, then keep moving" and "not living in the sting" and "amplifying your problems".

Re: How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

#6

Let me be frank: I received a 1 page resume of a female computer scientist, where the word "women" was mentioned 8 times (organizations, etc). We did not interview that person, since frankly we were scared .

Women are scary to computer nerds.

Re: How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

#7
This sounds alarmingly close to the dangerous "women can only succeed in business by acting like men" attitude that is prevalent in much of more traditional businesses and particularly in more conservative cultures around the world.

There are real biases and subconscious prejudices against female entrepreneurs, female engineers, and female professionals in many industries in general that will most likely perpetuate if ignored (which imo is what this article suggests). While ignoring the possibility of potential pitfalls might work, it definitely doesn't seem like an elixir that will cure all ills.

Re: How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

#8
post #4

Shelley Prevost has never been a startup operator. Her background is in psychological counseling, and she serves that role (in what looks like a team-coach or leadership-coach kind of role) at an incubator. That doesn't disqualify her from having opinions about how women should handle gender-based bias, team dynamic, and motivational challenges in startups. But it doesn't automatically qualify her, either. Meanwhile,…

It also commits the irony of talking about "women's issues" solely to badmouth the idea of doing just that, in essence. Count me as not a fan of the piece.

Re: How to Break Out of the 'Female Entrepreneur' Trap

#10
post #4

Shelley Prevost has never been a startup operator. Her background is in psychological counseling, and she serves that role (in what looks like a team-coach or leadership-coach kind of role) at an incubator. That doesn't disqualify her from having opinions about how women should handle gender-based bias, team dynamic, and motivational challenges in startups. But it doesn't automatically qualify her, either. Meanwhile,…

"Find other ways to get support, then keep moving"

As longs as those "other ways" don't including attending a women's symposium, and small talk. Sigh...

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