Latest news with #womenInBusiness
Globe and Mail
4 days ago
- Business
- Globe and Mail
Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn joins advisory board of women-led Athena Capital
One of the most decorated athletes in Olympic history is bringing her focus on female representation to venture capital. Skier Lindsey Vonn has joined the advisory board of New York-based Athena Capital, a venture capital firm focused on growth-stage, technology-focused companies nearing public or private exits. The firm, which is set to announce the appointment on Friday, manages about US$6-billion and is composed entirely of women across its general partnership and advisory council. Ms. Vonn is one of the most successful alpine skiers in history, winning three Olympic medals – including gold in the downhill at the 2010 Vancouver Games – along with 82 World Cup race victories and four overall World Cup titles. She retired in 2019 with the most World Cup wins by any woman at the time. The racing legend adds profile to a sector where women remain underrepresented in both capital allocation and leadership roles. Globally, startups founded solely by women received 2.1 per cent of venture capital funding in 2023, according to a study published last month by the Founders Forum Group. In the U.S., companies with at least one female founder secured 25 per cent of venture funding, but those led exclusively by women captured just 3 per cent. A 2024 report by the Women Entrepreneurship Knowledge Hub estimates that women-led startups in Canada received about 4 per cent of venture capital funding in 2023. Athena's general partnership and advisory council comprise more than 45 women with backgrounds in growth-stage investing, company building, and executive leadership. Ms. Vonn, who has held corporate board roles and completed a venture capital internship, will advise Athena on investor outreach and fundraising. Her perspective is aimed at strengthening the firm's push to back ambitious companies and outperform in a space that's still not always inclusive, the company said.
Forbes
02-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
The Rise Of Women-Owned Businesses But Without The Riches
The Rise Of Women-Owned Businesses But Without The Riches Women are starting businesses at an unprecedented rate, from side hustles to full time businesses, and we are seeing a powerful shift. It's an exciting time for women, especially Gen X and Millennial women, who are choosing entrepreneurship over traditional employment. But there is a problem among women business owners. Despite the surge in business ownership, only 1.9 percent of women-owned businesses ever cross $1 million in annual revenue. This is a tragic statistic, and too many brilliant, capable women are suffering because of it. So why is this happening? It's not because women aren't ambitious or strategic. It's because the system isn't built for us to scale. From funding barriers to mindset roadblocks, there are structural issues that keep women playing small in business. And it's time for change. Not solely for the sake of equity, but because the economy needs more women building wealth through business ownership. Nothing bad happens when women have more money. While women are launching businesses in record numbers, several key barriers prevent them from scaling: This is the biggest hurdle women face when trying to grow their businesses. Women receive a tiny fraction of venture capital and struggle to access business loans and angel investments, despite running profitable and innovative businesses. The lack of cash available limits the ability to hire, run marketing campaigns, and build the systems needed for growth. Women are then forced to bootstrap and that slows down the speed of growth and their potential as a business. Without scalable operations and automation in place, the growth of a business hits a ceiling. Scaling requires building a business that runs without the owner doing it all, however women have been conditioned to do it all. And without the capital to expand their business, women have no choice but to do it all. Business owners have been conditioned to chase revenue believing that it's the ultimate marker of success. But revenue alone does not build wealth. You need a clear understanding of profit margins, cash flow and profit drivers. It's easy to chase bigger revenue numbers while making less profit, and this revenue over profit mindset can lead to financial struggles and burnout. Profit is what fuels sustainable growth and financial freedom. Women have been taught to play small. We are told to be agreeable and modest, and that mindset often follows into business. Many women hold back on their pricing or going after big deals and showing up competitively in the market because it is frowned upon. And to make money is viewed as greedy and unlikeable for women. These beliefs quietly sabotage the financial success of women. If more women are to break past the million-dollar mark, we need to normalize financial ambition among women. Wanting to build wealth should be celebrated, not shamed. And it starts with shifting the narrative that wealth isn't selfish, and ambition isn't arrogance. Women deserve to make money, grow empires, and take up space in the business world unapologetically. Women also need real support. Access to capital must be reformed and more funding should be directed to women. Real change won't happen unless the gatekeepers, who are primarily men, step up. Since men still hold the majority of decision-making power, they must take responsibility for reforming the system. The burden should not fall solely on the women to fix a funding gap that they did not create. The bottom line is that the fact that only 1.9 percent of women owned businesses reach $1 million in revenue should be a wakeup call. As women continue to start and grow businesses, now is the time to provide the resources needed to grow and scale their businesses. Profit isn't a dirty word and there is no shame in financial ambition. We need to stop applauding survival and start investing in women.
Forbes
20-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
From I To We: The Collective Shift Women Leaders Are Making—And Why It's Working
Leadership is often framed as an individual pursuit. But at the recent WeTheChange gathering of women and nonbinary leaders of B Corps and values-aligned businesses, one truth resonated across every session, conversation, and shared moment: real change is collective. As I sat among founders, CEOs, creatives, and community builders, I felt a rare mix of affirmation and relief. It was a room filled with people who had already 'made it'—and still knew that doing it alone wasn't the answer. The prevailing energy wasn't hustle or competition. It was we. Collaborative. Curious. Connected. A powerful group of women leaders doing business in a way that's good for the world - and ... More themselves! This shift from 'I' to 'we' isn't just a feel-good sentiment. It's an urgently needed evolution in how we think about power, progress, and performance. And it aligns beautifully with the Lead in 3D framework I've spent years learning, teaching, and living. Lead in 3D is a simple but powerful framework that guides leaders to align their investments of time, energy, and attention across three essential dimensions: When we get stuck in a single dimension—sacrificing 'Me' for the sake of 'World,' or neglecting 'We' in pursuit of 'Me'—we lose energy, perspective, and momentum. But when we lead in all three dimensions, we unlock sustainability and satisfaction. The shift from 'I' to 'we' doesn't erase the self. It integrates it into a broader ecosystem of change. As Meghan French Dunbar, leadership expert and author of the forthcoming This Isn't Working, reminded us: women are more burned out, more stressed, and more likely to leave the workplace—not because we're less capable, but because we're navigating systems that were never designed for us. Her call was clear: stop contorting ourselves to fit broken norms. Start reshaping the norms to reflect who we are—and what we need to thrive. Her words echoed the foundational insight of 3D leadership: performance doesn't have to require sacrifice. In fact, the data shows that when we center empathy, belonging, and shared wellbeing, results improve. Systems change starts with inner change. And that change becomes collective when we model it together. Jessica Lau offered a metaphor that landed deeply: we need to move like geese flying in formation. In nature, each goose takes a turn leading—and rests in the slipstream when it's not their moment. No one flies alone. The formation creates efficiency, resilience, and shared direction. In nature, each goose takes a turn leading—and rests when it's not their moment. No one flies alone. It's the opposite of the solo-hero myth. And it's what I felt in that room: the ease and power of distributed leadership, of letting someone else carry the wind for a bit while you catch your breath—and then doing the same for them. Leilani Raashida Henry's story brought us back to roots—literally. The daughter of the first person of African descent to set foot on Antarctica, she shared her own journey to that same continent, decades later. Her reflections reminded us that our presence in leadership is never just about us. It carries echoes of those who came before—and ripples into the lives of those who will come next. Our presence in leadership is never just about us. It carries echoes of those who came before, as ... More Leilani Raashida Henry reminded us. It was a moving reminder that our individual stories matter. Not to make us exceptional, but to make us connected. Our personal truths, our ancestral threads, our inner shifts—they're all part of collective change. The event closed with a rousing moment led by Kate Dixon. One by one, each person stood and declared one action they would take. The range was stunning: That last one got a loving nudge from across the room: 'Playing big a little is an oxymoron.' With a laugh, the speaker corrected herself: 'Okay, okay—play big a lot.' It was a perfect metaphor for what we'd experienced: individual voices, strengthened by a collective container. Action made braver through shared witness. It wasn't about becoming someone new. It was about showing up as who we already are—together. Like-hearted accountability is a powerful tool for action, in a way that serves our businesses, but ... More also our communities and ourselves! As spiritual teacher Reverend angel Kyodo williams puts it: 'Without inner change there can be no outer change. Without collective change, no change matters.' That's what we saw at WeTheChange: inner work becoming outer strategy. Personal insight becoming confidence to reimagine our systems. It's what we mean when we talk about 'leading in 3D.' Some of us start with Me—recovering from burnout, reclaiming joy. Others begin with We—healing teams, reshaping culture. Still others begin with World—justice, equity, sustainability. There's no wrong place to start. The key is to move, and to move together. The old models of leadership told us to grind harder, do more, win alone. The new model invites us to align, collaborate, and rise—together. We don't need to play by the old rules. We must write new ones. We can build workplaces—and systems—where thriving isn't the exception. Indeed, French Dunbar shared recent research by Stanford psychologist, Jamil Zaki, that demonstrated the return on investment of empathy as a superpower, leading private equity firm KKR to invest in empathy training programs for its portfolio companies' leaders. This is the path to sustainable success, wellbeing, and shared prosperity. And that change starts with We.
Arab News
18-05-2025
- Business
- Arab News
‘It's a no-brainer to go where the progress is,' Fortune editor-in-chief tells Arab News ahead of Riyadh summit on women in business
RIYADH: The Fortune Most Powerful Women franchise, which includes an annual list of the 100 Most Powerful Women, began in 1998. Now, nearly three decades on, the publication is entering the Middle East region with the Fortune Most Powerful Women International conference in Riyadh on May 20 and 21. 'More and more women were getting into the upper ranks of business,' and 'we wanted to be on the ground covering it,' said Alyson Shontell, editor-in-chief and chief content officer of Fortune. 'There's no more exciting place for us to be right now (than Saudi Arabia) covering the world of business and women's progress,' she added. Despite reforms and transformation in the region, some still view it as a place with restricted freedom for women and media. However, Shontell is 'excited to go in judgment-free,' and connect with women in the region and 'show what they're doing to the world,' she said. The transformation in the Kingdom since Vision 2030 has been 'remarkable' and, she added, 'we want to see it for ourselves and show it to the world. 'It's a no-brainer to go where the progress is: the Middle East.' Fortune's ambition is 'to connect global power and the biggest businesses in the world,' and so 'we would love to build the most powerful women's network into a global network,' through which women in the Middle East feel connected to women in other parts of the world, she explained. This year, 11 percent of Fortune 500 companies are run by women, which is the highest number it has ever been, Shontell said. There is still a long way ahead before gender equality is reached in businesses, but 'that's a big reason why we think it's still important to show the changing evolution of power,' she said. Last year, Fortune also published a Most Powerful People list — 'to recognize powerful people as powerful people' — and that list was dominated by men. 'That's how the world is, and we're not going to pretend that it's otherwise,' Shontell said, adding that it is part of Fortune's mission to track progress, present the world as it is, and when there are changes, to showcase them as well. At the beginning of this year, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order on his second day in office calling titled 'Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity.' He has issued multiple orders since then aimed at rolling back the diversity, inclusion and equity (DEI) policies of major corporations, foundations, non-profits, educational institutions and even the government. One order, which deems DEI policies 'illegal,' suggests that these policies are a 'guise' for 'dangerous, demeaning, and immoral race- and sex-based preferences.' The directives have raised several concerns, some around women's participation in the workforce. Shontell, however, remains optimistic. 'There's a pretty strong commitment from women in the United States,' she said. 'We have made a lot of progress over the last 50 years here, and I don't think many people would like to see that backslide.' Shontell herself has been part of that commitment. She joined Business Insider in 2008, as the company's sixth employee going on to become editor-in-chief in 2016. When she was appointed as editor-in-chief at Fortune in 2021, she became the youngest and only woman to serve in that role in the company's 95 years. 'When you think of who the editor-in-chief of Fortune, or even Business Insider, is, you don't think of a young woman,' Shontell said. To illustrate her point, she said that even if one asked AI what it thought the editor of a business magazine looks like, it would draw up someone like JPMorgan Chase chairman and CEO, Jamie Dimon. And she was right. We asked Meta AI and ChatGPT: 'Can you generate an image of the editor-in-chief of a major global business publication?' The former gave us four images: one of a woman and three of men, while the latter gave a single image featuring a man. The most common reaction Shontell receives is surprise. But she doesn't mind. Rather, she likes surprising people and the feeling that 'no one sees you coming.' It 'kind of gives you something to work toward something to be extra proud of when you achieve it,' she said. For Shontell, the industry has been nothing but change since she stepped into it, which was well after the days of leisurely business lunches and thick magazines, she says. 'A lot of the trends that we're seeing now are just completely different than they were before,' and much of the conversation in the newsroom is around future-proofing the company, she said. The key, according to her, is a flexible team and the knack to recognize trends and understand which ones are here to stay. When she was at Business Insider, her goal was to get everyone to read it. Fortune, on the other hand, is not about scale. 'My goal is to continue to up our relevance and to broaden the audience just a little bit, but to keep it very much thought leadership,' she said. Shontell explained that it is hard to run a company in a fast-changing and unpredictable world, and so, the question is: 'How can we be the best asset for this global leadership reader?' The aim is to 'give them the information they need to do their jobs through the best of their abilities, so that the rest of us can all benefit from them making better decisions.' Fortune was relatively slow to embrace digital media with its website only launching in 2014. By the end of 2024, it had 24 million global users, and its social channels have a total of 7 million followers. From the archives: Streaming warriors. In our October 2019 issue, Fortune spotlighted the powerhouse women steering Netflix into its most competitive era yet. — FORTUNE (@FortuneMagazine) May 18, 2025 Still, not many younger audiences are aware of the brand or consume its content. Shontell admits that while Fortune has been very good at reaching C-suite audiences, 'we have increasingly been bad at reaching the next generation and pulling them up through their career path.' But now, with social media, she says 'we have permission to show up differently on different platforms' to reach a potential reader. That means speaking in a different tone of voice perhaps to reach GenZs and millennials on platforms like TikTok, which would be 'their first experience with us,' she said. It is a 'delicate balance' of 'how do you get that next gen reader so that Fortune will continue to exist and be read and widely known in 20 years, and how do you maintain that thought leadership at the same time?' As part of this effort, Fortune is reinventing its video offering this year and launching podcasts. Artificial intelligence is at the core of technology and any conversation about it, and undoubtedly is an 'incredibly powerful tool,' said Shontell. Despite the dangers of AI — fake news, misinformation, deepfakes — and concerns about potential job losses, Shontell believes AI will bring journalism back to its roots. Any news or information that can be rounded up and aggregated does not need humans and will be done by AI, but that is an 'exciting opportunity, because it will bring journalism back to its core roots of seeking original information and facts and bringing it to readers first with the best analysis (and) the best new information that you can get,' she said. Shontell says that in the last decade or so, the news media industry has almost lost its way, partly because the business model is predicated on cutting through noise and grabbing attention, instead of delivering news in a way that is aligned with the news company's specific approach. There will be 'hard change,' and news firms can either be a big publication with scale and a 'solid' business model like The New York Times or Bloomberg, or a smaller, niche publication; anything in the 'messy middle' will have a difficult time, she said.
The Independent
14-05-2025
- Business
- The Independent
E2E Female 100: It's time to lead by example
I am absolutely delighted to help to shine a light on these exceptional female founders and leaders. After all, to create, grow and maintain a successful business in the current climate, with continually escalating costs to do business and little in way of support or incentive, takes grit, determination and strength, all qualities which must be celebrated. At the heart of every strong, dynamic business lies a core of pure fire. A heady mix of entrepreneurial spirit teamed with a steely resolve and a truck-load of resilience. While some of us may be born with a passion for business and have the privilege and good fortune to be actively encouraged or able to pursue it, it's true to say that this isn't the case for all. Worryingly, in our industry, food and drink wholesale, a recent report by Food and Drink Wholesale UK (FWD) revealed that the number of female leaders is actually moving backwards. This is despite diversity, equity and inclusion identified as a key priority to drive the sector forward and encourage the next generation of talent to join. The report, Championing Change, revealed that just 16% of senior-level roles in the wholesale sector are held by women, compared to 48% of senior leadership roles in the UK's top 150 businesses. This is overwhelmingly disappointing to read. At Lioncroft Wholesale, I work alongside many incredible women whose skills, experience, insight and knowledge is exceptional, including our COO Daali Wouhra, without whom the business would not be the success that it is. What comes across loud and clear from this powerful FWD report is that a lack of visibility of female leaders is proving to be a major stumbling block for those looking to progress their careers. After all, we often have to see something before we can truly visualise it for ourselves. We need to see those who go before us in order to be inspired to follow their footsteps. With that in mind, in business, I do believe that role models and mentors have never been more important. Countless studies have shown that women with strong mentors are more likely to pursue and achieve leadership roles. Whether a mentor offers career guidance, confidence building or introductions and wider connections, these relationships can prove to be invaluable for those looking to sharpen and develop their skills and identify routes for progression. And let's be honest, gender diversity in leadership is not only critical when it comes to inspiring others, but also for the overall success of a business. Research continually shows that companies with diverse leaderships teams benefit greatly from the richness of different perspectives, resulting in better, more informed decision making and problem solving. A mix of life experiences, cultures, backgrounds and ages can challenge boundaries and provide invaluable insight. In fact, research from McKinsey has demonstrated that companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 25% more likely to have above-average profitability*. These different viewpoints, opinions and challenges that drive ideas forward leading to the best results and making companies more robust along the way. This is why the E2E Female 100 track is so critical. Championing female success in a world that can still feel dominated by men has to be a priority for us all.
