Female entrepreneurs are aiming to impact their careers and the next generation of young women.
Entrepreneurship programs for the ascending generations continue to extend into K-12 and higher education. Once positioned as education flybys, these efforts are now finding footing in sustained curriculum and career paths.
True to the notion that entrepreneurs often build their dream businesses while the plane is attempting to fly, those female business owners or early adopters have had to chart a course without direction and sometimes defined paths.
Female entrepreneurs in sectors that men have historically dominated have stretched the research sector looking for both clues and answers.
The Tackling the Global Profitarchy: Gender and the Choice of Business Sector study (Goldstein, Gonzalez, and Papineni 2019) found that female entrepreneurs focus on relatively less profitable sectors than those [sectors] pursued by male entrepreneurs.
The World Bank’s The Breaking Barriers: Female Entrepreneurs Who Cross Over to Male-Dominated Sectors report denotes the additional challenge of female entrepreneurs potentially being surrounded by glass walls. According to the report, the impact is noticed when women attempt to enter more traditionally male-dominated sectors (MDS), making it challenging for them to enter more profitable, traditionally male-dominated sectors (MDS).
India reports that female entrepreneurs from the country have continued to expand individual businesses and increase economic impact across the country. According to The Times of India, the country currently has 13.5-15.7 million women-owned businesses that provide direct employment to 22–27 million people.
Taking an example of the legal profession, the percentage of female partners in the top law firms was merely 12.5% in 2010, which jumped to 17.34% in 2015 and around 30% by 2020. In addition, other unconventional areas such as robotics, IT, accounting, finance, and sales have also witnessed a consistent increase in the number of women entrepreneurs.
This [increased opportunity], according to Indian Lawyer Roma Priya, has led to an overall rise in females exploring their passion and entrepreneurship skills in traditional and unconventional sectors.
Angelina Lawton, founder of Sportsdigita, a communication presentation company, can drop names, if she wants, with the best of the entrepreneurial world. The former senior vice president of corporate communications for the NHL’s Tampa Bay Lightening is blazing a trail in the sports technology and communication space with legacy teams across all four major sports (NHL, MLB, NBA, and the NFL) with Sportsdigita.
Lawton represents a growing number of female executives who have strategically cut ties to corporate jobs and moved to the opposite side of the negotiating table.
“I was fortunate to learn the mechanisms, at play, in business from my father’s financial firm. I didn’t know it at the time, but those experiences laid the foundation for my confidence and skills to develop,” says Lawton.
Trending Upward
Investment in the next generation of entrepreneurs and the equitable distribution of opportunity reveal themselves in the exodus many female professionals are taking to activate their own businesses.
Lawton believes that being a female entrepreneur can actually serve as an advantage in male-dominated industries. As one of the very few female business owners in the sports industry, I am often the only female in executive meetings. I like to say that it is a way to be memorable if you have the right confidence and candor. If you have done your research and know what to expect, nothing should intimidate you. Of course, It is easier said than done but I truly believe women can do anything and more of us need to start saying it,” says Lawton.
According to Sports Business, only 13 percent of the students in sports business postgraduate programs are female. The key finding, though, is that these students' employability rate is the same or even higher than males.
For some female entrepreneurs in the sports space, it means reshaping business parameters inside outdated male models. “In the sports industry, we deal with rules and policies mostly made for and by men. If women have children, we're at risk of pay cuts from sponsors during and after our pregnancies,” says Allyson Felix, Olympian and co-owner of the sneaker brand Saysh in Entrepreneur.
Next Generation
Sports industry executive and entrepreneur Angelina Lawton aims to win now while building a legacy ... [+]
With more and more stories like Lawton and Felix, the opportunity to create equitable and representative programs at the K-12 and higher education levels has become more realistic.
According to a recent Intelligent.com survey, 17% of 2022 college graduates are involved in running their own businesses, and 43% plan to continue the trend. As a result, entrepreneur programs in higher ed have increased in popularity over recent years. The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) reports a rise in demand for entrepreneurship education by 66 %, indicating that students embrace the idea that business creation provides opportunities.
In recent years K-12 schools have vigorously expanded with the advent of entrepreneur programs and competitions such as NFTE, Junior Achievement, Student Inc., and Diamond Challenge, among many others. These organizations are applying startup thinking to change how kids learn and set them up with the skills necessary for future entrepreneurial pursuits.
Lawton, in the spirit of her experiences with her father, extended similar support to her daughter during her formative high school years. “My daughter founded an after-school club called the High Flyers with me during her Senior Year of High School. I was so proud to be a part of something my daughter came up with, especially for such a good cause.
High Flyers was aimed to better prepare young women for life after High School in the college & business world and beyond. From which courses to take to create the right LinkedIn profile, we wanted to cover the basics. We went further, providing guidance on resumes and internship programs,” says Lawton.
Entrepreneurship has entrenched itself as a viable path for several generations spanning the professional lifespan across the globe. The sales pitch of a professional venture steeped in independence, creativity, and course-setting appeals to a changing economy, and the personalities at the front are leading by example.
Higher education’s specific focus on entrepreneurial curriculum should be a market indicator garnering significant attention from the corporate sector. Universities and their respective graduate programs are recalibrating their curriculum to meet the growing demand for entrepreneurial pathways.
Sometimes those pathways start before one steps onto campus. “Tradition building was instilled within me at a young age when I began working for my father in the financial industry. He taught me the importance of having a sense of urgency and the right mindset to make it as an entrepreneur, as I was often one of the few females in the room.
As a mother to 3 children myself, I see the importance of maintaining a balance in life through my father's approach and how strong relationships are critical both in business and personal life. Today, I want to empower my children to pursue their dreams – especially my daughter, Gabby, who I hope sees the success that is possible in male-dominated industries with hard work, confidence, and a resilient mindset,” says Lawton.
Most story ideas pitched to this reporter fall in the “I have an entrepreneur you have to know about” category. However, Angelina Lawton can be classified as an accomplished pilot navigating the ever-crowded skies of entrepreneurship and female-owned businesses. And her passion for teaching the next generation of young women indicates the ever-expanding runway of opportunities and equitable routes for her daughter and others across the U.S.
Lawton concludes, “I still see a lot of opportunities for women to advance into leadership positions in the sports industry. There has been good progress in recent years but certainly, there is a long way to go. I will say there has never been a better time to be a female pursuing a path in the sports industry – and I hope that only continues to be the case moving forward.”
Interviews have been edited and condensed for clarity.
