Do women need more business support than men?
By Sandra Hewett, published 48 days ago in Business Woman.
The closure of Business Link has raised some important questions on business support. Sandra Hewett looks at how enterprising women will be affected. Should women receive special treatment when receiving business advice and support?
Should women receive special treatment when receiving business advice and support? The question is debated even between women entrepreneurs, but the last few years have seen a big increase in government support and networking targeted at women, fostering the view that women benefit from an exclusive approach. What will happen in the current climate of austerity?
The last government put effort into encouraging women to start and grow their businesses, through the Women’s Enterprise Taskforce (closed in November 2009) and the Aspire fund for female-led businesses. There are two Women’s Business Centres in the UK (see here and here) and women’s networking groups have flourished.
"Women, in general, have different skills and networks to men, meaning they face different challenges," says Simone Brummelhuis, founder of thenextwomen.com. She cites networking, approach to financing and communicating their own value as being key differences. "Women often need help understanding that it is not arrogant to tell corporates or investors how great they are."
Rebecca Harding, managing director of Delta Economics, has conducted many recent studies into female entrepreneurship in the UK. "When starting a business, women often need different support to men, particularly in terms of scaling the business up," she says, "but as their businesses grow and become more sustainable, they follow very similar patterns to men."
Now, following the revelation by Real Business that Business Link is to be ended, the whole field of government support for enterprise is thrown into question. And some would argue that this will impact upon would-be women entrepreneurs more than their male counterparts.
"Women are more likely to use Business Links when they start their businesses and value the support that they get from Business Links more than men do," explains Harding. "The demise of Business Link could result in fewer growth-oriented women’s businesses in the future unless there is something clearly in place that substitutes for the services Business Link offer."
However, Brummelhuis disagrees. "Most of the female entrepreneurs that we follow or that come to us have not been receiving enough support or help from Business Link, so its demise won’t hurt them. Quite the contrary, they have been coming to us and to other groups, such as the British Library, for the support they haven’t been able to receive from Business Link."
This may highlight a blind spot with the IT sector. Elizabeth Gooch, chief executive, eg solutions plc: "We haven’t had much support from Business Link. This is a handful in a bucket of water. Other people will come up behind it and close the gaps."
Reaction from other areas has been mixed (see comments here). "Business Link was a starting point for me when thinking of setting up my own business but the advice on offer was only ever generic," comments Nikki Geddes, founder of franchise Kiddy Cook. "The best support and guidance came from other people already in the 'field'. Hearing about their successes and failures has got to be better for women."
So what will be needed to close those gaps? Harding indicates there is still hope. "For a long time women’s groups have asked for a signposting function, as the myriad of different support structures can be confusing at the start up stage," she says. "If the replacement for Business Link is a signposting service, perhaps online, then it could be very helpful."
Sandra Hewett is a coach and author of A Women’s Guide to Working for Herself (How to Books) to be published in the autumn.
8 comments.
Simon Bedding 45 days ago.
If I were a woman then I would find any extra support from the government solely on the basis of my gender as utterly patronising. This idea of women needing extra government help to get their businesses off the ground is hopelessly outdated.
Ann Hawkins 43 days ago.
To say "The last government put effort into encouraging women to start and grow their businesses" is a poor way of explaining the situation. The trend for women to start a business was well established long before the last government came into office and didn't happen because anyone in Whitehall was 'encouraging' it. To target support based on gender is an ineffectual use of resources and insulting to women. Education, training and experience should be the only criteria.
Rosy Holt 43 days ago.
I agree with Simon Bedding's earlier comment. In my experience women do not want to be patronised and do not need or expect any more govenment help than that offered to a man to get their businesses off the ground. Women's needs might be slightly different that in many cases they are "juggling" a family and home commitments as well as the new business but women are used to multi-tasking and have just the same focus and inspiration as men, we are after all in 2010.
Sophie Garrett 43 days ago.
I don't think women need any more or less support, but they are generally more likely to ask around for help, which is to their advantage. I agree with the last statement that a good website signposting the training, support, coaching and networking events that already exist would be very helpful, ideally with a review system. A kind of Trip Advisor for business support!
Rebecca Jones 43 days ago.
I agree that many women don't want to be given additional support however they often do tell me they need support in a different way. We also don't know how many women don't access support because of the way it is offered. In my work I regularly visit business start up support agencies and am often disappointed in the general standard of service to all clients but also note the in flexibility of the provision. We all have different needs and requirements and they need to be considered in the solutions offered in my opinion.
Sandra Hewett 42 days ago.
I think most people would recognise that women take a different approach (or family demands dictate it), hence so many women join women's business networking groups rather than, or in addition to, mixed ones. Of course women were entrepreneurs before the last government, but Labour put resources into finding out whether more support would increase numbers and help female-led businesses to grow, which characteristically, they do not. 'Education...being the only criteria'? Ann, how would we help those with less education or training, but with potential?
Emma Hewett 41 days ago.
We've been offering something very similar to Sophie Garrett's suggestion for a Trip Advisor for business support, for the last 3 yrs. See the University of Essex's free online portal for startups and entrepreneurs, http://www.venturenavigator.co.uk. Business Link saw us as competition, but our users signpost other users to the best sources of business support - VentureNavigator is completely impartial and available 24 hours a day - this is the kind of flexible advice women entrepreneurs need, not a generic offering.
Olga Astaniotis 14 days ago.
I agree with general views about it being a patronising approach. From one business to another, from one entrepreneur to another, we need different advice at different times in our journey, according to our own strengths and weaknesses, whether male or female. I require neither a woman to give me advice over a man, nor all-female networking events over mixed-gender events. I require sound advice, tailored to my requirements, delivered by people with the right experience, knowledge and contacts. The Business Link et al offer is often too generic, too prescriptive and too bureaucratic