TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — To coincide with International Women’s Day, Meet Global in collaboration with SoGal Foundation, invited eight women speakers to share their stories of success and hardship as entrepreneurs or leaders in the corporate sector.
Held on Thursday (March 9) at AWS offices in Taipei, the event featured women in a variety of careers, from tech accelerators, business development specialists, and social media experts. Panel discussions gave many the chance to air their frustration with gender inequality and the glass-ceiling in many corporations.
SoGal Foundation is dedicated to closing the diversity gap in entrepreneurship and venture capital. The foundation hosts initiatives to ensure inclusive access to education, networks, and investment capital.
“Right now, the ratio of female founders in the start-up community is only 20%, whereas males account for 80%. I want to change this status quo,” said AppWorks Principal Alyssa Chen (陳敬旻). She expressed disdain for the word “empowerment” as it applies to women in the work force, as she always believed that she had power equal to her male peers.
Chen said it was not easy breaking into the tech accelerator industry despite the steep learning curve, though she still enjoys her work six to seven years into her profession. “I think there are a lot of stereotypes that we have to break. We have to make steps to not only be gender neutral, but also be careful about the patterns and biases we put on other people.“
For example, Chen said that when we mention a soccer player, we automatically think of a male person, and when we encounter the term ballerina, we think of a female. “We need to check ourselves first, and see how much bias we have, and then influence our circle, and grow the circles bigger and bigger."
While Chen feels the need to change stereotypes in the office place, the same was not the case for founder and chair of Anemone Ventures, Revital Shpangental.
“I simply experience challenges as a business person. I don’t have a lens for gender. My challenges are building a business from scratch and building something. Being a woman is an advantage, as men feel that we are less competition and they even want to share information with us. This is power, a way for us to maneuver and progress,” said Shpangental.
There are no business shortcuts
For Chang Yuan-yuan (張圓圓), founder of the Dadaocheng art gallery, No Copies, “failure is the first step toward success.” She treasures each of the difficulties that she has endured from her transition from being the lead of a prominent accounting firm to someone now opening her fifth gallery.
When she was with Ernst and Young, she worked with an Indian team and they earned 20% more for their work because they negotiated every item in the contract and fought for their best interest. At first, she thought they were being selfish, but it was really about business culture. She said she appreciated that learning experience.
For other panelists like Fluv CEO Candace Chen (陳思璇), becoming an entrepreneur was something that she learned from her mother. “I was raised by a single mother who was a software engineer. Having her as a role model inspired me as she helped me become who I am today.”
“To overcome your obstacles, you have to find your 'why.' It can help you get through anything. I wanted to start a pet care company even though I have no technical background. This did not stop me from achieving my dream. I interviewed 300 engineers to find three people that were interested and eventually one became our CTO,”” said Chen.
For Tuteemi CEO Camila Saenz, becoming a businesswoman simply was not part of her life plan. “I love triathlons and was happy as a photographer for seven years and I did work with other NGOs. I simply saw a problem and wanted to find a solution.”
This inspired her to start an online tutoring company. She says that as a Latina she had a different perspective when it came to language learning. And as for her business acumen, some of it stems from her family, which is involved in the coffee business.
“When it comes to obstacles, as women are always going to have obstacles and we will need to find solutions,” said Saenz.
Kassy Cho, founder and CEO of Almost says, “I decided to start my company after graduation when I worked for Buzzfeed in London. It was exciting to me that young women were making positive changes. I saw that there was nothing serving the next generation of young women to get the info that they need."
“As a woman of color in London, sometimes we can experience conscious and unconscious discrimination. It can be difficult to break in if you are not a white guy who went to Cambridge or Oxford. Finding allies is hard and when we find them we can lean on them to help you."
Cho is ensuring that young women have the access and the resources needed to succeed in a changing world that might be overlooked by traditional media.
