Here are a few myths I’ve repeatedly run across in my career – and the myth “busters”:
|
Myth |
Buster |
|
Teams are successful when they think alike. |
Gender diverse teams are 21% more likely to outperform their targets. |
|
Women leave the workforce to focus on their families. |
Only 2% of women leave the work force to focus on their families.* (pre-pandemic) |
|
Men and women interact equally and have the same access to senior leaders. |
49% of women never have informal interactions with senior leaders. |
|
Women and men are promoted equally. |
Women are 21% less likely to be promoted to a manager position than their male colleagues. |
|
More men aspire to be CEOs. |
38% of women aspire to be CEOs, while just 35% of men want to become a CEO. |
Over the years I have seen women struggle to combat stereotypes and dispel these myths. We have long known that diversity within business yields great results, including a decrease employee turn-over and higher employee satisfaction. McKinsey and Company’s The Women in the Workplace Study 2020 notes that having women in senior positions results in 50% higher profits AND share performance.**
These myths, and the seemingly endless quest to overcome their impact on women’s careers, are why many women opt to start their own businesses and immediately leap to the CEO position. Today there are over 12 million women-owned businesses in the US. This puts women in the driver’s seat – and when they are there, their businesses outperform male entrepreneurs almost 2 to 1!
TheWMarketplace was built to promote gender equity and to support women as they build a solid economic base: to help women leaders thrive.
Female Founder Friday is our nod to dispelling these tired myths and supporting those women who work to accelerate gender parity each day. Women founded businesses that create value at more than twice the rate of men? Clearly, the response to the myth, “more men than women want to be CEO,” is a resounding FALSE!
Happy Female Founder Day
