Happy Monday!
At this year’s Oscars, Frances McDormand, who won best actress called for her fellow colleagues to adopt inclusion riders in their contracts. The idea is that prominent actors, actresses and directors have the clout to ask that gender and ethnic diversity be a requirement among the cast and the crew. In a recent NY Times article, Andrew Ross Sorkin postulates that the concept could also apply to Wall Street if large institutional investors like pensions and universities required the same commitment from funds that they invest in. Brilliantly simple idea which would solve a seemingly intractable problem in short order. The full article can be found here.
It seems that even when you have made it to the top, women face misogyny and harassment. A new book by a Wall Street Journal reporter details the intimidating and bullying behavior that Shari Redstone faced during her career including having her faced grabbed by Charles Gifford when he wanted her to listen to him (!). His apology? Apparently, he did the same things to his daughters when he wanted them to listen. There really are no words. The full article can be found here.
Many of you are aware that female founders receive a fraction of the money that start-ups led by men receive. On average women-led firms receive $935,000 and male-led firms receive $2.1 million according to a Boston Consulting Group study based on data provided by a global network of enterprise accelerators. The rub is that these underfunded women-led startups generated 78 cents of income for every dollar received versus male-led firms which generated only 31 cents of income for every dollar received. Does gender bias keep the venture capital industry from discovering the best talent? The statistics certainly seem to imply that. The full article can be found here.
The other place that the gender pay gap is hitting women is the amount of student loan debt they owe. Certainly, more women are enrolled in college than men (56%) but they tend to borrow more money and are slower to pay it back. The full article can be found here.
Finally, one of the things that holds women back is their lack of willingness to promote themselves. What women learn in our school system is to focus on their schoolwork and their grades will speak for themselves. This strategy does not translate in the professional world. A new book, based on the study of over 2,600 leaders, found that CEOs don’t get their jobs just because they did things well – they had to be noticed for their work and they did not wait around to get noticed. Executive presence and communication skills are the keys to success in any industry. The full article can be found here.
We have some terrific events lined up for you in 2018 including our ten-year anniversary celebrations in August! We look forward to seeing you all at an event in 2018! To learn more about our 2018 events, please visit www.txwsw.com
To help us celebrate our ten-year anniversary, I would ask each of you to consider corporate sponsorship of TXWSW. Benefits include attendance at our flagship events and recognition for your firm. To learn more, you may find our sponsor informationhere. Additionally, we would be happy to create a custom sponsorship for you. Please contact Bianca King atdevelopmentdirector@txwsw.com.
Kind regards
Christine