We’ve been enjoying some chats on Clubhouse over the past few weeks as well as hosting a room of our own – Real + Raw Convos for Female Entrepreneur. We discuss different topics every week that relate, inspire and educate female entrepreneurs in Australia.
An interesting topic we chatted about recently brought up many different thoughts and opinions and that is about the cutesy title’s women give themselves such as girl boss and mumpreneur.
For a few years now I’ve been vocal in my beliefs that when you call yourself these titles what you’re doing is setting yourself up for failure and they need to be ditched asap. I know that when they were first coined, they were done a little tongue in cheek with positives intentions but I don’t find them cute or empowering in anyway.
As women we’ve been fighting for gender equality for so long now and yes things have changed (but certainly not enough!) then these just reinforce social norms and enhance the idea that we are somehow less than men.
Part of my dislike of the title “girl boss” is that the word “girl” has long been perceived as weak. Think of “oh you throw like a girl” or “stop being such a girl”. But for others in the room chat, they were happy with being called a girlboss if it helped them secure funding or grants specifically for women. Lack of funding for entrepreneurial women is a major challenge we face.
Other titles that need to go are:
Boss babe
Boss bitch
Biz babes
Chickpreneur
She-eo
How is a she-eo different to a CEO, as pretty sure last time I checked a CEO could be any gender identity.
Oh, and this is a new one I heard last week that actually made me laugh out loud at its cringeworthy-ness “ambitionista”.
As a Mum of two, personally if anyone called me a mumpreneur I’d be insulted and I’d also tell them not to call me that as I find it to be a ridiculous label. Ever heard of a man being called a Dadpreneur?
But as it was brought up, for others this is a term they feel safe and empowered by using. They find it a way of integrating work life and family life and it clearly niches down their market to other women who think the same. It can also be used for purely marketing purposes.
What I enjoyed most from our Clubhouse chat on this topic was that no one in the room belittled anyone else opinion. They listened and respected their point of view.
It’s important we begin to adjust our own personal language, and yes for me that’s encouraging women to ditch these titles and to stop minimising ourselves, what we do and our achievements.
We need to build a different culture, one that actually reflects what its like being an entrepreneur and woman in business. The fact that when you bring more female founders into entrepreneurship, it’s not only propels economic growth it also creates jobs and increases financial independence in women. Yet there are huge challenges we face – unaffordable childcare, gender discrimination and the cold hard truth that we are 63% less likely to obtain funding in the early stages as compared to men.
You can join in on the chat – Real + Raw Convos for Female Entrepreneurs Australia by following @megandborrello and @grace.m on Clubhouse.
