Challenges Women Face in Business

There’s a quote by an unknown author that says, “In order to discover new lands, one must be willing to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.” This statement is very true, and easily applies to the challenges faced by entrepreneurs who work long, exhaustive hours, and must juggle the demands of business and their family all in an effort to jump start their business. What I find interesting is that although the challenges faced by women and men entrepreneurs are the same, the barriers for women are different. The important of this is major, because according to the U.S. Small Business Administration the number of women small businesses are outpacing other small business sectors in growth in every industry. This is significant, because the potential contribution of women owned businesses to the nation economically is enormous.

There’s an older, but good article by Mai Nguyen at Preflight Ventures, ‘Women Entrepreneurs: Turning Disadvantages into Advantages,’ which looks at some of the barriers that are still critical today.

http://www.preflightventures.com/resources/WomenEntrepreneursLitSurvey01-2005.htm