Motivation and Women



Motivation and Women

Introduction

Women's entrepreneurial activities have changed the landscape of the business world. While women-owned businesses are found across all industrial sectors, women entrepreneurs are most likely to run businesses that provide a service to consumers. Their enterprises are smaller, have fewer employees and lower revenues. These enterprises also grow at a slower pace than businesses owned by men. Women's businesses charting the highest rates of early stage and established entrepreneurial activity are in low/middle-income countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, followed similar economic profiles within Europe and Asia.

Micro-entrepreneurship benefits women, their families and the national economy of their countries. Female entrepreneurs are motivated by necessity, opportunity, autonomy, and personal satisfaction. Additional motivators include intellectual growth, flexibility, income, and prestige. Socioeconomic factors also influence the decision to start a business. Limited funding and family responsibilities often combine to limit the size of women's business enterprises. Women entrepreneurs define success beyond the bottom line.

Literature Review

Women own more than 10 million U.S. firms, comprising about 40 percent of all privately held companies in the country. These businesses have more than 13 million employees and generated almost $2 trillion in sales in 2008. Women are majority owners (51 percent or more) of about 75 percent of these firms or 7.2 million companies. The growth rate of privately held, women-owned businesses from 1997 to 2004 was twice that of all other U.S. firms. Women own 20 percent of U.S. companies with revenues of $1 million or more.

Women of color are majority owners of almost 2 million firms in the United States, employing more than 1 million people and generating annual revenues of $165 billion. In 2004, Latina women owned almost 39 percent of all American firms owned by women of color.

While women-owned businesses are found across all industrial sectors, women entrepreneurs are most likely to run businesses that provide a service to consumers. Women's ventures are more likely than men's to be in the service sector for both early stage and established entrepreneurs. Women entrepreneurs in Latin American and Caribbean low-to middle-income countries have the highest participation in service industries (74.3 percent), whereas women in high-income countries have greater participation rates in extractive, transforming, and business services sectors (52.1 percent). Increasing numbers of women are starting up and running high-growth industries such as financial services, biotechnology, and software.

Women entrepreneurs exist across a wide range of countries and circumstances. Women's entrepreneurial ventures make an important contribution to the economy in diverse countries across the globe; their input may be critical to the economic growth of low-and middle-income countries, such as those found in the Caribbean and Latin America.

Globally, the size, scope, and setup of women-owned businesses are very different from those owned by men in terms of size, number of employees and revenues. Women-owned enterprises are smaller, typically employ fewer persons, generate lower revenues, and are less growth oriented. Women-owned companies are more resilient than men-owned businesses, and ventures owned by women of color are more likely to remain in ...