Technology

I wrote on Young Go Getter how every entrepreneur I know tells me I need to do a startup before I start my own business.  What I failed to mention is that every entrepreneur I know is a guy.  This seems strange because women are starting more businesses than men are… sort of.  Actually, older women are starting more small businesses than men are.  Younger women aren’t starting the businesses that make it big; they are sitting in their cubicles, scared, thinking about how they might start a business someday if they can just figure out how to mitigate the risk of it.  Like me.

I can’t actually prove this, because there is no study that correlates young+woman+startup that I can find.  But chew on this: another observation is every entrepreneur I know started their business in technology, and technology businesses are the most common type of startup, especially for twenty-setters.  Yet women don’t want to study technology, or start businesses in technology.  Except for me, and a few other women who live in Silicon Valley.

And this is fine.  Women should study and do what they want.  But that means that I have to learn everything I need to know about starting a business in your twenties from men.  And Penelope Trunk, who wrote the closest piece of proof I have that this phenomenon is not just in my life but is actually happening worldwide.