I was listening to NPR yesterday afternoon and heard an advertisement for the evening Marketplace program about female entrepreneurs. Marketplace is one of my favorite radio programs of all time, but the timing of it’s evening show (6:30 on weeknights) makes it so I rarely get to listen live, but I had to check this one out. Luckily because Public Radio has such fantastic web presence they have a page with the program to listen to in RealPlayer format, so I checked it out this morning: Marketplace: The gender gap in venture capital. It was a good report, even if it was all stuff I’ve heard before.
I’ve found that “breaking through the glass ceiling” articles fall into two general categories:
1. Women need to act like men to succeed
I don’t like this one, it makes me feel like as a woman I don’t have any useful skills and I have to pretend to be a man to succeed. It actually reminds me of the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas that says “In order to enter into the kingdom of heaven, women must become men” but instead of the kingdom of heaven it’s “the realm of successful business.”
I’m not a man, I am not going to act like a man.
2. Women should use their inherently female skills to succeed
I might have reservations about this one, since it tends to be stereotypical, but it is the view I like to see in articles. This Marketplace report takes this view, certainly we need to be more assertive but we can still be successful just by taking advantage of our talents.