Good afternoon blog readers! This is my final blog post required of the course I’m taking at Brandman. I’d love to say that I’d continue writing about this topic but I feel after finishing the research, there isn’t much left to say. In the beginning I was wondering who had been successful, how they did it and the problems they faced. In the end my focus became how women in small business can achieve success.

I organized my resources with an annotated bibliography. This was great in having a go-to document I could reference quickly, to get information. My final paper was a literature review. Basically, one document that encompasses a summary of the resources I collected, which pertain to my topic. This literature review was an excellent way in organizing my thoughts and getting everything in order. I fear my review was far too long than what was required. However, I wanted to make sure I had included a thorough review. The subject of success and small business ownership is a personal topic for me. Having a thorough literary review I was learning as I went along. I’m not sure I would do this if it wasn’t required in the future, just because it was extremely time consuming.

In the end I think I’ve answered my research question, “How can women in small business be successful?” The research concluded there were two main categories, we as women, must focus on: our actions and our mindset.

With actions I’ve found marketing your business should be a priority. For both women and men, implementing a marketing plan, or lack thereof, can make or break your small business. Take action on marketing, make it happen, find a way and find a budget for it. The next action we must take is with networking. Don’t be shy or intimidated! Everyone started somewhere. Get out there, get your business name and product out there. Meet other business owners, male and female. Swap stories and find comfort in numbers. The final important action to take is seeking a mentor. This I’m still trying to do. Everyone starts somewhere indeed. So, don’t create a mentality of, “I know what I’m doing,” when in fact you probably don’t. Find someone to teach you the ropes. Share and bounce ideas back and forth.

Mindset is equally important to achieving success in small business. Have the mindset that, “I can do this!” Believe in yourself. Don’t let self-doubt take over. Reach out and create a support system, let others be a part of the great things you are trying to do. Don’t keep the mindset, “So long as the bills are paid, that’s success.” It’s not. Success comes from growth. Find a potential for growth and have the mindset, “There’s always room for growth.” Paying the bills isn’t a goal…reaching the top of the mountain is. Finally, be willing to trust and take advice. Open yourself up to failure. There are times you will fail. Accept that and know it is a lesson to learn from. Take advice from those who’ve been there before. Be kind to yourself, find balance and believe success is just around the corner. Let’s break that 90% stigma that we’re in it alone!

Good evening blog readers! This week I felt as if I was summing up all the information I have learned in my research. In the beginning I addressed who women entrepreneurs were, what setbacks they faced and so on. In my more recent posts it has been the focus of my attention to find out what women can do to be successful in small business. Obviously these steps are relevant to the earlier posts of what the setbacks were.

In my college course we were required to do an annotated bibliography. I completed this assignment with the mindset I was creating an outline to my research on how women can be successful in small business. I used only a couple of the peer reviewed journals from earlier research b ut only because I felt they were the most helpful in moving forward. I have found it much easier to find credible information on the internet. Using the Brandman library is a great source but the most helpful tool I’ve come across in this research is the advanced google search.

I feel there isn’t anything missing from my research and I look forward to posting the information I’ve collected. Being a small business owner myself I find it helpful to read information pertaining to being an entrepreneur and being successful. It has been fairly difficult to locate every aspect of being a woman and entrepreneur. I think my research encompasses a guideline of sorts on how to be successful in the world of small business. I plan on using the research and information I’ve collected and I think my audience reading this blog will as well.   

Good afternoon blog readers! This week we have gotten further on our research for women in small business. While I’ve researched and pointed out the setbacks women are faced with it has been difficult to find how these setbacks can be overcome. The funny thing about the internet is you can’t trust everything you see and read. This is why it has been the focus of my course at Brandman to conduct thorough research that can be trusted.

This week I found an article in an open access journal that pointed out several resources women can turn to for assistance with their small businesses. Although the article’s main area of focus is Canada, it listed several resources for women in the United States and Europe. The article was centered on a Canadian program called, “Lead to Win for Women.” (Dexter, 2011) This program outlines a direct path to overcoming the setbacks women face. It helps women in realize growth potential and then assists them in achieving that potential. The Canadian based article also mentions the lack of women in the forefront of business, not only in Canada but all around the world. (Dexter, 2011) I think programs like, “Lead to Win for Women,” are an ideal way to support women in small business. I believe, encouragement of this sort will be contagious for other countries and communities around the world. Listed below is the link to the article along with links to the resources that were listed within.

Dexter, J. S. (2011). Building an Infrastructure to Support Women Founders: Lead to Win for Women. Technology Innovation Management Review, 30-36

http://timreview.ca/sites/default/files/Issue_PDF/july11_osbr.pdf

Women 2.0

http://women2.com/

Springboard

https://sb.co/

Centre for Women and Enterprise

http://www.cweonline.org/default.aspx

Like I mentioned before, the internet has a funny way of listing untrustworthy, if not untrue information. However, one thing that was presented in my course at Brandman was academic integrity. With the internet being so readily available, one rarely stops to think of intellectual property. We constantly share, revise and reuse information on the internet. I think it’s important to understand the difference between public domain and intellectual property that has been copyrighted. This has greatly influenced my college career. I think the best practice is when in doubt cite the source, whether it’s just an idea or text. This practice makes me confident, leaving no doubt, in my academic integrity.

Good evening blog readers! This week I wanted to focus on how women in small business can find resources to help them be successful. Unfortunately, I was in search of an empirical article. Thus, I was unable to focus my attention solely on finding resources for women in small business. I was not introduced to any new ideas in my search for an empirical article. I actually got to feeling like I’m beating a dead horse. Once again I found myself having to minimize my search to the very broad topic of Women Entrepreneurs. It is absolutely amazing how there just isn’t much research that has been put into American women in small business.

My research is aimed at finding the answer to how women in small business can be successful. I do not intend to change the focus of this question but I am getting generally tired of reading about the same setbacks presented in different research avenues.

This week’s empirical research article makes me want to look further into what government resources are available to women in small business. I did find a great article with a “toolkit” for women entrepreneurs but was unable o use it because this week’s assignment was to specific on empirical research.

I am confident in my research abilities. I am finding I lack the patience that is sometimes required of the research.  

Good Afternoon and welcome back! Today’s focus is going to be on the set-backs women face in small business and entrepreneurship. This is a topic of great concern to me because I am constantly faced with the monster of failure. I was sure that my research would lead me to something like, gender biases in financial backing from banks. I also assumed there was some cosmic reason I face so many trials in my own small business. However, my research has been very eye opening on the contrary. I researched a scholarly peer reviewed article called, “Business as Plan B.” by Sarah Thebaud. This journal article was written about women just like me. The focus of this article was to point out the reason women enter entrepreneurship in the first place. In our society it is a norm that women are the primary caretakers of children and family. More often than not it is a work-family conflict women have with the wage/salary workforce that drives them to entrepreneurship. Thus owning a small business becomes a fallback strategy for balancing work and family. (Thebaud, 2015)

One setback women face using the Plan B strategy is often low growth and revenue in their business. This makes them no better or even worse off financially, than remaining in the wage/ salary workforce. Another setback to the fallback strategy is women often don’t set high goals to maximize growth. Compared to our male counterparts women are said to lack the social network, managerial skills and financial capital, which are vital to start-up businesses. When women open a business they are typically segregated into crowded, competitive industries such as food service, retail and interpersonal care. Being forced into these industries makes these women owned businesses financially vulnerable. (Thebaud, 2015)

It is said that women entrepreneurs often feel inadequate because of the gender norm in society a mindset in which entrepreneurship is masculine. In an environment rich with women executives and managerial positions, women entrepreneurs are said to thrive. However, this is not usually the case in the United States. There is much headway to be made in the opportunities afforded to women in the American culture. Many senior or executive positions in the U.S. are held by men because one simply has to be, “married,” to their work to hold this type of position. (Thebaud, 2015) In conclusion, I feel there is a deep correlation to the wage/ salary workforce and women entrepreneurship. It can be concluded that it is women themselves that often, “shoot themselves in the foot,” when it comes to entrepreneurial set-backs. Women leave the workforce hoping to find balance with work and family and end up finding a new set of problems.

My research this week was fairly easy to come by as soon as I narrowed down the subject header. Again my frustration was with the several revisions I had to make to my subject line, to find a relevant article to this week’s topic. Finding a scholarly peer reviewed article is something I am familiar and comfortable with. I find myself searching this type of information above all others, in all my classes.

This week’s focus on setbacks is somewhat comforting to me. I am finding in my research that I have fallen into just about every statistic when it comes to women in small business. Although that may not be such a great thing, it’s comforting. I think understanding where you are and where you’ve been is the only way to find where you are going. Next, I am hoping to focus more on success strategies. Perhaps, there is research that I need to be conducting on women friendly programs for entrepreneurs.

References

Thebaud, S. (2015). Business as Plan B. Administrative Science Quarterly; Vol. 60 Issue 4, p671-711.

I am making great headway into the research for Women in Business! My research into what makes women entrepreneurs successful was insightful. It isn’t always the case but overwhelmingly it can be concluded when women entrepreneurs are successful, they have had a support system. This support system ranges from, a word of advice, to financial backing.

I found a very insightful book through the Brandman online library system. The problem was searching for it. I have found that my topic is broad in the sense many other topics are related to women in business. The more I tried to narrow it down the more roadblocks I came across. Finally, I was able to find specific subject headers related to my topic by selecting a title that was somewhat relevant. I found this to be extremely useful.

One frustration I had with using the Brandman library is the e-book selection is limited. I actually didn’t find the book I’m using for my research within the e-book listings in the school library. The actual university library is in another state and it would take too long to request the material through the mail. This forced me to purchase an e-book through amazon.

As I continue to research my topic and read my rental book, I am hoping to really dig into the set-backs faced by women in the world of entrepreneurship. The book I’m using I believe will help me do just that!

Welcome back to the Women in Small Business blog! My research into American women in small businesses is underway. I wanted to center this week’s focus on women’s impact on the small business forefront. I also wanted to focus on what drives women to owning a business and possible set-backs they face along the way.

First, I’ve found that 90% of women-owned small businesses in the U.S. have no other employees other than the owner. (U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation , n.d.) This speaks volumes to me because I fall within this statistic. Furthermore, only 2% of women-owned firms employ 10 or more employees. (U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation , n.d.) If women-owned businesses are to have greater impact on the economy and create jobs, these percentages must change.

Women have fundamentally different reasons for becoming entrepreneurs compared to men. Entrepreneurship is often seen as an ideal balance of career and family among women. Narrowed down, most women start a business for a sense of achievement, a traumatic event such as a divorce, pregnancy discrimination or the corporate glass ceiling. Most men become entrepreneurs for growth opportunities and profit potential. (Enclycopedia of Small Business, 2007)

One of the biggest set-backs for women entrepreneurs is the lack of financing. There is a definite gender gap between the traditional financing opportunities of men and women. (Enclycopedia of Small Business, 2007) This difference leads most women to use credit cards and savings to fund their start-up businesses. (U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation , n.d.)

The research gained this week provides great insight into the broad topic of women in business.

The research for this week’s great information was not easy to come by. It took some digging to find credible, accurate information. I used the e-books section located within the Brandman University online library. I was given a list of reference libraries that contained e-books. From there I had 18 different titles related to my topic. I strategically combed through the subject headers to find statistical data about women entrepreneurs. I then researched for successful women in business on Google. The task of finding credible, accurate information on Google was surprisingly difficult and I had to revise my search topic several times. I used the advanced Google search link and tried to narrow down my search by location (United States), language (English) and domain (.edu or .org). I finally prevailed in finding current, relevant, authoritative, accurate and purposeful information.    

This week’s research makes me more inclined to dig further into what has helped women become successful entrepreneurs. I aim to focus on what women, specifically, have been successful and what helped them reach their level of achievement. On the contrast I want to investigate more possible set-backs women are faced with, when they venture out to becoming American small business owners.