The Plight of Being a Female Creative Entrepreneur

Taken with data from Leanin.org & the 3% Movement 

I distinctly remember the first time I had my creative confidence squished. I’ve always been an ideator- almost at an accelerated rate—but was told that I hadn’t been accepted into the “creative” track in the CU Boulder Ad program. Instead of thinking, “hell no, I can do this anyways” I thought I wasn't creative ENOUGH and spend the better part of my early 20’s trying to train my brain to be a way that it’s not. Despite being above average in every standardized test when it came to writing and word play, I let one opinion alter my authenticity. Since, I’ve embraced that I am at the core, a creative brain. I can easily find connections between seemingly disparate phenomena and do so freely. 

But the truth remains, the more varied the inspiration for me as I come up with ideas, the better the ideas will be. And since women and people of color make up a large majority of consumer spending and social sharing, it only makes sense that they would also be a larger part of the creative process. But that is where we’re still missing the mark, as a society. 

We all want to be inspired, and not just from visible creators. Learning about other women’s successes, particularly women who are more advanced in their careers, inspires me to work harder and dream more. Downplaying my success might feel more comfortable but it is particularly detrimental in networking and mentoring. 

As of 2017, only 3% of creative directors were women. And even less were people of color.

 And here’s the hypothesis as to why:

1. Lack of motherhood support
2. Lack of female mentorship
3. Lack of awareness that being a woman is an asset to connecting to consumers
4. Lack of celebration of female work due to the gender bias of award juries
5. Lack of women negotiating salaries they deserve

Also, there are only 3 categories that men dominate purchases in the marketplace. This means that women aren’t the subset, they’re the superset. And with the unprecedented rate at which women are amassing wealth and influence, it’s almost insane from a business perspective to misunderstand them. Which businesses do all of the time. 

More than ever, creativity has become a hot commodity in the workplace. Businesses compete ferociously for new ideas, and Silicon Valley — with its extreme focus on innovation — is the current bright spot of the US economy. Companies need employees who can tackle difficult problems, learn new skills fast, and identify opportunities in unexpected places. Top employers are increasingly looking to hire individuals who excel at creative thinking.

But whether you are seen as creative or not may depend on whether you’re a man or a woman. A recent paper by Devon Proudfoot, Aaron Kay, and Christy Koval at the Fuqua School of Business suggests that in certain contexts, people are more likely to associate creativity with men than with women. If this is true, then women may see their professional opportunities limited in workplaces where creativity is highly prized — and companies may lose out by undervaluing the creative ideas generated by their female employees.

The other problem, women are starting companies at a rate of 1.5x times higher than the national average but male-owned businesses receive 23x more VC funding. So even those who are ambitious and creative enough aren't supported on a larger scale. 

The drumbeat we march to is: Diversity = Creativity = Profitability. Because at the end of the day, our goal as creatives in the marketing realm is to find the best people, so we can make the best work, and ultimately, the best profit. But you can’t accomplish all of that with only one demographic, race, or gender

While comparable international data on the gender of owners of other IP rights such as industrial designs are not yet available (WIPO researchers are working on this), there is evidence of gender gaps there, too. For example, according to one estimate, only around 15 percent of those working in industrial design in the United States are female.

Gender disparities are harder to measure in relation to creative works such as books, music and films, because the IP rights that protect those works – copyright and related rights – generally arise automatically and do not need to be registered with a central authority. That makes it difficult to track such rights. 

But all the available information suggests that women lag behind their male counterparts in the creative industries. Many creative professions are dominated by men. For instance, the United Nations reports that just 7 percent of the world’s film directors and 20 percent of screenwriters are female. Similarly, a study of the global art market has revealed that works by women artists fetch less at auction than those by men. And male authors register twice as many copyrights in the United States as their female counterparts.

The IP gender gap should concern us all. Gender equality is a human right and the necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. Not only is it one of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals; it is mainstreamed in all the Goals. 

Furthermore, anything that restricts innovation and creativity means we are all less well-off. It means we are missing out on the potential benefits of those “lost” great ideas.

There is plenty of evidence that increased participation by women improves the innovation performance of organizations and societies. Research shows that diverse, inclusive teams are more innovative, and diverse companies are more profitable.

In part, this is simply a question of numbers: by widening the pool of talent, one increases the chances of valuable new insights emerging. But women can also bring a different perspective, and women innovators help to ensure that new products and processes meet the needs of the whole population, not just the male half.

So there is also a clear business case for encouraging more women to use the IP system.

Women are clearly not inherently less innovative or creative than men, despite what I was taught to incorrectly believe in my 20’s. Countless examples of women in every region of the world have proved that time and again.

Look at the Nobel Prizes, given each year for world-changing triumphs in science and literature. In the 1900s, the first decade of the prizes, only 5 percent of winners were women. Maybe this isn’t surprising given the very different norms of the time, but what about now? In the current decade, women have leaped all the way up to… 8 percent of prizes. 

Similar evidence of stalled progress can be seen in business leadership. Almost half (47 percent) of U.S. workers are women, and 39 percent of U.S. companies are women-owned. That’s a lot. But among the nation’s at the biggest companies, those that have the most influence on people’s lives, the number holds at a measly 7 percent

Most people think of brilliant ideas as emerging from the churning brain of a genius who’s been left alone to forge his (yes, his) own path in a tiny attic room, a Silicon Valley garage, or the lab late at night. This tendency to operate as an independent nonconformist, which psychologists call agency, is seen as more characteristic of men than women. Women are assumed to be good at resolving conflicts and maintaining relationships—essential skills for keeping an operation humming—but NOT at the kind of separation from others that’s supposedly essential to brilliance.

Research increasingly confirms that innovation comes from connecting with others, as well as holding oneself apart. It involves drawing new connections between existing ideas, as much as inventing new concepts out of thin air. It comes to teams as often as individuals. And, importantly, there are no clear gender differences in actual creative abilities. But women are more likely to go uncredited and unrewarded for their best ideas.

The responsibility for fixing this bias lies with those who are already at the top—mentors, advocates, evaluators, and investors. One starting point is to be cautious when describing mentees as “creative” or “brilliant,” because of the potential for bias.

Leaders can also ensure that they are incorporating multiple perspectives when sponsoring or recommending others. Female (versus male) executives in a study were rated as less “innovative” by their supervisors—but not by their subordinates, who knew them better. Hearing from those in the know before sitting down to make a phone call on a subordinate’s behalf may yield a recommendation that’s more nuanced and less biased.

It’s also essential that we broaden our own conceptualizations of innovation. Despite stereotypes, it’s not the case that being antisocial, or a jerk, feeds people’s greatest ideas. In practice, we come up with good ideas just as often by strengthening bonds by breaking them. In other words, changing the world is something we can do together, including the voices of both men and women as we go.

When it comes to marketing, when you work with a team that puts gender diversity and those who are underrepresented first, like Ideaison, you automatically get a divergence of perspective and opinions. This makes every idea more substantiated, richer, and deeper in meaning, thus connecting you that much more to the audience you're trying to reach. We’re here to change the industries we work with, one project, conversation, and experience at a time.