SheVentures

What maximizes your chances of receiving funds from a venture capitalist? Shelly Kapoor Collins knows firsthand. She's a tech entrepreneur and public servant–turned– founder/CEO of Shatter Fund, a venture capital fund that invests almost exclusively in female entrepreneurs whose businesses stand to disrupt the tech landscape. With more than 20 years in the tech sector advocating for innovation and...

Did you know female founders face bias in how venture capitalists ask questions and are often negatively impacted when their products fall in a male-dominated industry? These are two separate findings of Dana Kanze, Ph. D., that add to a growing body of research that quantify gender discrimination in attracting investors. After all, women receive a paltry 2.3 percent of venture capital — women of...

Sometimes, the best business ideas are right in front of you. That was the case for Ashley Clark, who pivoted from being a banker to an entrepreneur and creator of old-school board games and flashcards that teach financial literacy — going against the current trend of online gaming with six-figure success during a pandemic.   A decade as a banker underscored that too many people didn't understand...

To begin Financial Literacy Month on SheVentures, who better than Leslie Tayne to discuss one of America's biggest financial problems: debt, a $14.6T reality for American households. Leslie Tayne always knew she wanted to be a lawyer despite her father warning her when she started 20 years ago that it truly was a boys club. She tried many facets of the law before she pivoted to what became her pas...

With more than 25 years in the life sciences, lawyer Diane Lifton is a huge proponent of diversity and inclusion in the workplace and communities.   Witnessing how incredibly hard her mother worked to balance raising children with returning to law school, Lifton credits this experience to her own genesis of hard work and advocating for others.   Lifton spent two decades as a partner in two top-tie...

Inspired by her lawyer grandfather, from a young age Caroline Whistler grappled with the question: What does it mean to serve others in a measurable and impactful way?   To that end, Whistler co-founded San Francisco–based nonprofit Third Sector Capital - a consulting firm that has deployed $800 million in government resources and $40 million of private funding to help 40 U.S. communities. Whistle...

Anna Lee never wanted to be an entrepreneur, much less design and champion a data-driven sex toy.   Graduating from University of California, Berkeley, with a degree in the male-dominated field of mechanical engineering, Lee — the daughter of conservative Korean immigrants — worked at corporate giant Amazon as the sole woman on the concept engineering team. Having fully realized the "American drea...

Cynthia Coredo's childhood was rife with loss. At age 6, her father was murdered. Coredo witnessed his lifeless body lying on the streets of Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya. As a teen, she lost her older sister to illness and her mother to suicide, the result of depression from joblessness.    Coredo embraced the realization that she was responsible for raising her siblings and herself, and she...

Kimberly Ellison-Taylor is an advocate for inclusive leadership, and what it means to create an equitable workplace environment. It's not as simple as giving everyone the same opportunity — you need to meet people where they're at. We are, unfortunately, not all created equal.  The first Black woman and the youngest person to act as chairperson of the American Institute of Certified Public Account...

Spoiler alert: If you want to eavesdrop on a candid conversation about being a black female entrepreneur, this is a must listen.   Imagine being told repeatedly that no market or need for your business exists — yet your experience and social and financial acumen tell you otherwise.    Makisha Boothe experienced this firsthand; now she helps other black women navigate their business lives.    Raise...

As the daughter of first-generation immigrants, Sima Gandhi is no stranger to hard work. Her father encouraged her to succeed, and her desire and drive to take risks and break down barriers may come from her humble but stable early family life. Determined not to define female business acumen by the 90s pantsuit — Gandhi found her own direction.  With an industrial engineering degree from Stanford...

At the age of 6, Ngozi Okaro knew she was going to be a lawyer and change people's lives.   Growing up, Okaro's clothes were mostly handmade by her mother to accommodate her towering 6-foot-tall figure. While she resented it at the time, it instilled an appreciation for design and inclusivity within her.   Now, with a law degree from Georgetown and 14 years of experience in organizational developm...

For 25 years as a writer and editor for large magazines like Suede , Essence , and Latina to name a few, Marcia Cole embraced the editorial realm and conquered it.   Now, as founder and CEO of Ivy Digital (a content, technology, and data-driven marketing agency) and as the founder of nonprofit organization Passion Meets Purpose a service that empowers the homeless), Cole is constantly learning to...

From a young age, Kaitlin Maier's parents were huge advocates for her pursuing a career in STEM, which still sees female participation at a paltry 28 percent of the workforce .  A mechanical engineer, Maier wanted to do something in the often-overlooked field of women's health. While in college, she stumbled upon pelvic organ prolapse (POP), a condition that affects 35 to 50 percent of women — of...

Advocacy runs in this woman's blood. As the current director of advocacy and action for the National LGBTQ Task Force , Stacey Long Simmons has dedicated her life to helping others.  The LQBTQ task force website reflects the current state of affairs in America. The homepage reads: "Stonewall was a riot. #BlackLivesMatter. We support and protest and revolutionary fighting for the dignity of black p...

Whether you're an amateur cook or a master chef, we bet you've never thought of "Greek-ing" up your favorite dishes, right?   Kelly Salonica Staikopoulos and Joanne Staikopoulos-Marzella, two sisters formerly in the editorial and accounting worlds respectively, are now cooking up a storm with an innovative twist: Using recipes largely gleaned from their Greek mother, Mary — aka Kukla ("doll" in Gr...

Almost 7 percent of children between the ages of 3 and 17 in the United States have a developmental disability, the CDC reports , and the community is still largely under-served. Carissa Tozzi is changing that.    From an iconic New York City life as the entertainment editor of CosmoGirl and Seventeen to a publicist for social media influencers to the co-creator of an app for moms of children with...

After more than 25 years as CEO of advertising giant J. Walter Thompson's American division, an alleged scandal involving her boss during the #MeToo movement began to monopolize Lynn Power's time. As a result, she began wilting in her role, which was no longer about creativity, rather crisis.    The pivot into starting her own strategic consulting firm, The HMS Beagle, was a natural one, but Power...

This woman was not only the first foreign lawyer to practice law in Afghani courts — but she also won the first-ever presidential pardon of a moral case in the country's history from former President Hamid Karzai. Seriously.   From standing up for her Korean mother on the streets of Milwaukee to fighting against human rights abuses in Afghanistan and other countries, Kimberley Motley is an unstopp...

Feminist scholar turned real estate entrepreneur, Janelle Briggs wants to ensure the American Dream of homeownership is affordable and accessible to everyone.   An idea that may sound far-fetched and futuristic — one that most architects have only dreamed of on paper — Briggs and her cofounder/partner are making a reality. Stackhouse , a real-estate development company, is creating building struct...

What makes a ' Vagipreneur ' anyway?  From working in public relations to earning an MBA at Stanford, Rachel Braun Scherl had an untraditional foray into the world of marketing, so it's no surprise she later trademarked the word v agipreneur . Her start in PR led to her greatest lesson: the power of building business relationships. From there, Braun Scherl ventured into the world of female sexual...

Before COVID-19 forced everyone to take a microscopic look at their finances — Leigh Phillips was helping Americans save.  As unemployment claims skyrocket, it's clear just how fragile Americans' personal finances are. Roughly 40 percent of Americans don't have an emergency fund of even $400.  So how can anyone think of retirement savings when the day-to-day budget is already a struggle? Enter Lei...

Oppressive dictator regime. Sexual abuse. Drugs. Sex work. Incarceration. Transitioning. Actress. Trans rights and sex worker rights advocate. Positivity embodied. Fighter. Cecilia Gentili grew up in an oppressive dictatorship in Argentina and fled to the United States in her 20s for a better quality of life. She's battled drug addiction, imprisonment, and ICE; now Gentili is fighting another batt...

Eleven million women or 28 percent of all caregivers provide unpaid help to an aging adult as well as to children, according to the National Alliance on Caregiving. MaryAnn Jones — a 20-year-veteran magazine art director — lived this struggle: balancing a high-powered career, a daughter with type 1 diabetes, and a mother with an ovarian cancer diagnosis. All this while grasping for the precious mo...

Never tell Roshawnna Novellus, Ph. D. she can't do something.   At age 15, she raised $600,000 in scholarships to fund her education. And after being told by an educator she "couldn't do math," Novellus earned a doctorate in engineering with a minor in finance.   So it's no surprise that Novellus keeps breaking barriers today.   Though she got her start in corporate America, Novellus realized her...