Inclusion: Does Your Inside Match Your Outside?

My Founder’s Corner column examines the various challenges founders face in their journey of startup, growth and scale. Through my work with companies around the globe in tech, entertainment, education, social impact and numerous other industries, I will highlight themes that affect all founders, but there are nuances particular to the women founders I work with.  

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As the world goes through its current evolution of revolutions, it’s compelling to see how companies and organizations adjust to the cultural climate. It’s as if the world suddenly discovered women and people of color aren’t supported adequately, so everyone now has an initiative to include them in the conversation.

However.

It’s easy to see when people are simply following a mandate. It shows up as a disinterested conversation in which the talk is talked, but with no real commitment behind it. There are boxes to be ticked and budgets to be spent, and by the gods that shall be done.

But we know when that dynamic is in play. Rest assured, we know.

How do we know? Because we look at things like your management team, your board, the people in the room, and how you interact with us in the conversation. If you’re talking over us, or being prescriptive instead of listening, we know where things stand.

Your inside (your core values) doesn’t match your outside (your marketing).

Here’s a little news flash: Putting more chicks in the room isn’t going to solve the challenge of inclusion. Giving them “access” to more funding isn’t helpful if they’re expected to lead like men instead of leveraging what makes their style of leadership effective. Or if they’re asked if they plan to have children in the next few years. Yep, that happens so often it would make your head spin.

The entire reason I created IMPERIA™ was because in incubators around the world, I saw that very little was being done around the conversation called “Hey, you’re a founder who is a woman. How are things different for you?”

Remember what I said about alignment?

That applies to companies, too. If you’re going to have a mission, your team needs to reflect it. If your mission is to create initiatives for women, does your company or project support what a woman requires to thrive?

Let’s go beyond lip service and get to the real tasks at hand. Only then are we going to move the world forward.

With love from NYC,

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Photo: Alexis Chloe

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