Women in Tech. WIT

It’s no secret that the business world is in need of more female leaders. I have found myself fascinated by female start-up founders and leaders. As a female adult who has worked in both the Bay Area and Shenzhen-China’s Silicon Valley, I am interested in founding a startup and spurring the incorporation of women into executive positions in the technology industries. Why? A 2011 Catalyst analysis of Fortune 500 companies found that corporations with a higher representation of women on their executive boards significantly outperformed those with no female directors. Female-led start-ups tend to perform better than all-male teams by between 63 and 220 percent. Even more so, it is essential to see women’s entrepreneurship as an economic issue, not a gender-equity issue. When new companies and industries flourish, everyone benefits. And the returns will increase when more women contribute to the process by bringing their ideas to market and building high-growth firms around them. And yet, only 5% of America’s CEO’s are female and 18% of startups had at least one female founder; when it comes to technology start-ups, only 3% of CEO’s in technology fields are women. There is a need for stronger and greater female leadership at technology companies. What exactly led to the lack of female leader at the top executive positions in tech industry? I propose two causes: the lackness of women in VC firms; the lackness of women graduated with a STEM degree.

商业世界需要更多的女性领导人，这并不是秘密。我发现自己对女创始人和领导人很着迷。作为在湾区和深圳 - 中国硅谷工作过的女性，我立志成立一家创业公司，并鼓励将妇女纳入技术行业的行政职位。为什么？Catalyst* 在2011年 对“财富”500强公司的研究中指出，执行董事会中女性代表性较高的公司表现显著优于没有女董事的公司。女性主导的初创企业比全男性队伍的表现要好于63％至220％。更重要的是，将妇女创业视为促进经济发展问题而不是性别平等问题至关重要。当新公司和行业蓬勃发展时，每个人都受益。当更多的妇女通过将她们的想法推向市场并在其建立高增长的公司时，将会增加公司回报。然而，美国CEO中只有5％是女性，只有18％的创业公司有女创始人;在技​​术创业方面，技术领域CEO中只有3％是女性。技术公司需要更强大和更大的女性领导力。究竟是什么导致了科技公司顶尖领导层缺失女性领导？我认为原因主要是：风投公司女性领导人少；获得STEM专业的女性较少。 Despite the potential for better start-up performance under female leadership; after years of observation, I found the gender gap in venture capital is still very large. What causes this? According to my opinion, there are two reasons: There are fewer females educated in and looking to enter into STEM fields, and there are fewer women in VC’s. Only 8% of female-founded start-ups in the Bay Area receive series-A funding. The gender gap in venture capital funding has important implications for the lack of diversity in Silicon Valley. In the U.S., Women make up just 4% of venture capital partners according to the Wall Street Journal. There are less female students studying in STEM-related disciplines, yet educational background in STEM fields is vitally important to gaining an executive position. Women comprise 47% of the American workforce but just 25% of the STEM workforce. Thus, young women must be motivated to study and major in science fields if they wish to have a shot at becoming CEO’s.

尽管在女性领导下有更好的创业表现的潜力;经过多年的观察，我发现风险投资行业的性别差距还是很大的。是什么原因造成的？我认为，有两个原因：女性受教育程度较低，希望进入STEM领域，VC的女性少。湾区只有8％的女创业初创企业获得A系列资金。风险资本融资中的性别差距对硅谷缺乏多样性具有重要意义。根据华尔街日报，在美国，妇女只占风险投资合伙人的4％。少数女学生在STEM相关学科学习，但STEM领域的教育背景对于获得行政职位至关重要。女性占美国劳动力的47％，但仅占全部STEM劳动力的25％。因此，如果要成为CEO的话，年轻女性必须有动力学习和主修科学领域。 However, interestingly, these statistics are surprisingly higher in China. Take my city Shenzhen as an example. 40% of founders of technology firms are women, and that number is still rising. Chinese female entrepreneurs have been on the rapid rise in the past 20 years, accounting for about 25% of the total number of entrepreneurs. In China, about 17% of investing partners are female, according to New York Times. What has caused this interesting trend? Why does China have more females founding technology start-ups and related firms?

然而，有趣的是，这些统计数据在中国出人意料地更高。以我的城市深圳为例。技术公司的创始人中有40％是女性，而这一数字仍在上升。中国女企业家在过去20年来一直在迅速崛起，占企业家总数的25％左右。据纽约时报报道，在中国，约有17％的投资伙伴是女性。是什么引起了这个有趣的趋势？为什么中国有更多的女性创业技术初创企业和相关公司？ In short, there are far more opportunities for women to achieve executive leadership positions in the technology industry in China. More venture capital firms in China have female partners and tend to support female founders. More women in China also choose to study in STEM fields when earning their college degree, according to Chinadaily.com, women earned a bachelor degree in STEM ranging from 31% to 42%. However, according to the National Science Foundation (NSF) Asian American women, like women of most races, earn less than half the STEM degrees conferred to students of their race, and the growth in attainment of these degrees is slower for Asian American women than for the Asian American community at-large. Within that population, Asian American women are least likely to obtain high-income engineering and computer science degrees. Asian Americans report the highest rate of workplace discrimination of all groups — 30-31% of all AAPI report some form of race-based barrier to advancement. I believe this discrimination will significantly inhibit minority female technology entrepreneurs.

简而言之，妇女在中国技术行业担任行政领导职位的机会更多。中国更多的风险投资公司有女性合作伙伴，并倾向于支持女性创始人。根据 Chinadaily.com 的统计，中国更多的女性在STEM领域也选择了大学学历，在STEM中获得了31％至42％的学士学位。然而，根据美国国家科学基金会（NSF）的亚裔美国妇女，像大多数种族的妇女一样，获得少于其种族学生授予的STEM学位的一半，亚裔美国女性的这些学位成绩的增长速度较慢对于亚洲美国社区而言。在该人口中，亚裔美国女性最不可能获得高收入工程和计算机科学学位。亚裔美国人报告所有群体的工作场所歧视率最高 - 所有AAPI的30-31％报告了某种形式的以种族为基础的进步障碍。我相信这种歧视将会显着抑制少数民族女科技企业家。 In the future, I want to initiate a nonprofit organization to help women to look at earning a STEM degree in fields like operations research and pursue their dreams of becoming future executive leaders, especially in the technology industry; United Women entrepreneurs to support each other and share financing experience, connect female technology entrepreneurs from the U.S. and China.

未来，我想启动一个非营利组织，帮助女性在获得STEM学位，并追求他们成为未来行政领导者的梦想，特别是在技术行业。联合妇女企业家互相支持，分享融资经验，连接美国和中国的女科技企业家。

Yudi

钰迪

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