Did you know that female entrepreneur are the fastest growing segments of business owners in the United States? Despite that, women entrepreneur have a hard time securing funds for their startups. Due to lack of funding, female owned startups generate less revenue and have a much higher failure rate. Despite the odds, some women entrepreneurs outshine the competition and carve their own identity. You might not see them in the mainstream media, but they are making great strides in business. In this article, these shinning stars share their business advice so that budding female entrepreneur can learn from it and achieve success.
Arianna Huffington
For the Founder of Huffington Post, “Fearlessness is like a muscle. I know from my own life that the more I exercise it, the more natural it becomes not to let my fear run me.” You need to calculated risks without fearing failure in order to succeed at entrepreneurship. She further adds, “You have got to surround yourself with people who have perseverance and a willingness to take risks and fail.” To try something new, she resigned from her Huffington Post and laid the foundation of her own startup that will change lives.
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey needs no introduction when it comes to entertainment industry, but very few people know about the rough journey she has to go through before she became the world’s most popular talk show host. Despite that, she urges female entrepreneurs to stay positive and challenge the status quo. She once said, “Turn your wounds into wisdom.” She sees every event in her life as an opportunity to choose love over fear and wants to promote the same mindset in female entrepreneurs.
She was so obsessed with challenging the status quo that she even got bored with her world-famous talk show. “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and wanted to change the norm. She shares her experience in these words “I am sick of people sitting in chairs stating their problems. Then we roll the videotape then we have our experts on the topic. I am in the “What’s next” phase of my career.”
Coco Chanel
Coco Chanel was a fashion designer who transformed the fashion industry after World War 1 by creating a world-renowned fashion brand, Chanel. Her advice for young entrepreneurs is to focus on innovation. She once said, “In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different.” According to her, if you want to be successful, you need to be realistic. “Don’t spend time beating on a wall hoping to transform it into a door.” Continuous innovation and no fear of failure along with realistic approach propelled Coco Chanel to business stardom even in that era.
Sara Blakely
The youngest self-made female billionaire and founder of Spanx took it upon herself to create something that women can wear underneath because she did not like what was already on offer. She solved the biggest problem for women and returned they made her a billionaire. It is her will to make mistakes and improve that took her where she is today. Her advice, “It is important to be willing to make mistakes. The worst thing that can happen is you become memorable.”
She got that from her dad in her early years and lives by these principles. Sara shares what she learned from her dad, “My dad encouraged us to fail. Growing up, he would ask us what we failed at that week. If we did not have something, he would be disappointed. It changed my mindset at an early age that failure is not the outcome, failure is not trying.”
Cher Wang
The women behind HTC roaring success in past two decades, Cher Wang is the CEO of the company for all those years. She played a pivotal role in helping HTC manufacture one in every six smart-phone sold in the United States. She also donates generously to charities for the welfare of people. Her business advice is to continuously keep learning and improving. Cher Wang said, “It takes humility to realize that we don’t know everything, not to rest on our laurels and know that we must keep learning and observe. If we don’t, we can be sure some startup will be there to take our place.”
Rashmi Senha
I can bet very few readers might be familiar with Rashmi Senha despite her achievements. Rashmi Senha is the founder of SlideShare, a popular document and presentation-sharing platform. She shed some light on why she became an entrepreneur, “I think it is going to be hard to trace a specific event that made me want to be an entrepreneur. I like independence. I like to build things. Being an entrepreneur allows me to do both.” If you want some freedom and loves to build something new then, entrepreneurship is your best bet, but if that is not the case, you are better off with a traditional 9 to 5 job. To become a successful entrepreneur, you need to have an urge to create something new.
Tory Burch
Tony Burch is the CEO and Chairperson of Tony Burch LLC, which is a fashion design company. Her shot to fame came when Oprah Winfrey endorsed her line of products at “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and calling her “The next big thing in fashion.” She suggests the women entrepreneur must have a long-term vision and focus on the big picture. She shares the secret behind her company success, “We have a long term vision. It is not as if everything came so easy. It has been years of successes and sometimes not.” She also thinks that female entrepreneurs should dream big. As she said, “If it does not scare you, you are probably not dreaming big enough.”
Conclusion
Swimming against the tide is not easy, and these women entrepreneurs have done this for decades and came out on top. According to Muneeb Qadar Siddiqui, digital marketing executive at Dubai Monsters, a leading web design company in Dubai, “You could also achieve the same level of success by following their business advice. Just stay focused, eliminate the fear of failure and learn from your mistakes to improve and success will automatically come your way.” If you know about any other female entrepreneur and their secret of success, feel free to share it with us in the comments section below.