Everyone knows raising kids takes up a lot of your time. And anyone who knows about starting startups will agree that startups also take up a lot of your time. This creates a conflict for anyone doing both. But how much of a conflict is there? How much do kids…
One worrying trend I’ve observed among my male investor friends is that they’re much more wary of giving candid advice to women founders than they used to be. They are afraid of saying anything that a female founder might misinterpret as sexism. So, when giving feedback to a…
I’ve said it’s preferable to start a startup before having children. But what if the timing is beyond your control? Are you destined to fail? No, but you are at a disadvantage. A lot will depend on your circumstances. Especially how much support your spouse or partner—assuming…
If anyone asked me for the most important advice I could give to someone about starting a startup and raising a family, I’d say, “Start the startup before you have kids.” That’s because running a startup and raising children are basically incompatible. And if I’m being really…
A lot of people have talked about how women in Silicon Valley are ignored or otherwise disrespected. It’s true that this does happen. When you imagine it happening, you probably call to mind a man dissing a woman. What most people don’t realize, however, is that the perpetrators…
In recent years, activists and the media have prepared women to feel discriminated against by investors. Though well-intentioned, this causes female founders to go into investor meetings expecting to face discrimination. That often causes them to misinterpret investors' actions, and the resulting disconnect can harm their chances of raising…
Because of our biological clocks, women need to consider the timing of children a lot more urgently than men. Startups take much longer than you’d think before they become successful. You should have a 5-10 year horizon, at least. And the period between when you start the startup and…
There’s never been more pressure on VCs to fund women than now. Whether the desire to have founder diversity in their portfolios is genuine or simply due to increased scrutiny, investors are funding more teams with women. What we need to realize is that investors are giving us a…
I’m a founder, an investor, and a mom and I’ve noticed there’s a gap between what’s talked about publicly and what women actually need to know about running a startup. That’s because the truth might be considered politically incorrect and no one wants to get…