Don’t Call Them An ” Entrepreneur “

They’re Called a Girl Starter !

One of the things I learned when we set out to create an entrepreneurial venture for young women is that this is a generation that doesn’t necessarily like the word “entrepreneur.” We held focus groups with millennial and Gen Z girls, and we heard over and over that that word sounded elite, and  it was hard to spell .  These young women wanted to be identified in a way that felt less intimidating and more attainable for more young people.

All In The Name?

They absolutely want the opportunity to create and imagine and build things, but they felt like more women would participate if they were called something that sounded more approachable. That’s why we came up with “Girl Starter”—the spirit and definition of “starter” is essentially the same as “entrepreneur,” but the girls we talked to felt like more young women would feel comfortable taking a chance if we found a new label for them.

They may not like the term “entrepreneur,” but millennials and the young people that make up Gen Z seem to be naturally entrepreneurial. They don’t want to climb the corporate ladder like their parents did; 62 percent of them would rather start their own venture—and their notion of what they want to do for a job is very different, too. From the outset, they are approaching what a career is and what they achieve in a way that clearly sets them apart from their elders.

Girl Starters And Visionaries

And this is something we saw with our “Girl Starter” submissions and the chosen contestants. When we put out a call for submissions and got 400 videos in 10 days, we knew there was an appetite for this type of venture. And we know that there are many, many girls who have what we call the “starter spirit”: They’re really excited, confident and enthusiastic. They also have varied experiences in business—some are very entrepreneurial already, and some had never done anything like this before in their lives. In choosing our eight participants, it was important for us to show that range; we want as many young women as possible to be able to see themselves in one of our contestants, to be able to envision their own personal journey to launching something.

Another thing we saw as we were putting together the show is that so many of the young people of today want to do something that is good and has a purpose—virtually all of our applicants submitted ideas that had the common characteristic of wanting to make the world better. Even if their plans weren’t, perhaps, strictly charitable endeavors, the end game for most was a way to solve a problem that would improve our world. And that is across the board, whether the ideas were tech-focused or product-related.

The Girl Starter Process

We are shining a light on early-phase business building because we think that is a great place to start in order to familiarize more young women with the process of getting an idea out of their head and into the first round of funding. In other words, we wanted to demystify the steps to start a business, and to answer for as many girls as possible: What is the space between ideation to pitch? So, even though some of our contestants already had fairly extensive entrepreneurial experience—in fact a couple of them already had their own company—we asked them to come up with new ideas for the competition in the interest of creating an even playing field for the whole group and to appeal to a wider swath of audience.

After all, at the end of the day, “Girl Starter” is a reality show. But unlike the way a lot of other reality programs function, on our show, the drama comes from business building, not from women tearing each other down. Women supporting women—that’s certainly a message that is vitally important to get across on a cultural level.

About Jeannine Shao Collins