In this era, a women’s business center?

Thanks to a fifth-grade soccer team my husband coached, my family has gotten to know a family of African refugees who settled in the Treasure Valley about four years ago.

In many ways, the family isn’t so different from ours. Education is very important to them, and soccer plays a huge part in their lives. They like to go fishing and hiking in the mountains in the summer, and they perennially try to steer their kids away from computer screens – with mixed success.

In other ways, they’re enormously different. The kids are politer and less inclined to question adults, for one thing. For another, the mother of the family is extremely modest, and wouldn’t dream of disagreeing with a man on anything.

I never gave this much thought until a friend told me that MicroEnterprise Training and Assistance, or META, is planning to open a women’s business center at its headquarters in downtown Boise.

I’d known that Idaho was one of very few states without one of these Small Business Administration-sanctioned women’s business centers.

But when I heard we were getting one, I wondered why we needed it. From the national stories I read about young women and higher education, it seemed as though women are doing OK. Young women outnumber young men on most college campuses. Women in their 20’s earn more than their male counterparts in most major metropolitan areas.

Still, there are fewer women entrepreneurs. Less than a third of all U.S. businesses are women-owned, according to the U.S. Census. And many studies show women still earn less than men. But who knows what is holding them back? It’s well known women are much more likely to be the primary caregivers of children, which usually takes them out of the workforce for extended periods. I know that’s why I worked only part-time for many years.

I wasn’t the first to ask the director of the fledgling women’s business center, Sheila Spangler, why we need a women’s business center. Spangler, who is only now hiring staff for the center and setting up her office, said she’s asked this a lot. She explained that some women are just more comfortable dealing with other women – and thus more likely to seek the funding, mentoring, and other assistance that is going to lead to the opening of a business.

As Spangler noted, there’s plenty of research to show women are more likely to risk sharing their ideas when they’re in an all-women setting. That’s the reasoning behind many all-girls high school programs.

For this same reason Zions, and other banks, have long had women’s financial groups or other women-only small business services.

All this reminded me of our family friends the refugees. In their culture, it’s fine for women to work outside the home or to go into business, but it’s just not proper for those same women to interact closely with a man outside their family. This idea would stand firmly in the way of a woman who wanted to go into a bank and ask for financing – or to work with a mentoring program like SBA’s SCORE.

This is where META’s women’s business center will make a difference. The program will use a five-year grant from the SBA to help women either start or expand their businesses. It will focus on low to moderate-income women. The program has to do its own fundraising to match its funding from the federal government.

META will measure outcomes, such as businesses started and jobs created, and report back to the SBA. The center will serve the five-county region that includes Ada, Canyon, Elmore, Gem, and Payette Counties through the META office in Boise and a satellite office in a Caldwell storefront.

Spangler expects to find a lot of her clients through referrals from small business programs at banks or from the SBA itself, which receives a lot of calls from start-ups who need money. She hopes that the center will be discovered by walk-ins at the Caldwell office.

And it’s not for women only. Spangler told me many of the clients who use women’s business centers are men. The center doesn’t discriminate.

Anne Wallace Allen is managing editor of the Idaho Business Review.

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One Response to “In this era, a women’s business center?”

1. Venture Idaho Says:
   January 18th, 2012 at 2:50 pm

   As we have come to expect, a well written and informative piece. In response to your initial question (“In this era a women’s business center?”), however, I would propose there are important onsiderations you did not raise.

   You state, “As Spangler noted, there’s plenty of research to show women are more likely to risk sharing their ideas when they’re in an all-women setting. That’s the reasoning behind many all-girls high school programs” This may well be true, but when dealing with adult women in the business world, is it something we should be accommodating or encouraging? After all, to be successful in the real world a businesswoman will eventually need to interact with men, and do so effectively.

   You note that “For this same reason Zions, and other banks, have long had women’s financial groups or other women-only small business services.” In the free market, this makes sense–find a need and fill it.

   But should the government be doing the same?

   I’m not sure what the ultimate conclusion should be, but I would always error on the side of less government involvement and less nanny state coddling. The women I have known in my life–and particularly those who have an entrepreneurial zeal–are very intelligent, strong willed, confident creatures, and I can’t imagine any of them being the least bit anxious approaching a man versus a woman in a business transaction. I fear one likely outcome of this META coddling will be to draw women (and maybe men) who may otherwise be unsuited for the world of business into an entrepreneurial venture. This could well be a recipe for disaster, as they find themselves very quickly in over their heads and unable to cope with the harsh realities a small business reveals each day.

   I’ve no doubt the META folks have only the best intentions. I do hope they provide coaching for their prospective entrepreneurs in developing confidence in presentation and negotiation techniques, so these they quickly move beyond any fear of dealing with the dastardly male half of the population!

   Food for thought.