We were recently contacted by a team from Entrepreneur Magazine for a social media project they’re working on about startups, and jumped at the chance to tell their 4.5M followers about MAÄT. During a preliminary call, they told us they’d be asking for a business ‘hot take’ during the shoot.
Hot take: (n) a quickly produced, strongly worded and often deliberately provocative or sensational opinion or reaction (as in response to current news).
In order to work, we knew our hot take needed to make us feel at least a little uncomfortable. We went with: “Female founders shouldn't be afraid of being disliked”. This felt uncomfortable because first of all, it goes against societal conditioning that makes being liked important to women. Secondly, in the follow up, we spoke about female founders who stepped down from their companies in the past few years, when they were accused of behavior that made them 'unlikeable' to a lot of people. Since they weren’t given the chance to embark on the slow and painstaking process of redeeming themselves, maybe they should have dug in their heels and refused to go off quietly into the night. Had they been able to stay on, changing and becoming better, perhaps their experience would have fostered a culture that’s more generous with second chances to women, which would benefit us all.
Today is International Women’s Day and this year’s theme is ‘Accelerate Action”. It focuses on recognizing strategies and tools that drive women’s progress in education, employment, and leadership. One of the best tools and strategies to accelerate women’s progress is simply women supporting other women. By doubling down on supporting each other, especially when we mess up and are at our most ‘unlikeable’, we’ll create the space that allows us all to change and grow.