Supporting Growth-Oriented Women Entrepreneurs : A Review of the Evidence and Key Challenges

In recent years, support programs for women entrepreneurs have gained traction and prominence as a means to create jobs and boost productivity at the national and regional levels. However, disparities in initial resource endowments of male and female-led firms, sector sorting into low productivity activities, social norms, and institutional arrangements, constrain the growth of female-led enterprises. This note reviews the outcomes of programs supporting female growth entrepreneurs and draws lessons from available evidence to inform the design of more effective programs. The review shows that most programs are primarily geared toward microenterprises, making it difficult to draw conclusions about program design for growth-oriented entrepreneurs, but some early findings point the way forward. Management practices appear to improve as a result of business education, but there is little robust evidence to prove that support programs lead to significant improvements in business performance outcomes. Furthermore, in programs with both male and female participants, firm performance improves in some cases for male-led firms only, not for female-led firms. The note concludes by suggesting the need for more experimentation in the design and delivery of services and a new focus on strengthening the engendering of support programs to more specifically address gender-specific constraints such as social norms, entrepreneurial preferences, and institutional arrangements, changing public discourse, and paying more attention to factors that induce female entrepreneurs to diversify into higher value-added activities. Offering mentoring, networking, and other consulting services, in addition to education on basic business practices and strengthening critical areas such as gender-specific content, can potentially increase the effectiveness of these programs.

Bibliographic Details

Main Authors:	Cirera, Xavier, Qasim, Qursum
Format:	Brief biblioteca
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2014-09
Subjects:	ACCESS TO CAPITAL, ACCESS TO CREDIT, ACCESS TO FINANCE, ACCESS TO INFORMATION, ACCESS TO MARKETS, ACCESS TO NETWORKS, APPLICATION PROCESS, BANK ACCOUNTS, BORROWING, BUSINESS ASSOCIATIONS, BUSINESS EDUCATION, BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT, BUSINESS EXPERIENCE, BUSINESS MANAGEMENT, BUSINESS NETWORKS, BUSINESS OWNERSHIP, BUSINESS PLAN, BUSINESS TRAINING, BUSINESSWOMEN, CAPITAL RETURNS, CAPITAL STOCK, CHAMBERS OF COMMERCE, CHARACTERISTICS OF BUSINESS OWNERS, COMPANY, CONSULTING SERVICES, CULTURAL NORMS, CUSTOMER SERVICE, DEVELOPMENT BANK, DIVERSIFICATION, ECONOMIC ACTIVITY, ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT, ECONOMIC GROWTH, ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES, EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES, EMPLOYMENT GROWTH, EMPOWERMENT, ENDOWMENTS, ENTERPRISE GROWTH, ENTREPRENEUR, ENTREPRENEURIAL ABILITY, ENTREPRENEURIAL BEHAVIOR, ENTREPRENEURIAL FINANCE, ENTREPRENEURIAL SUCCESS, ENTREPRENEURSHIP SUPPORT, ENTREPRENEURSHIP TRAINING, ENVIRONMENT FOR WOMEN, EQUAL ACCESS, EXPANSION, FAMILY BUSINESS, FAMILY BUSINESSES, FAMILY LAW, FATHER, FEMALE, FEMALE BUSINESS, FEMALE BUSINESSES, FEMALE EMPLOYMENT, FEMALE ENTERPRISE, FEMALE ENTERPRISES, FEMALE ENTREPRENEURIAL ACTIVITIES, FEMALE ENTREPRENEURIAL ACTIVITY, FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS, FEMALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP, FEMALE PARTICIPANTS, FEMALE WORKERS, FINANCIAL CAPITAL, FINANCIAL LITERACY, FINANCIAL SKILLS, FIRM SIZE, FIRMS, GENDER, GENDER DIFFERENCES, GENDER DIFFERENTIAL, GENDER DISTRIBUTION, GENDER GAP, GENDER ROLES, GENDER SPECIFIC, GREATER ACCESS, GROUP LENDING, GROWTH OPPORTUNITIES, GROWTH PLANS, HOUSEHOLDS, HUMAN CAPITAL, HUMAN RESOURCES, HUSBAND, INSTITUTIONAL ARRANGEMENTS, INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK, JOB CREATION, KEY CHALLENGES, LABOR MARKET, LABOR MARKETS, LACK OF INFORMATION, LIMITED ACCESS, MARKET INFORMATION, MEDIUM ENTERPRISES, MICROENTERPRISES, MICROFINANCE, MICROFINANCE CLIENTS, PERCEPTIONS OF WOMEN, PRODUCTIVE ENTERPRISES, PRODUCTIVITY, PROFESSIONAL NETWORKS, PROFITABILITY, PROVISION OF FINANCE, RATES OF RETURN, REAL ESTATE, SALES GROWTH, SELF-EMPLOYMENT, SMALL BUSINESS, SMALL FIRM, SMALL FIRMS, SMALL-SCALE ENTREPRENEURS, SME, SOCIAL ASSISTANCE, SOCIAL WORK, STARTUP CAPITAL, SUCCESSFUL WOMEN, SUPPLY CHAINS, TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE, TECHNICAL TRAINING, THEORY OF THE FIRM, UNCTAD, VENTURE CAPITAL, VENTURE CAPITAL FUNDS, WOMAN, WOMEN BUSINESS OWNERS, WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS, WOMEN ENTREPRENEURSHIP, WOMEN OWNER, YOUTH,
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2014/09/20344837/supporting-growth-oriented-women-entrepreneurs-review-evidence-key-challenges http://hdl.handle.net/10986/23654
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