Today's woman entrepreneur - do you recognise her?

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Submitted by Sue Stockdale on Fri, 08/06/2007 - 9:20pm.

women entrepreneur business skills achievement enterprise

How would you describe today’s woman entrepreneur? Is she focused individual driven to work all hours in the pursuit of profit? Or is she a woman who wants a lifestyle business with the minimum of stress?

There has been a lot of research into the characteristics of today’s women entrepreneur. This research has been borne out by the interviews I carried out with ten of today’s leading female entrepreneurs in the UK. These women include Michelle Mone, creator of the Ultimo bra and Penny Streeter OBE, Founder of Ambition 24 Hours recognised as the fastest growing unquoted UK company in 2002.

It shows that today’s woman will have a strong need for achievement and a passion for her product or service. She will have carried out some research into her market but also relies on intuition and her existing business knowledge to judge whether her business idea is likely to be viable.

She is also driven by the need for autonomy. A confident, focused individual with self-belief and tenacity, today’s women entrepreneur has a clear vision of what she wants to achieve and strong personal values by which to drive the business. These values are founded on respect, integrity, ethics, honesty and a passion for excellence.

Whilst she will encounter challenges on the way, including access to finance and balancing work and life requirements; her determination and tenacity to succeed will shine through.

She will lead her business in a manner that promotes genuine concern for others, team-working and openness. Amongst her measures of success are interaction with people and helping others and she is open to sharing her learning and experience with others.

This profile applies to both women who are growing large businesses and also those who are running lifestyle businesses. So do you agree with this description? Do you know women who have these characteristics or maybe different qualities and are equally successful?

What do you think?