Women Get Ready, Get Set and Go Global

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 by: Laurel J. Delaney, MBA

Today,
women are starting businesses at twice the rate of men and becoming a
major force both in the traditional and the new global e-business
marketplace.

In November, The National Women's Council's
Interagency Committee on Women's Business Enterprise prepared and
presented to the 2000 Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development Conference a case study (http://www.nwbc.gov/oecd.pdf)
on successful public and private initiatives for fostering
entrepreneurship among women. It notes the significant role women have
played in the recent economic prosperity and affirms the fact that
"countries with high levels of economic activity and with the highest
start-up business rates are the ones where women are well-engaged in
entrepreneurial activity." More intriguing still, small businesses
owned by women and minorities are focusing more intense efforts on
exporting than those owned by non-minority men. The U.S. Small Business
Administration's (SBA) Office of International Trade, in a statistical
report released last year, indicated that "America’s small businesses
are big players in international trade — and their role is growing
rapidly." Export data analysis (http://www.sba.gov/library/oitreport/oitnov99report.html) shows that 97 percent of U.S. companies that export are small businesses and women own 40 percent of all small businesses (http://www.sba.gov/news/speeches/alvarez112900.html).

Wanna Grow? Go Global!

Women
account for 30 percent of the businesses that export more than half of
their products. "Women-owned firms participating in the global
marketplace grow more rapidly than women-owned businesses that are
primarily domestic," SBA Administrator, Aida Alvarez said. "They are
more apt to develop a new product or service and expand domestically.
At the SBA (http://www.onlinewbc.org/),
we have several programs in place to help women-owned businesses take
advantage of the outstanding opportunities available through
international trade."

Achieving Success a Woman’s Way

Could
it be that businesswomen go globetrotting with their products or
services more readily than men do because they adapt more easily to
foreign countries and cultures? “I think women [have a] natural ability
to embrace their work and their businesses as a natural extension of
their own family,” says Cherie Piebes, IBM’s Global Small Business
Program Director for the Alliance Marketing and Women Entrepreneurs
market (http://www.ibm.com/smallbusiness/women).
“Research has indicated that women tend to manage from a centralized
focal point, while men manage from a hierarchical stance.” A more
personalized style of business interaction makes women uniquely
equipped to succeed on the international front, where quality personal
relationships are key to success. Even though we realize that the
ability to stick to a complex business agenda will win our colleagues'
confidence and respect, the emotional sensitivity and the capacity for
relationship building that is largely attributed to women can be useful
in any business negotiation. National Foundation for Women Business
Owners (http://www.nfwbo.org)
researchers put it more succinctly: “The fact that we are women, with
different challenges and perceptions in the workplace . . . can finally
be turned to our advantage, judo style.”

Listen and You’ll Understand

What
really enables a woman entrepreneur to go global? Here’s what two
dynamic global businesswomen have to say. “It has been my experience
that doing business in any part of the globe is all about listening,”
says Deb Armstrong, President of majority woman-owned Kendallville,
Indiana-based, A-1 Production, Inc. (http://www.a1production.com),
a producer of bushings, hydraulic fittings and machined parts. “Maybe
this is why women are the ones working more diligently to increase
business overseas. While we listen and observe, we also see that we
must be flexible to do business in other parts of the globe, be patient
with others and most of all accept and embrace the differences in
people,” Deb notes. “Producing a product or service at a good price
also helps!”

Relationships Seal Deals

What
else brings success to women conducting business overseas? I asked Ms.
World Trader of The Year (awarded by the state of Minnesota in 1985) to
see if her opinion differed. “Building trusting, quality
relationships--something especially women excel--in has been the key to
international success for me,” says Yvonne Halpaus, Director of Sales
and Marketing for QNET LLC (http://www.ce-mark.com),
a quality assurance and international trade consulting firm
specializing in CE Marking and ISO 9000/EN 46000/QS 9000 with
affiliated offices in California, Wisconsin and Tokyo. She elaborates
further: “In the past, when I traveled throughout the world to sell
machinery, I prepared in detail to understand the market I was
visiting--including the Arab world. I read about the culture, their way
of conducting business, visited with our international bankers to
obtain economic reports and forecasts. While conducting business, I
always made sure to ask questions and not jump to conclusions based on
Western viewpoints. I tried to study situations through local
viewpoints. Combined, this gave me an edge in negotiations. I seemed to
understand or at least be willing to try.” Deb Armstrong jumps in to
add: “I would have to say that to me, another reason why we succeed
more so than men in the global marketplace is because we are open to
differences in methods, practices and meeting people’s diverse needs.
Because of my success with global trade (from 1997 grew exports to 10
percent of company’s total sales) and the changes made in the company,
I was promoted from Senior Vice President to President in 1999.”

Who Says Women Aren’t Allowed?

This
is all great and fine, but what about certain parts of the world where
the perception is that women aren’t allowed to participate in business
dealings--then what? “When my top sale in the Middle East was valued at
$2 million, management stopped asking if they were doing the right
thing sending a woman to the Middle East,” says Yvonne. “It became a
mute point.”

Whatever Your Business, The World Is Yours

It’s
clear that whether you run a service or manufacturing enterprise, the
wide-open world of global marketing is the businesswoman's natural
habitat. If you haven’t already gone global, you can start by visiting
a few of these one-stop-global-shops that cover everything from how to
start your business to how to operate in the global marketplace.
Although most of the Web sites are designed for businesswomen, much of
the featured content will be of interest to all entrepreneurs.

• AT&T Women in Business (http://www.att.com/wib/index.html)

• Advancing Women (http://www.advancingwomen.com/index.html)

• Businesswomen in Trade (http://www.infoexport.gc.ca/businesswomen/menu-e.asp)

• Forum for Women Entrepreneurs (http://www.fwe.org/)

• Global Funding Community (http://www.seekingcapital.com)

• Online Women’s Business Center (http://www.onlinewbc.org/docs/market/index.html)

• Organization of Women in International Trade (http://www.owit.org/)

• The Enterprise Development Website Women and Enterprise Development (http://www.enterweb.org/women.htm)

About the Author

Laurel Delaney runs a Chicago-based global marketing, consulting and web content providing company aimed toward entrepreneurs and small businesses. She is the author of "Start & Run a Profitable Exporting Business" and teaches an MBA Export Entrepreneurship course at Loyola University Chicago. In addition, she serves as Director of International Development for SeekingCapital.com, a global funding community that facilitates education and interaction between entrepreneurs and investors. Ms. Delaney can be reached at laurel@seekingcapital.com.

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