Frontiers: breaking the glass ceiling: empowering female entrepreneurs through female mentors

Frank Germann, Stephen J. Anderson, Pradeep Chintagunta and Naufel J. Vilcassim

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Among the millions of entrepreneurs in developing economies, few are able to earn a decent livelihood. To help these entrepreneurs succeed, governmental and nongovernmental organizations invest billions of dollars every year in providing training programs. Many of these programs involve providing entrepreneurs with mentors. Unfortunately, the effects of these programs are often muted, or even null, for woman-owned firms. Against this backdrop, we tested whether gender matching, where female entrepreneurs are randomly paired with a female mentor, could help address the gender gap. Findings from a randomized controlled field experiment with 930 Ugandan entrepreneurs show that mentor gender has a powerful impact on female entrepreneurs. Firm sales and profits of female entrepreneurs guided by a female mentor increased by, on average, 32% and 31% compared with the control group, and these estimates are even larger for female entrepreneurs with high aspirations. In contrast, female entrepreneurs guided by a male mentor did not significantly improve performance compared with the control group. We provide suggestive mechanism evidence that female mentor-mentee arrangements were characterized by more positive engagements.

Keywords: female entrepreneurs; gender gap; glass ceiling; mentorship gender-matching; randomized controlled field experiment; small firm growth; developing economies; (ESRC) joint Growth Research Program; the Deloitte Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (DIIE); and the universities the authors were affiliated with when the research was conducted. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J16 L20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 10 pages
Date: 2024-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp, nep-hrm, nep-lab and nep-sbm
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in Marketing Science, 1, March, 2024, 43(2), pp. 244 - 253. ISSN: 0732-2399

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Journal Article: Frontiers: Breaking the Glass Ceiling: Empowering Female Entrepreneurs Through Female Mentors (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:120477

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