"When no one is with you, you still have a complete you with you."
I have been through my roller coaster entrepreneurial journey now from long. There were many low and high moments. The low times from not having a single rupee in my bank account and cheque worth rupees lacs hanging on my head like the sharpest bloody sword. The low times, when I decided to change the location of my business and out of more than 20 employees just one joined me to my new location, my village Tangra. A major setback to my business. The low times when I lost all my money in scaling up my venture Simbacart in its year 2. The high times when we did 1 crore of sales just in the first year. The high times, When we got Upcoming Startup Of The Year 2016 Award by ASSOCHAM. The high times, when I got an invitation for TEDx.
It is all in mind. The winning and losing. The hottest rays of the sun cannot evaporate the oceans and even the strongest storms cannot move the mountains. Women have to be oceans and mountains to survive in the entrepreneurial universe.The top challenge women face is the social challenge. I and my husband started entrepreneurial journey three years back. We were lacking funds, and my husband decided to join AMEX in the United States to support the venture. Since then we are staying apart. However business has connected us in a unique way.
Every day we have hours of positive healthy discussion on what to do next, where we were wrong and what we did right. On a funnier side, we cannot even fight as many families now depend on us. We cannot run the business on mood swings and hence luckily every step is in favor. But, how does the society reacts??
"Why you stay in India? Why don't you join your husband in the US?"
"How do you stay without your husband for months? Don't you love him?
"Do you love money more than a relation?
"It has been 3 years, you people still do not have kids? Have you consulted the doctor?
" Why did you started such a venture where you are stressed each day? You should go and join your husband in the US and enjoy your life.
Apart from such pinching questions, the nearest relations ones ask to close the venture many times. Women are not meant to face challenges, they are meant to live with their broken dreams, I believe this is how the society thinks. Many women have ample money given by family, but zero satisfaction of what they have achieved in their life. Though, the education level is no less than their brothers and husband. That's Sad.
The economic challenge is no lesser challenge even the men face. However, the context is different. Where men are the owners of the property, they or the family possess. Women, especially in India have no assets in their name.I have never come across any women's family or in-laws pledging a property in a bank because she wants to start her own venture, she wants to pursue her dream, her passion.
Many times when family supports women, She has been questioned extreme. Though the men too but women are much more emotional and they feel pressurized and give their best to convince their families that they are not weak. Imagine, the toughest situations they are in and they go through. In lesser time, the expectations of making the business profitable are quite high. Many times the conscience of families cannot accept daughters and daughter-in-laws risking more than boys in the family, hence they never encourage women even when they are right. The question here is "Do we treat women equivalent to men? or we just say that in media or in our chat groups that women are treated equivalently to men.
My experience says they are NOT. When I go to a bank for a loan, they ask me about my father, about my husband. What I have achieved in life that is none of their business. They ask what property I have on my name or they ask me to pledge property of father or husband for a loan. Though with our successful efforts, the business is sustaining well from last 3 years. However, that's shocking that after doing the business of nearly 3 crores, I have never been able to get a loan of even 1 lac from any of the banks around me and I have been always discouraged by the managers. One of my friend's relative asked me to talk to banks about a scheme for women, where she gets a loan of up to 1 crore for her startup. I went to my local PNB bank, where the manager says for that you should have collateral 125%. What a joke? My father runs a flour mill in the village, invested every piece of land on my studies and still you want me to pledge his last left asset a home too? That's Sad!
Not me only, thousands of serious women entrepreneurs are going through this and few even worst. There is no help, there are only schemes and documents and fake politically strategized ads in media.
"When no one is with you, You still have a complete you with you" This is what I believe in and every women entrepreneur should believe. We are our own relatives, friends, co-founders, investors, counselors when we are entrepreneurs. Start little, assume initially that there is going to be least social and economic support and definitely zero in many cases. A 2014 Babson College Report found that less than 3 percent of venture-capital-funded companies had female CEOs. So that is the scenario. Women can be trusted to give life to a newly born baby, but not for the ventures which are born and raised with much equivalent pain, hardships, and challenges.
Yes, women are emotional and there the success lies. The stubborn companies which do not have emotions in them have least chances to surpass, A Stubborn Women Entrepreneur with an undying passion for making a startup successful.
My honest writings
Mandeep