WEI represented House of Commons Women’s Enterprise launch

Rochdale Women’s Enterprise Initiative (WEI) Business mentor Elaine Simons represented WEI at the launch of the Prowess UK “State of Women’s Enterprise” report at the House of Commons.

Prowess is the UK network of organisations which support women to start and grow their businesses; they have 250 members, including WEI, who supports over 100,000 women in business each year.

The first part of the day was spent in group consultation, with almost 100 delegates discussing the key areas of the report’s findings, followed by an evening reception at the House of Commons to launch the report and celebrate the fifth anniversary of Prowess.

The report provides a comprehensive picture of the rate of business start-ups, the sectors from which women are leaving employment and recommendations on how national and local government can further support women’s enterprise.

The research shows that:

• Women are more likely than men to think that social, ethical and environmental considerations in business are important( 59 % of women compared with 48% of men).
• Women are moving from employment to selfemployment mainly from education, healthcare and community work sectors.
• Women from the black community, particularly African Caribbean are among the most entrepreneurial of all groups.

Erika Watson Prowess Executive Director felt the figures were encouraging, and called for a national mentoring network to support women at all stages of their business growth. She felt that training, mentoring coaching and networking were crucial to increasing the numbers of female entrepreneurs.

During the evening reception the author of the report Dr Rebecca Harding stressed that the attitudes and motivations that drives women’s enterprise are fundamentally different to men, and that these differences need to be taken into account in the delivery of business support to women. The report also called for a specific strategy for developing ethnic minority women’s entrepreneurship.

If you would like more information on Ms Simons visit, please contact her on 01706 646471.