Foreign-Born Women CEOs Find Common Ground

As a minority in the Silicon Valley start-up world, female CEOs encounter more obstacles than their male counterparts.

That was the consensus of a panel of five business-savvy, foreign-born female CEOs. The women, drawn to Silicon Valley from France, India, Singapore and other nations, assembled at Adobe’s San Jose headquarters for "Global Women's Journey." There, they discussed how they tackle, and overcome, the challenges of starting and running their own businesses to an audience of 80 women -- and a couple of men. 

“A lot of people said you aren’t going to make it: You’re a foreigner, you’re a woman,” said French-born Béatrice Tarka, who co-founded travel website Mobissimo with Stanford Database Group alum Svetlozar Nestorov. “But if you want to accomplish anything, you have to go for it.”

It can take longer for women to secure funding for their companies than men, Tarka said at the Thursday event. Many women tend not to be as bold or aggressive as men when it comes to pitching ideas and raising money, especially when they hail from a culture that expects them to be "soft" and "feminine," she said.

Michelle Zatlyn, a Palo Alto-resident and co-founder of CloudFlare, Inc., stressed the importance of finding female mentors through through online resources such as LinkedIn and Twitter, and lining up supportive business partners. Born in Canada, Zatlyn is now one of two women out of 20 employees in her San Francisco workplace.

Regardless of gender, the panalists agreed entrepreneurs need to be resourceful, and throughly research the markets they’re seeking to enter.

“It’s an entrepreneur’s task to go and search. Not everything is handed to you,” said Poormina Vijayashanker, founder and CEO of Bizeebee, a yoga business software company based in Palo Alto.

To “get to the top,” women often  to make some sacrifices, such as postponing have a family, said Vijayashanker.

But not everyone agreed. Tarka, who recalls bringing her two young children to her office, said it is still “possible to have everything.”

Singapore-born and raised, Aihui Ong said she was not aware of gender inequality in business until she came to the U.S. Before starting her San Mateo-based culinary website Love With Food, a friend approached her, disheartened that her new business wasn’t succeeding.

“She said it was because she’s a woman. I told her, ‘You shouldn’t think like that,’” said Ong, who has tapped into several resources available for women entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley such as Women 2.0.

The panel was moderated by NPR Digital Culture Correspondent Laura Sydell, who felt the subject of women CEOs is often pushed to the back burner: Women, like men, would rather talk about the ins-and-outs of the business world than gender inequity found in it.

“A lot of people don’t want to talk about what’s different about women in technology because they’re so busy,” said Sydell.

But the topic remains essential, said Brazilian-born event organizer Margarise Correa, who saw the event at an early celebration of International Women’s Day. Two years ago, she founded BayBrazil, the organization that sponsored this event alongside Silicon Valley Bank.

“In every culture,” said Correa after the event, “the problems related to women are the same.”

Related Topics: Aihui Ong, BayBrazil, Bizeebee, Business, Béatrice Tarka, CEOs, CloudFlare, Love With Food, Michelle Zatlyn, and Mobissimo