Teams with women work better, forum hears

Corporate teams that include women outperform those that do not on the group intelligence scale, according to the chief executive of a company committed to promoting women in high-potential start-ups.

Sharon Vosmek, chief executive of Astia, cited research by MIT professor Thomas Malone about group performance at the Women Invent meet-up at the Digital Exchange in Dublin last night. The event was organised to highlight female role models in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Vosmek heads a San Francisco-based non-profit that provides capital, connections and guidance to female entrepreneurs launching high-growth companies.

“We’ve put our stake in the ground that 100 per cent of our portfolio will have women in the executive team,” she said.

Vosmek has called the programme a “social experiment” to bring men and women together to do business. “Not to mentor women, not to support women, but to invest in women. And it’s working, to great effect.” She called on entrepreneurial women to stop allowing people to try to “fix” them through women -in-leadership initiatives as an example.

"I will never again attend a women-in-leadership training session. I am a leader," Vosmek said. She said "this is the time" for entrepreneurial women in Ireland.

“Dublin is one of the most vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystems that I’ve experienced around the world. You have investors, both here and those who fly in to take a look at what you’re doing. You have entrepreneurs who have gone before you. You have an incredibly fertile ground that is excited by the notion of economic growth, innovative growth and personal growth,” she said.

Sinead Kelly, project manager of Young Women Into Technology, also spoke. Run by community education body An Cosán in west Tallaght, the project promotes women in tech in disadvantaged communities.