Allure and Reality in FemTec Entrepreneurship

Abstract

The following case study describes the founding process of a female engineer who, frustrated and discouraged by her years of work experience, was attracted to the benefits of self-employment. Associating self-employment with being freed from the specific constraints she had experienced in her everyday working life, her notion of self-employment was based on role models from her private surroundings. Her dissatisfaction with her former working life was especially the cause of the decisions by her direct superior and the lack of opportunities to effectively participate at her job. In her self-evaluation, she saw the reasons for her company’s failure most notably in the lack of competence and qualification when it came to e.g. customer acquisition. She was also frustrated by the wrong advice she had received by start-up consultants. She found helpful advice only from self-organized, private consultants and mentors, as they (unlike the “professional” start-up consultants) had specific knowledge and experience in their technical fields. The drama in this case lies especially in the fact that the female foundress’ product idea was in fact implemented and capitalized upon by one of her clients when the market entry of her own company was delayed by a few months. As a result, she lost the promising starting point of her own founding, while unintentionally placing an experienced competitor onto the market. The interesting aspect of this case lies in the confrontation with the reality of entrepreneurship and the conscious experience of “walking the path” of entrepreneurial work, especially the organizational work of getting the own company up and running. In this instance, it ultimately represented the foundress’ downfall.

Appendix

1.1 I The Founding Process at a Glance

1.2 II Additional Information that Focuses on the Personality of the Foundress

The following aspects allow deeper insight and complement the self-presentation by providing additional personality factors taken from the interview transcript.

1.2.1 Professional Background/Employee Perspective

• The foundress studied mechanical engineering because she did not feel secure about “interpersonal factors.” She was very surprised that the interpersonal factors in this field are as powerful as they are—not only when it comes to technology and technical issues.

• In her 14 years of experience working as a mechanical engineer for a company, she worked in a number of mostly smaller establishments. These companies tended to be more patriarchal (with the owner being the “king”). She in some ways felt she was the only “rebel” in the entire business. Another company she worked for expanded very quickly. No one gave her concrete feedback regarding her work performance until after 3 years of employment she received overall criticism about her job, leading her to leave the company at her own request.

1.2.2 Role Models/Founding Experience

• The foundress never planned or thought she would be self-employed.

• The foundress was told about two acquaintances who successfully founded a company together and continue to successfully run it. She stated that this however did not consciously motivate or encourage her to start her own company.

• Later in the interview, she told us that her mother had been an entrepreneur in the catering industry and had gone bankrupt. The foundress also remembered the considerable burden of her mother’s endless working days.

1.2.3 Motivational Factors

• The main reason to become a foundress was her frustration with her specific situation as an engineer employed at her former company.

• In this context, she reported having particularly “bad” bosses and problems where no one provided her with the necessary support.

• With her own company, she wanted to be a better boss, and work with her team cooperatively while motivating people. She made it her goal to receive and appreciate the ideas and suggestions of her employees. She felt that she would enjoy having a leadership position.

• Among other things, being an entrepreneur allowed her the opportunity for a self-determined, free organization of her everyday work activities.

1.3 III Her Take on Failure

1.3.1 The Dilemma with the Start-Up Consultation

The foundation consultant upset her in particular (“I felt incredibly badly advised”/“He scared me without actually helping me”). She named some reasons for this:

• The consultation gave her the impression that the founding of a GmbH was difficult and problematic.

• She received different answers to her questions everywhere she went, and got the impression that no one knew what to actually do (“I ran from Pontius to Pilate and no one could really tell me the right way to do it”).

• She had the impression that the so-called “experts” were not experts at all. They displayed no specific knowledge of their professional field, and in some cases never had their own founding experience.

• The expert advice (e.g. from the IHK on patents) was also bad. She also received answers which even turned out to be wrong and not even applicable to her case. On the other hand, she learned the right information about her specific case with regard to patent law from her circle of acquaintances.

1.3.2 Business Planning

• She was not aware of the fact that the founding process of the GmbH would actually take several months. In her opinion, this delayed the process so much that she lost customers she had already acquired.

• It was only during a later phase of the start-up process that the foundress looked for a consultant who had real entrepreneurial experience. In her opinion, this consultant gave her very competent advice and could help her in concrete terms. The time lost by this point however was vast.

• The foundress herself also reported difficulties with the business planning. “I thought I would sell the more parts and with a bigger profit margin.”

• In retrospect, the foundress described it as “naive” to have asked the advice of only one single potential customer. It struck her as “embarrassing” to ask without having founded a company or offered any products.

1.3.3 Entrepreneurial Knowledge

From the foundress’ point of view, various knowledge deficiencies were responsible for uncertainty and the ultimate failure of the project. She identified (among other things) the following factors:

• Loss of time due to lack of entrepreneurial knowledge.

• Self-conception (“Who am I? An entrepreneur or a foundress? Do I trade or am I a manufacturer?”). The ability to assess the proper “to do” list to be able to assess promotional possibilities.

• Knowledge about concrete bureaucratic steps and proper sequence of the company founding.

• Knowledge about what documents have to be submitted, in what order, and where (“I was rejected at each office because I didn’t have the right documents yet”).

• Specific funding advice (counselling on her specific industry sector).

• Acquiring the right training (and feedback at an early stage about these kinds of training opportunities).

1.3.4 Resilience/Inner Pressure/Stress

• The foundress frequently reported an internal pressure or stress that was unbearable (also see the self-description). “Working more self-determined and more freely—during the founding process I noticed it just doesn’t work. ‘More freedom’ just doesn’t exist.” “The internal stress was much, much greater than I thought it would be.”

• The following aspects were particularly problematic for the founder:

  • The order situation.

  • The dwindling capital stock (she paid her wages with this): “I became so tense, I just couldn’t stand it.” “Then it was just pure existential fear. So I said, ‘I’m gonna look for a job again.’”

  • Always being “on call.”

  • No representation.

  • “Are the customers really going to pay their bills?”

  • Problems with third parties (e.g. brochure problems).