On February 20th, Mariya Gabriel, EU Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society gathered CEOs of tech companies who signed the Declaration on an inclusive business environment, to take stock of their progress and share good practices. EBAN Board member and Luxembourg Business Angel Network President Larissa Best represented EBAN at the roundtable and contributed from EBAN’s perspective to the discussion on the leaders of the future and driving change. According to Larissa, “Start-ups are the leaders of the future and every pitch is trying hard to drive change. Thus, our community knows how to encourage change because that is what Business Angels do.” Larissa pointed out that we find less women pitching and that public speaking classes are extremely important, in all instances, pitching or otherwise. She also added that driving change is hard because it leaves you open to attacks and thus, we need to help young leaders who wish to drive change to sustain their arguments when under attack when they are pitching, as well as in general.
The declaration that Larissa signed along with the other prominent women present at the roundtable focused on the commitment to achieving gender balance and providing equal opportunities in their companies by:
- Instilling an inclusive, open, female-friendly company culture
- Recruiting and investing in diversity
- Giving women in tech their voice and visibility
- Creating the leaders of the future
- Becoming an advocate of change
The good practices and recommendations to achieve an inclusive business eco-system open to all will be published on Digital Single Market website in March 2019.
Whether the CEO of a large high-tech company or of a start-up, you can also contribute to closing the gender gap in your company by signing the declaration.