Management Information Systems Commons^™

Still A Man's World? Second Generation Gender Bias In External Equity Term Sheet Negotiations, Ethne Swartz, Frances M. Amatucci, Susan Coleman

Department of Information Management and Business Analytics Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Women increasingly start and lead growth ventures yet receive a small proportion of external equity funding. Term sheet negotiation is a pivotal moment for obtaining growth capital. We employ a multi-method, mixed mode research design to explore strategies of women entrepreneurs who have negotiated term sheets and discuss our quantitative findings. Results indicate that women entrepreneurs in our sample worked hard to achieve optimal outcomes yet come up short because of exogenous and endogenous factors linked to second generation gender bias in the negotiation process. Propositions for future research are generated given the results of this exploratory research.