Some say it is not necessary, that equality will come by itself. Others have to create spaces. With time and effort, they will no longer be needed. For many entrepreneurs it is also necessary to create that place where they can talk about their business without the label of women. Female Founders Day was born with the vocation of creating those spaces in which women, and of course men, talk about their work, their challenges and their commonalities. The change comes precisely of those spaces. Also to overcome that glass ceiling and that eternal syndrome of the impostor of which a whole generation of great professionals is the victim and against which great women in the history of science and technology have been fighting for years.
We speak with Silvia Rivela, entrepreneur and co-organizer of the Female Founders Day that will take place on November 23 at the Ateneo de Madrid. At some of the startup founders of the Spanish entrepreneurial scene will meet. There will be a lot of conversations about the challenges and difficulties of starting a business for a woman, because they still exist, but there will also be a lot of innovation. “Not only software, which is already incredible, but also a lot of hardware that does have merit when it comes to undertaking,” explains Rivela.
Also with a clear objective on the table: create referents. And here many might think that they already exist beyond Female Founders Day. We have seen great women entrepreneurs at the South Summit, the 4 Years from Now or at the recent Web Summit in Portugal. They exist and they are many. The objective of Female Founders Day was to create an environment in which all participants are references for the new generations. No distractions. Without noise. “To generate a great impact”, Rivela points out. And because by bringing together all the female talent, many synergies can be achieved in the ecosystem.
At least this was the premise of Female Startups Leaders, organization behind the meeting. A group that was born through the networks during the hardest phases of confinement and that almost a year later already has its replica in real life. From the hand of Silvia Rivela, Carmen Hidalgo and Esther Molina, who went from the networks to a dinner and from there to take seriously the need of the entrepreneurial ecosystem to put a loudspeaker on all those women who are sometimes afflicted. Female Founders Day is, in this case, the first piece of a great story for female entrepreneurs.
Rivela, in addition to Female Founders Day, an entrepreneur with a history
Of course, the story of Female Startups Leaders and Female Founders Day would be empty if behind the group there were no great entrepreneurs. Silvia Rivela had her niche in the market. With a degree in architecture, her goal was to create the offices of the future. The offices, in fact, of the big startups on the national scene. Deliveroo or Spotahome went through his hands to create not only workspaces, also places where the furniture created the ideal space to improve business culture. Dowe was, and still is, the company he created from scratch.
Like any other entrepreneur, Rivela encountered a budding enemy: the coronavirus sent most of the employees home. The sophisticated offices were in the background to find themselves in teleworking. Dowe’s goal, therefore, was no longer essential for many of the national tech companies. Even now, that the return to the offices can already be measured in traffic jams in large cities, Dowe’s sense has changed.
“Maybe it’s throwing stones at me on my roof, but if a company can have an office half as big as now, because half of its staff telecommute, then much better,” says Rivela. He has projects in hand to reform the workplaces of various startups. In fact, Dowe is what he feeds him today. But she also has a new goal besides the match on Female Founders Day.
The pandemic brought many employees home. Many of them did not know how to work at home, the companies did not know how to create those connection relationships between workers. Rivela created a variation of Dowe himself: Cohesionist. An online teambuilding system for companies to integrate their employees. Also with an objective: Rivela is one of those rare bird with nomadic life. Not being linked to a fixed place of work and being able to work from your van in the Canary Islands is a real advantage.
Still in the testing phase, Cohesionist was already able to test its system with a first client: Cabify. The goal was to create an online environment in which workers could speak without the limits of labor relations. Despite the importance of having the unicorn among its ranks, Rivela confesses that they are the startups that are beginning to succeed –The ones that have power– the ones that attract you the most.
In any case, Rivela creates online parties in which for the moment she acts as a moderator to animate the situation, also to check that everything is flowing. Also create adventures in which each employee takes a role on a ship with a mission. Everything from home, but with a physical part that each employee receives via messenger: feeling part of a group – for the party they were festival bracelets – is important. The objective is to identify the needs of the team through the game, also enhance established roles and create a company culture that, for a long time, has been relegated to the background and unimportant. Along with the offices designed by and for the best cohesion of the group, Rivela wants the group to know how to communicate wherever it is.