When Bobbie Racette first started looking for capital to back her tech startup, Virtual Gurus, which matches clients with remote workers all over North America, she heard one word more than any other: “No.”
“For the first two years, more than 170 investors said no to me,” the founder and CEO says. She wasn’t alone—statistics have shown that companies founded by women receive only a nominal percentage of all venture capital investments. “I had to find investors who understood what I was trying to do.”
That was seven years ago. Racette, a Cree-Metis woman and member of the LGBTQ community, did eventually land a big “yes” from The Scotiabank Women Initiative, which is a program designed to empower women and non-binary entrepreneurs through equitable access to financial and professional growth opportunities that helps them succeed on their own terms. Gillian Riley was the founding executive champion of the Initiative, created in 2018, to strengthen equality and financial support for women entrepreneurs in Canada.
The results speak for themselves. The Scotiabank Women Initiative has deployed $8 billion in capital to support women-owned and -led businesses in Canada and engaged over 25,000 women entrepreneurs across five countries. Virtual Gurus has grown too, and now has over 40 employees and more than 650 virtual assistants. The company has seen nearly 300 per cent year-over-year revenue growth, and recently Racette was named Woman Entrepreneur of the Year, Prairies Region at the Startup Canada Awards.
Both Racette and Riley—now President and CEO of Tangerine Bank, a subsidiary of Scotiabank and Canada’s leading digital bank—continue to see the unique challenges facing women and non-binary entrepreneurs, and the potential that’s unlocked when they have the right support. Here, they reflect on the need to open more doors for more women and non-binary people in business, the importance of funding, mentorship, and what’s ahead.
Gillian, can you explain the gap that you saw for women entrepreneurs, and why you founded The Scotiabank Women Initiative?
Gillian Riley: In my previous role, as Executive Vice President, Business Banking at Scotiabank, I spoke to many women entrepreneurs who explained the difficulty in getting financing. The more women I spoke to, the clearer the need for viable solutions became—and not only ones that provided more access to capital for women, but also access to education, tools, networking and mentorship. We discovered that companies founded by women were receiving less than three per cent of all venture capital investments. The opportunity to support women in starting and growing their businesses was very acute. That was what prompted the start of The Scotiabank Women Initiative.
Today, the Initiative has grown substantially. The program continues to expand globally and helps thousands of women whether supporting them to take their careers and businesses further, collaborating with inclusion-focused leaders and companies, providing women-owned and women-led businesses with equitable access to funding or helping women take charge of their finances.
Bobbie, can you speak to the importance of programs that fund women in business?
Bobbie Racette: Being LGBTQ, Indigenous and a woman in tech, having access to these programs is extremely important because we don’t get many chances. Now, I have a few women-led program funders, and if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
Report on Business named Virtual Gurus as one of Canada’s top 100 fastest-growing companies for 2023, and 90 per cent of our talent identify as women. We’re providing them with work-from-home opportunities through the tech platform we’ve created. We wouldn’t be able to do that if we didn’t have funding and access to capital.
Gillian, you’re still involved in The Scotiabank Women Initiative, but you have passed the torch on to other leaders at Scotiabank. What about the program’s evolution excites you most?
Riley: I’m so proud of the impact this program has made already and the impact it will continue to make as the program expands its footprint internationally. I am grateful for the leaders at Scotiabank that are carrying on the opportunities for the more than 25,000 women touched through the Initiative.
It fills me with pride to see the exceptional women building on the success of the program, including Canadian Banking’s Lesly Tayles who has exceled in delivering the programs supporting women entrepreneurs, like Bobbie. Anya Schnoor has driven the expansion to four countries, championing the expansion to countries in the Caribbean and Latin America, with more to come.
Loretta Marcoccia has been instrumental for generating more focused initiatives to not just continue opening doors for women, but to open the right doors through the Corporate Governance Program to advance women’s increased participation on executive boards. Scotia Wealth Management’s Erin Griffiths is also driving support and education for our advisors to meet the unique financial needs of women clients as they go through major life milestones.
This is just a sampling of women leaders delivering The Scotiabank Women Initiative’s remarkable impact and growth over the past five years—and we have a whole future to go.
What role does a program like The Scotiabank Women Initiative play in making real change? Why is it important for a big bank to invest in a program like this?
Riley: When you work in banking, people are entrusting you with their financial future and their ambitions for the future. Currently, women-owned businesses contribute $150 billion to the Canadian economy and advancing women’s equality could add $150 billion to the GDP by 2026. Programs like this help jump-start that positive trend, and ensure valuable businesses that contribute to our economy aren’t overlooked.
Now that you are President & CEO of Tangerine Bank, how have you continued to move the needle on equitable opportunities at Tangerine?
Riley: I’m always advocating for equitable opportunities. We’ve spent a lot of time developing programs for our employees to support the advancement of women and equity-deserving groups. Our People Networks are employee resource groups that reflect our diverse culture and provide employees with the opportunity to come together to encourage and exercise allyship across the organization. Executives are members of these networks and are fully integrated in order to learn about how we can impact the workforce in different ways. At Tangerine, we’ve also done a lot of work on our hiring processes to make sure that we have diverse pools of candidates and have noticeably increased women representation at all levels. I’m happy to say that today at Tangerine, 50 per cent of Directors and above are women, and our Board is made-up of 63 per cent women, making us unique amongst our peers in the Canadian banking sector.
Looking to the future, what are you most hopeful for, for women entrepreneurs? What are the barriers that could get in the way and how do we overcome them?
Racette: I’m most hopeful for diverse people to not be disregarded. We are refusing to let the world overlook us anymore. If we can get all the venture capital firms and investors to diversify their portfolios a little bit more, the world would be so different. I really think we’re getting closer to that. I just want people to stop overlooking the power and the capabilities of people like myself, because we can do it, we just need our chance.
Riley: I agree, Bobbie. I’m hopeful for a future where women and diverse individuals have equal opportunities—getting everyone equitable opportunities needs to be a shared priority where we’re all working together to remove the barriers that get in the way. The Scotiabank Women Initiative is a program designed for women by women, but if we all could adopt a ‘for-all-by-all’ mentality that supports the growth and investment in all futures, it would be a big step towards a more equitable playing field.
If we can all come together and focus on this input—imagine the positive impact it will have on our economy? The future looks bright if we keep opening doors for all.
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https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/adv/article-how-the-scotiabank-women-initiative-is-driving-meaningful-change-for/
Content From Globe Content Studio
Published December 18, 2023
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