OUR VISION FOR THE FUTURE

Last revised February 1, 2023, by Startups for All

Make impact.
Be sustainable.

Welcome to Startups for All, a trusted community for purpose-driven founders and emerging social entrepreneurs from historically marginalized populations.

Our mission is to redefine what foundership looks like and to build a world with full representation of women of color and
queer/trans BIPOC as startup leaders and CEOs.

From less than 1% to 51% by 2026.

Our Challenge Today - The Data

• At the start of 2020, women of color represented 4% of C-suite positions in corporate America, as compared to men of color at 12% and white women at 19% representation.1
• Black women are almost twice as likely as women overall to say that they can’t bring their whole selves to work and more than 1.5 times as likely to say they don’t have strong allies.1
• A study of the racial leadership gap in non-profits showed a decline of representation of people of color in Executive Director/CEO roles, from 20% in 2016 to 17% in 2019.2
• In a survey of 14,985 early-stage ventures that applied to one of 318 accelerator programs from 2013-2018, only 13% of accelerator applicants were led by female founders.3
• In a 2018 survey, 50% of non-LGBTQ workers reported that there are no employees at their company who are open about being LGBTQ.4

1. Women in the Workplace 2020, LeanIn.Org and McKinsey, 2020
2. Race to Lead Revisited: Obstacles and Opportunities in Addressing the Nonprofit Racial Leadership Gap, 2019
3. Accelerating Women-led Startups, Global Accelerator Learning Initiative (GALI), March 2020
4. HRC’s A Understanding the Climate for LGBTQ Workers Nationwide, 2018. “This national study is based on data from a probability-based sample of self-identified LGBTQ people (N= 804) with a shorter survey to gauge perceptions and experiences of non-LGBTQ people (N=811). Probability-based samples of LGBTQ people are rare in social research: most studies are conducted through opt-in or snowball methods of growing respondent pools. All research methods have their value: to capture the most diverse range of representative experiences, we opted for a smaller, probability-based sample rather than a larger, non-probability based one.“

Our Vision

We believe in a future of work that embraces the values of community, diversity, and purpose to advance sustainable and equitable economic growth for all, especially amongst historically marginalized and othered populations.

From the moment an idea or aspiration takes shape, we invite you, as a purpose-driven founder, to reflect upon new ways of building your ecosystem of people, products, services, strategies, and systems, and to experiment with new ways of gathering and holding space for equitable participation from all and those with different lived experiences and perspectives from your own.

Our Core Values

• We are community first. We believe in the value of community and connection, one conversation at a time, one relationship at a time. We seek to leverage our collective strengths through practices such as cooperative agreements, co-creation, and transparent feedback loops.

• We see YOU. We believe in your authentic self, your differences, your superpowers. We value our unique backgrounds and prioritize safety in our interactions with each other. From day one, we strive to create spaces where everyone has equitable opportunity to rise and participate.

• We lead with purpose. We believe in purpose over profit, creating measurable and sustainable change over time. We help you define your north star and non-negotiable core values. These serve as cornerstones in advancing your own purpose and navigating decisions with ease.

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Our Impact

Our impact strategy is guided by advancing these UN Sustainable Development Goal targets:

• SDG 5 Gender Equality 

• Goal target 5.5 Ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision making in political, economic and public life

• SDG 8 Decent Work and Economic Growth

• Goal target 8.3 Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation, and encourage the formalization and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial service.

• SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities

• Goal target 10.2 By 2030, empower and promote the social, economic and political inclusion of all, irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status.

• SDG 11 Sustainable Cities and Communities

• Goal target 11.4 By 2030, Strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world’s cultural and natural heritage.

Our Difference

• Our community, services, and programs are open-to-all. We do not have application requirements, rather, we use community agreements and shared accountability to create and hold inclusive spaces so that every individual has the ability to:

• Safely and fully participate in program activities
• Safely engage with other participants, valuing our unique backgrounds and lived experiences

• Our core curriculum centers on strategy, communications, and systems change, merging concepts and frameworks from non-profit impact strategy and for-profit product strategy.
• We help scale knowledge transfer through micro-mentoring and giving founders easy access to trusted experts who themselves represent a diverse range of social identities and positionalities..

Our Work

Startups for All was founded by Susan Liao, a champion and advisor of inclusive leadership and product strategy. In 2021, we completed two pilot cohorts with a community of 30+ founders from across the U.S, with varying legal structures, including non-profits, LLCs, B-corp, and C-corps. Approximately 80% of our cohort founders and experts are self-identified as women, LGBTQIA+ or non-binary and 75% as BIPOC/non-White.

Get Involved

• Amplify our stories and follow us on these social

• https://www.linkedin.com/company/startups-for-all
• https://www.instagram.com/startupsforall
• https://twitter.com/startupsforall

• Meet our Founders and Meet our Experts
• Give back to the community - contribute to our 2024 Impact Fund or sponsor an event! Reach out to Susan at susan@startupsforall.org.

Questions?

Contact Susan at susan@startupsforall.org.

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