There are more female entrepreneurs now than ever before.

Check out these magazines featuring successful female entrepreneurs on their cover – Fast Company, Entrepreneur, Fortune and Success, all heralding an era of female achievement. The ratio is changing.

In the past it seemed the media was trying to create the perception of female entrepreneurs and executives as if they were males. Women were posed like men, dressed like men…but check out the cover of Inc. Magazine. They made media history by featuring Audrey Gelman, CEO of The Wing. She is the first visibly pregnant woman featured on the cover of a business magazine. Blaze. That. Trail!

Look, I’m not here to mansplain. And, I know I am merely scratching the surface of gender in business. But as you know, I love seeing others succeed, and even better when it’s a group who statistically has had less entrepreneurs. One female entrepreneur we were lucky enough to have on our Entrepreneurship Elevated podcast is Michelle Pippin. Michelle is the founder of Women Who Wow, a coaching and mentoring program for female entrepreneurs. She offered some insight regarding female entrepreneurship and women in the workplace.

One of the questions I posed to Michelle was what sets female entrepreneurs apart from their counterparts? Well, aside from the obvious?

Expectations

Successful female entrepreneurs are not that different from men, however, Michelle notes there are different expectations placed on each party. She says women, along with the rest of society, place the expectation of being all things to all people squarely on women’s shoulders. I’ve seen it in my own life. Let’s face it, when my wife and I had kids, no one asked, “Oh, what are you going to do Mike? Are you coming back to work?” But you bet just about every female in the workplace is asked this if she’s building a family.

Entrepreneurship and traditional female roles

While not every woman becomes a mother, many female entrepreneurs are. Michelle and I discussed the stigma women, and society, place on mothers. A bit of damned if you do damned if you don’t. Sometimes there’s shaming for “just” being a mom, and conversely, shaming for being a working mother. Stigma aside, what’s the best way to manage that conflict? Michelle says it’s tough to navigate balance for love of family and burning desire to follow your passion. Her fix? Flip that script and feed your own priorities vs someone else’s expectations.

Finding balance

Speaking of priorities. Michelle says don’t seek balance! Instead of the eternal search for The Holy Grail of Balance, guide yourself by priority. One day your priority may be your keynote speech or appearance on MSNBC, the next day your priority may be your family. If you truly tap into a sense of what your priorities are (again, priorities, not other’s expectations), a sense of balance will likely fall into place naturally.

Different management styles of men and women

Michelle also says women have a tendency to place standards of perfection on themselves, and feel a need to be perfect in all of the many roles they are expected to fulfill – did we mention perfectly? Let’s face it – society expects women to be strong, yet soft, professional, yet maternal, shrewd, yet kind. Michelle’s work around that? Defiance! Defy all the expectations with no excuses. Example, you don’t have to temper saying no to someone by following it up with an explanation. And that could certainly ruffle feathers.

A strong or defiant man is a leader, but a woman can be labeled a “bitch”. It’s not something I have ever believed or supported and often wondered how women deal with that. We loved Michelle’s perspective and it resonated with us deeply: not one drop of another’s opinion should affect your confidence or worth. (Repeat that if it didn’t sink in the first time.) If you are strong in that conviction, the concern of others is diminished and you can focus on your priorities. Determining what you want from your life as an entrepreneur should be your gauge for your own self esteem. It should be your measurement – not the measurement of anyone else.

Michelle has two favorite tips on how to defeat challenges of entrepreneurship and they apply to men as well as women.

Defiance

Yes, there it is again! Defiance! Entrepreneurs need to be defiant. It’s a main strategy that Michelle uses. Simply put, Michelle breaks rules to avoid blending into the masses. (Man, does this sound familiar!) 

Consistency

Michelle attributes a huge part of her success to practicing consistency. It’s a quiet strength in a loyalty to your own goals. What you do every single day gets you farther. That consistency dramatically sets you apart. Consistency makes people notice you.

Female entrepreneurship is an important topic, one that cannot be summed up in one blog post. But for now, this is me saying how grateful I am that the entrepreneurial field is leveling out. I am so excited to collaborate with more entrepreneurs across the board.

If you want more tips like this go to Mikemotorbike.com or Mikemichalowicz.com and click on Get the Tools for tons of tried and true resources for business help and how to run a truly profitable business. Let’s rock entrepreneurship!