Coffee, donuts, and an engaging conversation held at UTRF’s Business Incubator showcased the need for increased flexibility and diversity in the workforce.
On Wednesday’s Rise & Grind event the audience became acquainted with Kim Seals, General Partner of MomSource Network investor The JumpFund and Courtney Jones Startup Day alum & Founder of the MomSource Network.
MomSource Network is a startup focused on seeing women achieve their ideal work/life blend. The company has two separate parts to its business. Part one is a tech platform focused on development and training for women as they navigate their journey in and out of the workforce. MomSource Network also provides a gateway of progressive employers who are willing to use their skill set in a flexible full-time, permanent, or part-time remote capacity.
The other half of the company is providing consulting services to those progressive employers who are mindful about attracting and retaining great female talent.
The JumpFund’s mission is to invest women’s capital in female-led southeastern companies with growth potential in order to generate a strong financial return and elevate the role of women in business.
The JumpFund invested in MomSource Network about two years ago, and Kim Seals along with her sister Pam made a sidecar investment as well.
“There’s a lot of data that supports that there is a need for women to invest in women, and it can produce a good ROI,” said Seals.
During the Rise & Grind event Seals recited striking statistics that highlight the positive financial outcomes from employing a woman within a company’s leadership.
According to a recent MacKenzie survey, companies with at least one female founder are performing 63% better than investments with all male-led companies.
“We want to see diversity in that leadership, and one of the key reasons is that most purchasing decisions made in the household are made by females,” said Seals.
Seals brought up that 80% of all purchasing decisions in the household are made by women. If a company doesn’t have a female in its leadership team helping make product and strategy decisions, that business is missing a key voice of their customer.
“We’re seeing companies with women in the top leadership positions producing 47% higher returns on equity and 55% higher returns on EBIT,” said Seals.
On top of that, Courtney Jones echoed the importance of flexible employment.
“85% of people say they would be more loyal to their current employer if they were offered increased flexibility,” said Jones.
Jones mentioned that in society, women are often pushed into choosing whether to become a full-time working mother or a full-time stay at home mom.
“At the end of the day, it’s really about organizations being progressive enough to say, ‘We’re willing to offer some agile workplace arrangements if we can still get the results that we need for our business,'” said Jones.
Seals reinforced that need for flexibility after describing her background in human resources with Mercer and it’s importance at the time.
“There was a real financial ROI for our companies that we were working with at Mercer about how to keep women in the workforce,” said Seals.
Seals said Mercer quickly discovered that they needed to keep women engaged, figure out how to create that work/life blend for them because it was something their clients were asking for. Ultimately, that’s what led to her interest in MomSource Network.
Rise & Grind was hosted by UTRF, Three Roots Capital, and Best Behavior Creative Club