Happy New Year! Welcome to a new episode full of women disrupting tech inspiration 🚀.
Join me as I speak to Tessa de Flines to explore why angel investing is about as close as you can get to making an impact as a woman.
How to be an ambassador for female entrepreneurs | Tessa de Flines on Women Disrupting Tech – Women Disrupting Tech
How to be an ambassador for female entrepreneurs 🪄
On this first episode of Women Disrupting Tech in 2024, Tessa guides us on an inspiring deep dive into the startup world.
We explore what makes scaling so challenging and how startup founders can deal with these challenges. Tessa helps us discover
- What makes scaling a journey that is unique to every company 🚀
- How female founders can future-proof their businesses 🔮
- Why visibility is the key to making an impact as an investor and a founder 👀
Tessa also shares what she looks for as an angel investor in startups and her recipe for getting dealflow as an investor. Plus, around 34 minutes into the interview, she mentions a framework from McKinsey that helps frame difficult strategic discussions in the proper context.
What’s Magical About This Episode 🌟?
From pitching tips to advice on how to scale your company, this conversation covers it all. I found listening to all the wisdom Tessa shares with you really powerful. One pitching tip I want you to take advantage of is inserting breaks in your pitch after every couple of sentences. This gives the listening people the opportunity to take in the information and ask questions if they have. And it allows you to check if they’re still interested.
Another magical part of the podcast episode comes towards the end of the episode (around the 39-minute mark), as Tessa graciously shares her insights into three startup investments that hold a special place in her portfolio. And at least one could be familiar to you as I interviewed the founder back in the fifth episode of this podcast.
About Tessa de Flines
Tessa is passionate about helping (female) startup founders reach their full potential. To do that, she uses her business scaling knowledge, expertise, and visibility as an angel investor.
After working for large corporations like General Electric and ABN-AMRO in process improvement, strategy, and marketing roles, Tessa de Flines entered entrepreneurship and learned how much direct impact she could have.
It was through networking that she met her partners at Masters of Scale just before COVID hit. With Masters of Scale, she helps companies to future-proof their business.
And Tessa’s impact goes beyond. She is also an angel investor with Great Stuff Ventures and the chairperson of Female Ventures. Female Ventures is a non-profit that empowers women in their careers with knowledge, inspiration, and networking through events, a community, and a mentorship program. Tessa is also an active mentor for (female) startup founders and as a Fractional COO.
If you would like to learn more about Tessa and her work, you can connect with her via LinkedIn.
What’s coming up?
In the next episode of Women Disrupting Tech, I interview Núria Barceló Peiró. She is the general manager of a Female Role Model agency called RoleItOut.
And if you’re curious to learn how RoleItOut helps women develop themselves into the Next Female Role Model in tech, keep your eyes on your mailbox next Friday.
In the meantime, you can binge the entire inspiring archive of episodes with over 1,000 minutes of Women Disrupting Tech content I published last year on Spotify, Google, Apple, or Goodpods.
Be a Male Ally
How do you get started with diversity, equity, and inclusion in tech when you’re a man?
Let me give you a few suggestions, courtesy of ChatGPT:
📚 Educate yourself about the topic.
👂🏻 Listen to underrepresented people and amplify their voices.
💪🏼 Support inclusive practices like fair compensation.
🫱🏼🫲🏾 Collaborate with DEI organizations and advocate for DEI within your company.
Sounds easy? Maybe not…
About 18 months ago, I was struggling with this as well. So, I started a podcast to interview women working in tech. I wanted to learn why there are so few of them. This podcast is called Women Disrupting Tech.
Since I started, I’ve interviewed 37 women about topics ranging from DEI in general to mental health and how to do chores like bookkeeping. My goal is to provide them with a platform so they can inspire other women to consider an education or a job in tech.
But my goal for 2024 is to have more men join the conversation as guests and members of the Women Disrupting Tech Community.
As a member, you’ll receive a free email every Friday. By reading it, you’ll learn something new about diversity in tech. Like how we can prevent the gender pay gap. Or how to start with DEI in a startup. The women I interview inspire you with their stories, help you understand their points of view, and advocate for them. Of course, I include links to the most recent podcast episode and the show notes for further reading and education.
So, it is an excellent way to start educating yourself. But reading the newsletter and listening to the podcast also ticks other boxes on the list. By sharing the articles, you can amplify their voices to other people in your network. With the wisdom these women share, you can support inclusive practices in your company.
Ultimately, that’s good for business and gets you karma points. All of that for free.
To join the Women Disrupting Tech Community, enter your best email address below.
Women Disrupting Tech | The Podcast 
1 Comment