WISE summit inspires female entrepreneurs to rise above challenges
The summit on Northeastern University’s Boston campus welcomed 200 participants for networking, workshops, inspiring speakers and more.
Rajia Abdelaziz had already been through a successful fundraising round for her company invisaWear, which creates jewelry and accessories with a hidden emergency alert button, when she agreed to demonstrate her successful pitch for a Boston accelerator.
But Abdelaziz left the accelerator’s Shark Tank-style competition in tears after one male judge told her he “never heard about women worrying about their safety,” and a second asked if she was sleeping with her male co-founder. In fact, experiencing a scary incident as a student had been the inspiration behind Abdelaziz’s company.
“I was mortified,” Abdelaziz recalled at the annual Women’s Interdisciplinary Society of Entrepreneurship (WISE) Summit on Saturday at Northeastern University’s Boston campus. “Here I was doing a really kind thing to try and help some young entrepreneurs, and I’m leaving crying because that was such a horrible experience.”
WISE is a student-led group at Northeastern University focused on helping women and underrepresented genders enter the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Pursuing its goal of empowering individuals of all backgrounds to join and to lead in the entrepreneurial conversation, the organization held its annual summit at the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex, welcoming 200 participants for networking, workshops, inspiring speakers and more.
“Everyone probably has a different definition of what it means to be an entrepreneur,” said Amelia Brooks, a fifth-year business and management student and co-director of WISE. “We’re so many different things, and at the summit we’re really showcasing that. Some of us have our own ventures, some are in a corporate structure, but in a way we’re all entrepreneurs.”
In a panel discussion entitled “Selling Yourself Without Selling Out,” Abdelaziz and Northeastern graduate Heather Cassar, vice president of people at the FinTech company Narmi, discussed how authenticity is crucial to entrepreneurial and business success.
Both women said that their authenticity had been challenged throughout their careers.
Cassar recalled that one time after a work presentation in which she used humor to deflect nervousness, she was told that if she wanted a job in human resources, she couldn’t let people know she was funny. Cassar countered that.
“My best advice is to be genuine,” she said. “If you interview as a version of yourself that you are not, then when you get to work, you have to keep perpetuating that inauthentic version of yourself, and it’s really hard to do.”
Meanwhile, Abdelaziz discussed advice that she had received to change her hair, her makeup, her pink outfits and the length of her skirts if she wanted to access venture capital money, of which only 2% typically goes to women.
“It’s probably the worst advice anyone can ever tell you, because if we continue to behave that way, then [only] 2% of venture capital will continue to go to women for the rest of our lives,” Abdelaziz said. “We need to show that the narrative can change, and how intelligent you are doesn’t depend on the length of your hair, how much makeup you have on, or how short or long your skirt is.”
Her comment elicited rapturous applause.
“It’s so important to keep hearing the message that you can do it,” said Krithika Natarajan, a fourth-year student in data science who organized the summit with WISE. Natarajan called Abdelaziz “so inspiring” and a reminder to remain focused on your goals.
Editor’s Picks
The panelists also discussed how best to hire a team (both, interestingly, mentioned that they had hired friends, going against conventional advice), how to develop a board of advisors, and how to handle the male-dominated entrepreneurial landscape.
“When someone tells you what could go wrong, really focus on what could go right,” Abdelaziz said. “You really need to focus your energy and your mindset on positivity.”
In fact, that’s just what Abdelaziz did.
After the pitch competition, which left her in tears, Abdelaziz received a call from an audience member who managed the funds of a successful female entrepreneur in Boston. She told her boss about what had happened to Abdelaziz.
The woman invited Abdelaziz to pitch invisaWear and subsequently invested $1 million in the company.
Today, invisaWear has surpassed $20 million in revenue and made Oprah’s Favorite Things Back-to-School list, while Abdelaziz has been featured on “Good Morning America,” the “Today” show and “The View,” and was on the cover of Forbes magazine.
“I can’t wait to come back here in a few years and hear one of you guys talk about your story,” Abdelaziz told the audience at the summit.
