0
20
40
60
80
100
$120 billion
MIXED GENDERS2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020U.S. VC DEAL FLOW BY FOUNDERS’ GENDERFEMALE ONLYMALE ONLY2020 DATA AS OF 11/19/2020 SOURCE: PITCHBOOK
$2.6 B.$14.9 B.$108.6 B.FORTUNE DECEMBER 2020 /JANUARY 2021 97back on Instagram: “The incentive isn’t to report what’s happen-
ing. It’s to write things that will be shared on social media,” she
wrote. “Why are women being targeted specifically? Because read-
ers find their takedowns even juicier.”
Korey, who in January returned as co-CEO and in October
stepped back again, declined to comment. But many startup
insiders argue that male leaders get away with similar demanding
behavior—or worse—all the time. (See also Elon Musk, Fortune’s
2020 Businessperson of the Year.) “The dirty secret is that be-
ing in a growth-stage company, it’s not for everyone. And a lot of
these companies have problematic cultures,” says Leslie Feinzaig,
founder of the Female Founders Alliance, a startup community.
Instead, the rare women who secure significant VC money—
whether they opt to lean in to the idea or not—are inevitably put
on what All Raise’s Kostka calls “the perfection pedestal,” closely
scrutinized by media, workers, and investors. With that spotlight
comes the visceral fear that they could be next.
“Every time there’s a teardown, I get text messages from female
founders that are just like, ‘What the hell?’ And, ‘When is it going
to be me?’ ” says Vanessa Larco, a partner at venture capital firm
NEA. “It’s scary—and it’s just not fair.”E
VEN SOME OF THE STARTUP employees whose
complaints have led to founder resignations acknowl-
edge that they expect more from female founders—in
part because the few who do reach the “perfection
pedestal” tend to be privileged white women who
often promise that their business will be the one to
finally provide better opportunities to the Black and brown hourly
workers they employ.
“Women are a lot more harshly held accountable. That’s part of
being a woman in a male-dominated society,” says Leslieann Elle
Santiago, a former assistant store manager at Reformation who is
a Black woman. “But they have a responsibility to create businesses
that are not only for white women.”
The anti-racist reckoning of 2020 has both accelerated the
female founder backlash and provided more of a window into how
the gender double standard plays out. Direct comparisons between
male- and female-led companies aren’t easy to make, but the case
of Reformation comes close. Founded by former model Yael Aflalo,
the “sustainable fashion” startup is a celebrity favorite that in 2019
claimed it was on track to post more than $150 million in rev-
enue. Last July, Aflalo sold a majority stake to private equity firm
Permira Advisers, telling the New York Times that her company
catered to “a powerful customer who wants to be both brand- and
style-conscious but also be a good person.”
But in June, after Reformation expressed social media support
for Black Lives Matter, Santiago responded fiercely on Instagram,
alleging that Aflalo had treated Black employees with “disgust” and
denied them professional opportunities, including promotions and
travel, that were offered to white Reformation employees. A week
later, after Aflalo apologized and said she had “failed all of you,”
she resigned as CEO. (Reformation says a third-party investigation
later cleared Aflalo of being “racist”; she remains on the board.)says. “They don’t need to care about me or my
cofounder.”
Which brings us to the tech industry’s love/
hate relationship with the press. Many in the
startup ecosystem blame reporters for build-
ing up young, photogenic female founders
only to eventually tear them down. And it’s
true that the rise of these women has been
partially enabled by business publications
including Fortune and by the largely female
journalists who cover women in business,
including me. (Before joining Fortune, I ed-
ited the Inc. package on female founders tied
to Gelman’s pregnant cover photo.) It’s also
our responsibility to report on the failings of
these companies—but when a woman is in
charge, such reporting often draws accusa-
tions of bias or clickbait.
In December 2019, after the Verge report-
ed on intense and “bullying” Slack messages
that Away CEO Steph Korey sent to employ-
ees late at night and her expectations that
they cancel holiday vacations to work, Korey
briefly stepped down. This summer she hitFALLING FUNDING
VC dollars invested in companies
founded by women dropped to
$434 million in the third quarter of
2020, its lowest level in three years.