Growing Their Own Way: High-growth women entrepreneurs in Canada

Executive Summary

Women’s representation at the helm of high-growth firms is an important means of increasing their overall inclusion in the labour force and ensuring that Canada benefits from the innovations they have to offer. Women entrepreneurs are also more likely to be involved in social enterprise; finding ways to enhance their scaling efforts thus offers broad social benefits beyond any one firm’s profitability. Despite the importance of women’s inclusion as leaders of high-growth firms, women remain underrepresented and under-financed within this phase of growth.

This report is the culmination of months of investigation into the experiences of women entrepreneurs in Canada as they scale their high-growth firms with the goal of better understanding the challenges and opportunities facing this important population. It offers a summary of what we heard from entrepreneurs across the country as well as recommendations for governments and policymakers, financial institutions and other funders, business support organizations and other stakeholders in the entrepreneurial ecosystem seeking to better serve high-growth women entrepreneurs.