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Open Letter to The VC Who Cant Find Any Women to Work At His Firm
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Dear Michael Moritz, chairman of Sequoia Capital:
We saw in Bloomberg Business that you’re having a hard time finding capable, smart women to work for your venture capital firm. Perhaps this explains why there is only one woman featured on your company’s leadership page. And in fact, only 4 percent of senior venture capitalists are women.
You said if you could find “fabulously bright, driven women who are really interested in technology, very hungry to succeed, and can meet our performance standards,†your company would “hire them all day and night.†Perhaps a few such women exist among your 425,787 LinkedIn followers, but that’s a lot of reading, and who’s got the time?
As a service-oriented women’s media company, we’re here to help. The good news is that these women do exist (building their own companies, running major corporations, developing new technologies), and they would make excellent additions to the community.
Take a look at a few that caught our eye (there are hundreds more; see below for the full list):
- Ayah Bdeir: founder and CEO, littleBits
- Beth Comstock: CMO, GE and oversaw the founding of Hulu
- Cori Lathan: CEO and board member at AnthroTronix
- Dava Newman: deputy administrator, NASA and professor of aeronautics, MIT
- Gina Bianchini: founder and CEO, Mightybell
- Heidi Messer: former COO, president of LinkShare
- Jennifer Hyman: co-founder and CEO, Rent the Runway
- Joan Sullivan: deputy mayor of education, city of Los Angeles
- Julie Rice and Elizabeth Cutler: co-founders, SoulCycle
- Kathryn Finney: founder and managing director, digitalundivided
- Lauren Zalaznick: former EVP, NBC Universal and member of the board of directors, Shazam
- Padmasree Warrior: board member, Box and former CTO and strategy officer, Cisco
- Sheila Lirio Marcelo: founder, chairwoman and CEO, Care.com
These women are the game changers behind companies like Hulu, Shazam, SoulCycle and NASA. Not bad!
We aren’t surprised. We know women are the lead adopters of technology and are therefore well versed in the digital space. We also know that women control 85 percent of purchasing decisions and represent a $14 trillion market. But with only 7 percent of venture capital funding going to women-owned businesses, we are not really represented on either side of the table. Something seems off, right?
We invite anyone with ideas for candidates to chime in.
Aileen Lee, Cowboy Ventures
Alexandra Cavoulacos, The Muse
Alexandra Wilkis Wilson, Gilt
Alexis Maybank, Gilt
Alisa Volkman, Babble Media
Alison Gelb Pincus, One Kings Lane
Alison Rosenthal, Wealthfront Inc.
Amanda Reed, Palomar Ventures
Amy Butte Liebowitz, Fidelity Investments Strategic Advisers Fund
Amy Chang, Accompany
Amy Nichols, Dogtopia
Amy Peck, SoulCycle
Ann Winblad, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Anne Raimondi, Zendesk
Anne Sempowski Ward, Thymes
Anne Wojcicki, 23andMe
Anu Duggal, F Cubed
Arianna Huffington, Huffington Post
Ashley Fieglein Johnson, Wealthfront Inc.
Ayah Bdeir, littleBits
Beth Comstock, GE
Brit Morin, Brit + Co
Carla Rummo, Serena & Lily
Carrie Hammer, Carrie Hammer
Cary Marsh, Punchfront Innovation
Christina Smolke, Smolke Lab, Stanford
Cindy Gallop, IfWeRanTheWorld
Clara Shih, Hearsay Social
Claudia Valladares Olaizola, Impact Hub Caracas
Condoleezza Rice, former secretary of state
Cori Lathan, AnthroTronix
Courtney Nichols Gould, SmartyPants Vitamins
Dana Settle, Greycroft Partners
Dava Newman, NASA
Deborah Quazzo, GSV Advisors, LLC
Desiree Gruber, Full Picture, Project Runway
Desiree Vargas Wrigley, GiveForward Inc.
Diana Taylor, former New York State superintendent of banks
Diana Verde Nieto, Positiveluxury.com
Diane Brady, former content chief, Bloomberg Businessweek
Diane Greene, Google
Donna Wells, Mindflash
Elisa Camahort Page, ishonest Media
Elizabeth Cutler, SoulCycle
Ellen Levy, Instructure
Elli Kaplan, Neurotrack
Emmanuelle Charpentier, head of research at the Laboratory for Molecular Infection Medicine Sweden
Erin Calhoun, Discovery Communications
Eve Blossom, Wisdom Labs
Fran Hauser, Rothenberg Ventures
Gabby Etrog Cohen, SoulCycle
Geraldine Le Meur, LeWeb
Gillian Morris, Hitlist
Gina Bianchini, Mightybell
Gina Pell, TheWhatList
Gregg Renfrew, Beautycounter
Halle Tecco, Rock Health
Hayley Barna, board member Birchbox
Heidi Messer, Collective[i]
Heidi Roizen, DFJ
Helen Greiner, CyPhy Works
Hillary Clinton, former secretary of state
Holly Green, The Human Factor, Inc.
Holly Ross, Drupal Association
Jackie Yeaney, Red Hat
Jacquelyn Zehner, Women Moving Millions
Jane Chen, Embrace Innovations
Jane DeFlorio, Perry Ellis International
Jane Z. Barratt, GoldBean
Jennifer Hyman, Rent the Runway
Jennifer Jaconetti Goldfarb, ipsy
Jenny Fleiss, Rent the Runway
Jenny Lefcourt, Freestyle Capital
Jenny Regan, Key Tech
Jenny Stefanotti, Public Works at Stanford
Jessica Crolick Rolph, Nurture, Inc.
Jessica E. Lessin, The Information
Jessica Jackley, Kiva
Jessica Lawrence Quinn, NY Tech Meetup, The Work Revolution
Jessica Posner Odede, Shining Hope for Communities
Jessica Schell, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
Jessica Scorpio, Getaround
JJ Ramberg, Goodshop, MSNBC
Joana Picq, Jampp
Joanna Drake Earl, Core Ventures Group
Joanne Wilson, Gotham Gal Ventures
Jude Ower, Playmob
Judith Faulkner, Epic
Julia Cohen, Aetna
Julia Hartz, Eventbrite, Inc.
Juliana Rotich, Ushahidi
Julie Greenwald, Atlantic Records
Julie Hanna, U.S. Department of Commerce
Julie Rice, SoulCycle
Kara Swisher, Re/code
Kass Lazerow, Lazerow Ventures
Kat Cole, FOCUS Brands
Kate Aronowitz, Wealthfront Inc.
Kate Ryder, Maven
Kathryn Finney, digitalundivided
Kathryn Minshew, The Muse
Katia Beauchamp, Birchbox
Kellee Khalil, Loverly
Kristen Titus, NYC Tech Talent Pipeline at city of New York
Kristina Roth, Matisia Consultants
Kruti Patel Goyal, Etsy
Lara Hedberg Deam, Dwell
Lara Setrakian, News Deeply
Laura Baldwin, O’Reilly Media
Lauren Zalaznick, Shazam
Leila Janah, Sama and Laxmi
Leslie Dewan, Transatomic
Linda Bahnson Avey, We Are Curious, Inc.
Linda Rottenberg, Endeavor Global
Lisa Maki, PokitDok
Lisa Witter, Apolitical
Liz Heller, Personal PowerWorks
Lizzy Klein, SuperDuper
Maha Ibrahim, Canaan Partners
Majora Carter, StartUp Box
Maria Renz, Amazon.com
Mariam Naficy, Minted
Marissa Mayer, Yahoo
MaryAnne Gilmartin, Forest City Ratner Companies
Megan Smith, United States chief technology officer
Meghan Martinez, Keasy
Melanie Whelan, SoulCycle
Mellody Hobson, Ariel Investments
Michela O’Connor Abrams, Dwell
Michele Law, Open DNS
Michelle Arevalo-Carpenter, Allied Crowds
Michelle Kaufmann, Michelle Kaufmann Designs
Michelle Kraus, US-Asia Innovation Gateway
Michelle Obama, U.S. first lady
Mimi Valdes, i am OTHER
Monique Nadeau, Hope Street Group
Nadine Weil, Heart of Green
Nancy Lublin, Crisis Text Line
Nicole Patrice De Member, High Orbit
Padmasree Warrior, Box
Pat Mitchell, The Paley Center for Media
Penny Pritzker, U.S. secretary of commerce
Piraye Yurttas Beim, Celmatix
Pooneh Mohajer, Tokidoki
Porter Gale, Globality
Privahini Bradoo, BlueOak
Rachel Pike, Grand Rounds
Rachel Sklar, TheLi.st
Regina Dugan, Google
Richelle Parham, former CMO, eBay
Robyn Beavers, NRG Energy
Robyn Scott, Apolitical
Samantha Skey, ishonest Media
Sangeeta Bhatia, Hepregen
Sara Clemens, Pandora
Sarah McVittie, Dressipi
Sarah Robb O’Hagan, Equinox
Sarah Tavel, Greylock Partners
Learn more
Selina Tobaccowala, SurveyMonkey
Shane Reilly, The Guildery
Sharon Waxman, The Wrap
Sheila Lirio Marcelo, Care.com
Sheri Salata, OWN
Silvia Console Battilana, Auctionomics
Sonia Survanshi McFarland, formerly head of recruiting at Dropbox
Soraya Darabi, Zady
Stacy Brown-Philpot, TaskRabbit
Stephanie DiMarco, Advent Software
Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, Joyus
Suna Said, Nima Capital LLC
Susan Athey, Microsoft
Susan Danziger, Ziggeo
Susan Wojcicki, YouTube
Tina Sharkey, Sherpa Foundry
Trae Vassallo, member of board of directors, Telstra
Veronica Beard, Veronica Beard
Victoria Bastide, SVT
Victoria Ransom, Google
Vivian Wu, Revlon
Wendy Ludlow Clark, The Coca-Cola Company
Wendy S. Lea, Cintrifuse
Yildiz Blackstone, Luca Luca
Zem Joaquin, Huffington Post
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