Representation as Successful Life-Path Indicator
The Role of Diverse Stories In Widening the Entrepreneurial Funnel
This article is a part of the book “How to Build Thriving Start-up Ecosystems: Five Information Patterns for Success.”
Around the globe 77% of venture backed companies are created by founders who identify as White while only 3% of venture funds are given to female founders (World Economic Forum). For a potential founder like Annika — who is both female and Indian — her reticence to jump into entrepreneurship is well deserved. There is a low probability that someone that looks like her will succeed.
To get Annika to opt in to becoming an entrepreneur, the first thing Community Information Designers (CIDs) can do is utilize diverse founder representations that garner initial attention from nontraditional potential founders. Then, CIDs need to follow this attention with signals that an entrepreneurial life-path can lead to success. Students like Annika need to feel as if it is worth their time to select-in to paying attention to entrepreneurship related information in their environment.
Start with the Superficial
The easiest way to start changing the story Annika tells herself is by having diverse visual representation within advertisements for entrepreneurial activities in the world around her. This can be simple, such as having flyers, billboards, and posters utilize students that are both male and female, and from a variety of races. Studies have noted that same-race faces capture attention more than different-race faces (Zhou, Cheng, Yue). Seeing a founder on a poster of Annika’s same racial background signals that these are not simply resources available to the student body as a whole, but available specifically to people like her.
The idea of representation is often couched in vague terms like “inspiration” and “empowerment” that hides the powerful idea of the life-path theory of cultural evolution (Creanza, Kolodny, Feldman). The life-path perspective sees people as in a constant battle of trade-offs where each person searches for an optimal path towards success. When a person sees another with their same set of traits (race, gender, discipline, etc.) achieve success, it presents a positive signal of a potential evolutionary path towards success and increases the likelihood that person will go down this same path (Yassin).
Orient Information in Space
To reach potential founders that have not opted in to entrepreneurship activities, CIDs should orient advertising geared towards early-stage founders to the widest audience possible. In digital spaces, this means sending out information to general student body listservs rather than entrepreneurship-specific ones.
In physical spaces, CIDs should orient early-stage entrepreneurial information again to the broadest audience possible. These spaces geared towards a broad audience in a city would be public spaces that include plazas, government buildings, and sidewalks that are accessible to all (Li, Dang, Song). In the context of the university, public spaces are better understood as places of generalized attention, where students from a broad range of disciplines and degrees congregate. At the University of Michigan these spaces include the Diag, the Hatcher and Shapiro libraries, and the Michigan League.
The semi-private realm in cities refers to places like private businesses or neighborhoods (Madanipour). At a university, it is perhaps better to label these as specialized spaces, where students and professors who study a specific discipline gather. The posters and flyers on bulletin boards in these spaces tend to correspond to information that would be relevant to these more specific disciplines. At the University of Michigan, these spaces might include the Institute for Social Research, the Chemistry Building, and the School for Environmental Science and Sustainability, amongst several others. When a CID places information about entrepreneurship activities into these specialized spaces, any one flyer will likely reach a smaller number of students that view it. However, if the information is targeted to students in that specialty, any one flyer will have a higher degree of relevance and in turn action potential.
Past Visuals to Paths
Diverse founder representation on entrepreneurship-related advertising can generate initial interest from a broader range of students. However, this interest will quickly dissipate if not backed by specific information on how the depicted entrepreneurs found success. To convert interest to engagement takes mentorship to help potential founders see a concrete path towards success. Good mentors serve as information transfer vectors that can provide concrete details on unique pathways non-traditional entrepreneurs can take for success. They can also advise on unsuccessful pathways that can help future founders avoid unprofitable paths.
It might sound simple, but the best way to share this information is through stories. The timing of planting, harvesting techniques, and crop rotation, have been passed down orally through generations through the use of folklore (Campbell). Though today stories are often seen as entertainment, they hold immense power as evolutionary tools that enable a person to expend less energy trying out incorrect answers. Stories of how non-traditional founders succeeded can help the next generation have a higher likelihood of success. But not all stories are equal; the most useful stories are specific and actionable.
This can be done by structuring stories around specific important decision points at each stage of past diverse founder journeys. At each decision point, CIDs should collect data on what past founders saw as their potential options, and their thinking behind why they chose a specific path. This model provides the next generation of founders heuristics to apply if they are in similar situations.
As well, these stories should convey information on whether nontraditional founders developed a unique niche. Were they able to tap into their culture’s communities as an underserved customer base? Did they utilize different designs or techniques that brought a unique offering to the market? Did they know of a successful company in a global market whose business model could work in the U.S. market?
From Interest to Opt In
How CIDs get these stories might vary. You might sit down with alumni and interview them, and post these stories in emails or a blog. You might connect nontraditional founders with younger counterparts directly to facilitate this knowledge sharing directly. You might create a digital platform where alumni can connect to current students directly, or utilize existing platforms like Adjacent.
Whatever the specific method, setting up a structure for this kind of information transfer is an important step to help non-traditional founders translate initial interest to selecting in to putting their time and energy to understand the entrepreneurship ecosystem around them.
