SheStarts

[Intro music]

<Super> Nicola Hazell, SheStarts Director

[Nicola sitting in office]

Nicola: So my niece is 14 years old. She’s the oldest of 12 nieces and nephews that I have, and she’s already talking to me about the fact that she thinks that working towards gender equality is really important. I think that’s wonderful, but I also think that’s shit. That she’s 14 and she’s already worried about the fact that things aren’t equal in this world for women. That at 14 years old, you’re already thinking about how, how should I be fixing this problem. When it’s a problem that shouldn’t exist in 2016.

<Super> Wendy Suen, Founder of Quivalence

[Wendy sitting in home kitchen]

Wendy: It’s not this pie in the sky, can’t be done thing. Like it’s not that unachievable. It’s real.

<Super> Carla Harris, Founder of Longevity

[Carla sitting at dining table]

Carla: it’s just making the most of every moment, you know. So when my son, Frankie’s, asleep I’m working, you know. And at night time when the kids are in bed, I’m working again. So there’s not a lot of one on one time with the husband at the moment. It’s a big sacrifice and a big commitment.

<Super> SheStarts powered by BlueChilli

[Light upbeat music]

<Super> Episode 01: Bootcamp

[Dramatic music]

Nicola: The impetus for SheStarts was the fact that when you look at the tech and start up environment all you see is a bunch of guys in hoodies and sneakers playing ping pong. Women are missing in this picture.

<Super> Colette Grgic, CIO BlueChilli

[Colette standing in office]

Colette: Once women get funded they actually have a really high success rate all the way through funding, because they’re building successful businesses. We’re just not opening the funnel up enough at the start.

Nicola: When we opened applications on the fourth of October, at seven thirty in the morning the first person has already registered their application. We had 800 people register to apply and it was only open to half the population!

<Super> Claudia Barriga-Larriviere, Head of Culture BlueChilli

[Claudia sitting in office]

Claudia: You should have seen the applications we’ve got, well they are like crazy impressive.

<Super> Naomi Stuart, Founder of FarmPay

[Naomi sitting in office]

Naomi: As soon as the news leaked out that, you know, I’ve been accepted into the top 20 with SheStarts, you know, the phones started ringing.

<Super> Georgia Bird, Founder of Honey

[Georgia sitting in office]

Georgia: Confidence is a huge thing and feeling like I deserve to be here and people like, believe that it’s a viable product and that it’s worth fighting for.

Wendy: Quivalence was no longer an idea that my husband and I talked about, it’s now I talk about to everyone and anyone who’ll listen.

Claudia: I’m always concerned about when people, men or women, come to me during a hackathon; during an advisory session or whatever it is and say – this start up is my baby. But, well then now I have to come and criticise your baby.

[Nicola standing in front of room filled with women]

Nicola: Welcome, welcome to SheStarts bootcamp! The next two weeks, we’re gonna find out just how big and game changing your ideas are.

<Super> Sebastien Eckersley Maslin, Founder and CEO Blue Chilli

[Sebastien sitting in front of room filled with women]

Sebastien: I’m here to expose some unfortunate realities. That half of you aren’t going to make it through this program.

<Super> Catherine Eibner, GM Start up BlueChilli

[Catherine standing in front of room filled with women]

Catherine: A start up is a journey that’s full of unknowns.

Colette: A product without marketing is like winking at a girl in the dark, right? You know what you’re doing but nobody else knows what you’re doing, and that’s why you need to be pitching.

Sebastien: Product itself, in terms of the detail is less important. It's how you go about solving the problem with that product. I wanna hear the how, rather than the what.

<Super> Alan Jones, Start up Evangelist BlueChilli

[Alan sitting in office]

Alan: What I don’t see tested enough is per use pricing. When I want to go and get a coffee, twice a day, you know. I’m not a subscriber of a coffee shop.

Naomi: Pricing itself is something we’re still so open with and still working out the best ways to do it.

Sebastien: When you buy something you desire, you’re not doing it because it’s a rational thought. You rationalise it after the fact. You go, I want that ‘cause it looks awesome. Or I want that because it makes me feel good. Or I want that 'cause I’m hungry. These are our primal emotions that we feel.

Nicola: There’s some that, perhaps are gonna need at little bit more coaching to get themselves particularity ready for those judges.

Claudia: A lot of people come to programs like this, knowing that their business is going to be taken apart and put back together, or not put back together at all. But they don’t expect that everything you know about the stuff that you know might not be true in this building.

<Super> Lauren Meyer, Co-founder of Shark Share Global

[Lauren sitting in office]

Lauren: We had expected the kind of things would all get torn apart and put back together, but the number of times things got torn apart and put back together I would never have been able to imagine.

<Super> Sally Dwyer, Co-founder of StackSet

Sally: You know when you have an idea and someone challenges that and tests it. There’s two ways to look at it I guess. You can be kind of a little bit disheartened, or you can actually look at what they’re telling you, and really embrace it.

Jessica Christiansen-Franks & Lucinda Hartley, Co-founders of Neighbourlytics

[Jessica and Lucinda sitting together in office]

Lucinda: To be honest, it felt like a slap in the face. But it was the slap that we needed.

Carla: We’ll find out that the fit’s there or the fit’s not, and sometimes finding out the fit’s not there is just as important.

[Light upbeat music]

Nicola: And when they’re standing in front of those judges, they will have by that stage, if they haven’t already, realised that they are standing before perhaps the biggest opportunity of their lives.

<Super> Eglantine Etiemble, Co-founder of Boomerang Factory

[Eglantine sitting in office]

Eglantine: Listen, being in the top 20 is already a life changer, so I don't need to be in the top 10. I mean, I am badly hoping and will work really hard to be in the top 10.

Carla: I’m not worried about their ideas, I’m worried about mine, and making mine as best as it can be.

<Super> Coming up next week…

Wendy: There’s, you know, nervous tension in the belly.

<Super> Emma Poposka Kardaleva, Founder of Brontech

[Emma sitting in office]

Emma: To actually communicate the vision in a way that people in that room will understand. Oh my heart is beating very fast.

<Super> Tune in at shestarts.com

<Super> SheStarts powered by BlueChilli

<Super> Supported by our partners, ANZ, GSK, MYOB, Sunsuper, UTS and Vasudhara.