Female ownership

The incredibly cool and superior way in which women carry and give birth to children also proves time and time again to be the reason why we generally “lag” behind men in many other areas – career, salary, pension and perhaps above all ownership. For example, did you know that in Sweden, men own more than twice as much as women (all things that can be owned, such as real estate, land, companies, shares).

Have you read Ownershift’s latest report? It maps company ownership in Sweden, which turns out to be 70% male. Thus, men are more than twice as likely to own companies as women, and the proportion of female owners is increasing surprisingly slowly.

And does it matter? Yes, we think so. As highlighted in the Ownershift report, we are convinced that a more diversified ownership of companies would allow us to better create products and services for everyone. That looks at everyone’s needs and puts new issues on the agenda and perhaps solves things in new ways, where necessary. Imagine the potential!!!

What if we could, as Deqa Abukar wisely says in an interview with Ownershift, “take advantage of gender differences rather than ignore them”. She is referring to the fundamental difference that women carry and give birth to children and men do not. It’s not about trampling on women’s opportunities, she says, but there’s no need to celebrate progress either. “We should not adapt to a society that is not built for women,” she says, but rather we need to build systems that suit women, given that we are the ones getting pregnant.

There is no evidence that men are better than women at finding solutions to problems, the essence of entrepreneurship and the beginnings of business. However, there is much evidence to suggest that entrepreneurship systems are tailored to men. There are, of course, many pieces of the puzzle left for women to have the same opportunities to own companies, but one way to help is to provide role models and inspiration for women to dare to start and grow companies. We at Unna want to be able to inspire, and can safely say that starting up and running a company is the ABSOLUTE most fun thing we have done!