It is certainly not only hardship for women in business. Many businesses, business schools and already successful women offer support for female students, managers and leaders. One way to open a few more doors for women are scholarships.
At Insead in France, for example, 42 per cent of Insead MBA scholarships last year were given to women. The school has also organized 15 networking and panel events for female MBA candidates globally. Another business school that is actively supporting women is Cass Business School which offers more MBA scholarships for women in 2012 by increasing the number of "Women in Business Scholarships" from three in 2011 to four in the current academic year. The number of women studying at the business school has also increased from 38 per cent in 2010 to 45 per cent in 2011.
Apart from business school initiatives’ there have been private efforts with two women in London setting up a network known as the 30 Percent Club. Their aim is to improve diversity in company boards by getting 30 percent of the jobs filled by women. The club is also about developing the pool of talent just below board level to make sure there are enough women to fill chief executive posts when they become available.
A great opportunity for women as well as men has been opened up by Stanford University. The university will roll out free online start-up courses on entrepreneurship this year. The prestigious university will offer a total of 16 courses free of charge. Amongst them are topics like technology entrepreneurship, computer security, machine learning, software-as-a-service, human-computer interaction, game theory, cryptology and making green buildings.
