How do you add more seats around the table? And what magic happens when you do? The resources below originating from a plurality of creators shed light on both the challenges for varied voices in small business and entrepreneurship to be heard as well as what successes can be realized when diverse perspectives are included.
Be sure to check out the other posts in our Small Business Month blog series, swing on by the curated displays at David Lam Management Research Library and Irving K. Barber Learning Centre running from Oct. 21 to Nov. 12, 2021, and have yourself a prosperous Small Business Month!
Books/Magazines
Pao, E. (2017). Reset: My Fight for Inclusion and Lasting Change. Spiegel & Grau.
Abrams, S. (2019). Lead from the Outside: How to Build Your Future and Make Real Change. Picador.
FIND THIS BOOK AT VANCOUVER PUBLIC LIBRARY
Johnson, D. K. (2019). Buying Gay: How Physique Entrepreneurs Sparked a Movement. Columbia University Press.
Hilton, C. A. (2021). Indigenomics: Taking a Seat at the Economic Table. New Society Publishers.
Harts, M. (2019). The Memo: What Women of Color Need to Know to Secure a Seat at the Table. Seal Press.
Munoz, J. M., & Spain, M. (2015). Hispanic–Latino Entrepreneurship: Viewpoints of Practitioners. Business Expert Press.
Ulmer, M. (2020). Bee Fearless - Dream Like a Kid. G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers.
Smith, T., & Kirby, A. (2021). Neurodiversity at Work: Drive Innovation, Performance and Productivity With a Neurodiverse Workforce. Kogan Page Limited.
Sokunbi, B. (2021). Clever Girl Finance: The Side Hustle Guide: Build a Successful Side Hustle & Increase Your Income. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Bunten, A. C., & Graburn, N. H. H. (Eds.). (2018). Indigenous Tourism Movements. University of Toronto Press.
Uwagba, O. (2017). Little Black Book: A Toolkit For Working Women. 4th Estate.
Podcasts
The Brand is Female
Summary: Hosted by Eva Hartling, The Brand is Female interviews women — thinkers, writers, creators, and entrepreneurs — who expound on pushing boundaries and breaking through glass ceilings to unlock their potential and thrive.
Our episode picks:
For Maggie Marilyn, who grew up on the New Zealand coast, circularity is not just a buzzword. When she started her fashion line, Marilyn knew she wanted to integrate circularity and sustainability into every part of the brand. She has succeeded: from giving up contracts with wholesalers; to recycling clothing; to providing a repair service for the brand’s clothes, Marilyn’s line proves sustainability in fashion is possible and profitable. Her company champions transparency and change in an industry whose harmful practices have been effecting the environment for decades. Listen to find out what motivates her and how she sticks to her values in business.
Award-winning journalist Soraya Chemaly talks to Hartling about women’s rage (the subject of her last book, which the New York Times called “revelatory”), and why women should be angry. They discuss the “steps backwards” we have taken when it comes to gender equity, which have now been further amplified by the impact of the pandemic, and the many other nuances of living in the “boxes” that society has created for women.
The Electric Ladies Podcast
Summary: Women leaders and innovators across sectors talk career management, climate change, and corporate social responsibility.
Our episode picks:
How do you pivot a 75-year-old business to mitigate potentially catastrophic damage from climate change to your main ingredient? Bigelow Tea relies on the crop, as CEO Cindi Bigelow — who maintains that Bigelow Tea is, at its essence, a botanical business — is very much aware. Listen to find out what she and her company are doing to mitigate the effects of climate change on their business model, and what it’s like to run it as a woman and a third-generation family member.
Laura Pagliarulo, CEO of SolaREIT, explains how her company leverages the concepts of the real-estate investment trust and existing farmland to finance community solar projects for communities that would not have access to solar power otherwise. She explains exactly how it works, provides examples of successfully financed projects, and dispenses some insightful career advice.
StartUp Women
Summary: A spinoff of StartUp Canada, StartUp Women features business experts and entrepreneurs — most often women who hold multiple intersectional identities and have historically been marginalized in business conversation — who talk about their entrepreneurial journeys.
Our episode picks:
Dakota Brant is the CEO of Sapling and Flint, an on-reserve jewelry manufacturer specializing in silver and gold. Brant, a Mohawk woman hailing from the Six Nations of the Grand River territory in Ontario, explains why her company is located on the reservation and how she seeks to inspire meaningful arts-based opportunities located in First Nations territories through her speaking ventures and partnerships with e-commerce platforms such as PayPal. “I don’t want Indigenous artists from this community thinking they need to move away in order to pursue their own cultural art forms. The opportunity just isn’t there if they want to live at home.”
Wanda Deschamps is the founder and principal of Liberty Co., a consultancy focused on increasing the participation level of the Neurodiverse population in the workforce, with a special emphasis on autism. Wanda is an advocate for women with autism in all avenues of her life, and researches autistic women’s experiences in the workplace. Listen to find out about her research, advocacy, and how her own autism diagnosis at midlife inspired her work.
Media Indigena
Summary: A podcast dedicated to discussing Indigenous and First Nations current affairs, with a focus on happenings in BC and Alberta. Several episodes touch upon Indigenous perspectives and voices in business.
Our episode picks:
This two-part series discusses the complicated history and phaseout of fish farms on British Columbia’s Central Coast. Phasing out the farms is a vote for the restoration of the region’s once-thriving wild salmon population, but not everyone is glad to see them disappear. KimTallBear and Candis Callison discuss whether their phaseout represents a step forward into a sustainable future for species central to the culture of the First Nations of the BC coast.
Media Indigena returns to an evergreen topic: that of the existing carbon economy in Canada and its chances for decarbonization. Indigenous peoples living under settler colonialism are caught at the ambivalent center of this debate, because few of their choices are not actively or passively constrained. While Indigenous communities suffer the worst environmental and health impact from carbon extraction, they must also fight for their land back or participate in fossil-fuel capitalism to secure an income. This episode takes a look at the forms of activism that are emerging in spite of this impossibly constrained existence.
Podcasts and guest episodes from voices on our Books list:
Sokunbi, B. (Host). [Audio podcast]. Clever Girls Know Finance.
From Bola Sokunbi’s popular Clever Girl Finance website and blog comes this podcast, in which a diverse set of women share the honest stories of their financial and life journeys. These conversations, though centered around finance, often relate to entrepreneurial topics as they navigate addressing limiting financial beliefs, the financial side of starting values-based businesses, budgeting, and intentionality.
Harts, M. (Host). [Audio podcast]. Minda Harts, LLC.
Author of The Memo: What Women of Color Need to Know in Order to Secure a Seat at the Table, Minda Harts, talks with women of colour about their discouragements and triumphs in business and their navigation of a workforce that isn’t invested in their success. Highlights include a chat with CIO of the Luminary, Surabhi Lal, about the essential nature of empathy and community, and with Apprecia D. Faulkner, CEO of Global Strategists Association, which seeks to increase community engagement among the African diaspora.
Uwagba, O. (Host). [Audio podcast]. Women Who.
From Otegha Uwagba, author of Little Black Book: A Toolkit for Working Women, comes In Good Company, a podcast that interviews smart, successful women at the height of their careers and the “working woman” culture. It’s full of ideas, fresh advice, practical discussion, and feminist discourse.
Toronto-based futurist Nikolas Badminton interviews Carol-Anne Hilton, author of Indigenomics:Taking a Seat at the Economic Table and creator of the #indigenomics movement. Hilton talks about her work in building #indigenomics to a movement that spurs the growth of a $100-billion Indigenous economy.
Stacey Abrams, author of Lead from the Outside: How to Build Your Future and Make Real Change, has done many podcasts. In this episode of Women Amplified, a replay of her 2021 California Conference for Women keynote, Abrams shares the vision for leadership, thoughts on ambition, and the successes and failures that led to her founding of Fair Fight, the nonprofit that registered 800,000 new voters in Georgia and helped steer the course of the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
Videos/Webinars
Moore, K. (2021, June 25). The Power of Ambiverts [Webinar]. UBC Sauder School of Business.
Conventional wisdom used to assert that extroverts were better positioned to excel in business. More recently, the inherent traits of introverts and how they might be successfully applied in professions and industries such as business have been extolled. But what about ambiverts? Those who identify and/or project as both extroverted and introverted? One would think they would be ideally positioned for success. Find out in this webinar organized by our friends at UBC Sauder School of Business.
If terms and concepts related to gender diversity feel overwhelming and/or confusing to you, then here is a place to start building your awareness and understanding. With help from host Kai Scott, and remembering to always lead with empathy, you can begin to better understand transgender inclusive practices in the workplace. Note on access: Try going to this link to view a replay of the webinar on Zoom. If that doesn’t work immediately, then go to the page with the original event announcement. Register for the event (if you are not UBC Sauder alumni, then click the “Other” box and type in N/A for Grad Year, etc.) and you should then be sent back to the above Zoom link. If you still can’t access it, please email us to let us know and we will try to get you a link or copy.
Market Research
How do we make sure we're getting to where we want to be? Assessment and disclosure provide a roadmap on the journey. In this report, Osler examines gender diversity disclosures by TBX-listed and CBCA companies subject to disclosure policies, and provides examples of best practices for improving gender diversity within companies and on teams.
Social Media
UBC Library is on TikTok! Well, more specifically, our @businesslibrarian is! If you managed to make it all the way through this post but typically prefer your recommended resources presented in fun, little video clips, then @businesslibrarian is who you want to spend time with. We recommend her 'Must Read Books for Entrepreneurs' posts.