This study shows that women may be at a disadvantage when signaling that they are “entrepreneurial” to venture capitalists. We demonstrate how gender-based disadvantages may arise from role incongruence in entrepreneurship by analyzing multi-source data from 131 venture capital applications, venture capitalists’ cognitions, and their funding decisions. Our analysis indicates that women who signal an entrepreneurial attitude are more likely to elicit prevention considerations from venture capitalists, whereas men who signal such an attitude are more likely to elicit promotion considerations. We also find that promotion considerations increase the amount of financing, whereas prevention considerations decrease the amount of financing. Our study increases knowledge about the gendered cognitions that underlie implicit bias among investors and knowledge about the effects of regulatory focus on funding outcomes by exploring the interaction between gender and entrepreneurial attitude.

Our study uses cognitive mapping techniques to take into account how the same/opposite gender influences the cognitive evaluations of venture capitalists (VCs). Contrary to what has often been discussed in previous entrepreneurship literature, our results report women VCs evaluate women entrepreneurs more critically, and men VCs evaluate men entrepreneurs more critically. However, overall, the VCs' vaguer processing and lower rating of women's venturing compared to men's indicate a general structure of subordinating women's venturing compared to men's venturing. Ultimately, this contributes with an alternative view to explain what we see on the VC scene: women entrepreneurs are more likely to be rejected. We discuss implications of these results as well as implications for future study.

Like other developed countries, Sweden has experienced gender ratio stagnation in entrepreneurship, where women entrepreneurs are underrepresented. According to a large body of literature, the ability to engage in entrepreneurial endeavors depends on entrepreneurs’ access to financial resources. However, research repeatedly shows that women often do not have the same access to funding as men and that male entrepreneurs are overrepresented in the financial support system for new ventures. In contrast with traditional lenders and investors (banks, venture capitalists, business angels, etc.), governmental venture capitalists (GVCs) have to adhere to national and EU regulations; thus, they must comply with gender equality requirements. However, national reports suggest that women and men entrepreneurs do not have the same access to governmental venture capital. Accordingly, to understand this imbalance in governmental finance distribution, the overall purpose of this thesis is to explore Swedish GVCs’ gender constructions in their external and internal communication, as well as in their cognition.

To understand how gender differences may occur in GVCs’ social constructions, I draw upon gender role congruity theory, which provides insights into perceptions and beliefs about women’s and men’s expected roles in society. Accordingly, to explore GVCs social construction at the three levels (external and internal communication, and cognition) I employ a mixed-method approach. By doing so I use a variety of data and research analyses to provide both depth and width on the issue at hand.

The empirical findings of the thesis reveal constant duality and dichotomies, and the construction of two distinct personas; they provide insights into the way the symbolism of entrepreneurship as a masculine endeavor is performed within GVCs’ work processes. The overall conclusion is that although GVCs are expected to be gender neutral in their work processes, an exploration of gender constructions in external and internal communication as well as cognitions confirms the existence of gender biases regarding both women and men entrepreneurs that undermine women and favor men. Considering the overall gender-neutral role GVCs are expected to play in providing gender equality in access of governmental venture capital, the thesis highlights the unconsciousness of gender bias as well as the difficulties of executing gender neutrality in practice.

Rapporten RIKA affärsmodeller presenterar ett ramverk för arbete med normkritisk innovation för nya affärsmodeller med inriktning mot kommunikations- och marknadskanaler. Rapporten baseras på resultat från VINNOVA-projektet RIKA 3.0. Offentliga finansiärer, näringslivsrådgivare, nuvarande och potentiella entreprenörer samt andra typer av finansiärer har inom ramen för en experimentell miljö, s.k. Livinglabb, tillsammans bidragit till att identifiera upplevda problem och möjligheter med finansiärernas kommunikation och marknadskanaler. I arbetet har en normkritisk analysmetodik använts för utveckling av en prototyp; ”MÖTA” för att hantera kommunikation med inriktning på affärsmodeller mot en mångfald av entreprenörer/företag samt ett dialogverktyg för normkritisk innovation i kommunikations- och marknadskanaler. Dialogverktyget har potential till att bidra till en mer medveten kommunikationsstrategi med möjlighet att möta en mångfald av företagare och därmed bidra till jämlik tillgång till offentlig finansiering. Dialogverktyget kan därmed synliggöra och riva strukturella hinder kring mångfald hos offentliga finansiärer, vilka idag mer eller mindre omedvetet hindrar mångfald av företag och deras möjlighet att ta del av det offentliga finansieringssystemet. Genom att sätta ”MÖTA” mot nuvarande affärsmodeller kan potentialen inom en bredare bas av företag, företag som ligger utanför den gängse normen av företagande tillvaratas även de som ofta mer eller mindre omedvetet exkluderas från finansieringssystemet

RIKA 3.0 avser att i living lab-miljö utveckla en prototyp till nya inkluderande affärsmodeller för offentlig finansiering, något som ska bidra till jämställd/jämlik tillgång till offentlig finansiering.