Taryn Andersen, a venture capitalist, recognized the challenges that female executives confront while seeking funding. She saw how female CEOs behaved differently than male leaders and had distinct experiences with investors. Since she had worked as an investor, Taryn knew how tough it was to locate female-led digital start-ups. She saw the market’s demand for an initiative like Impulse4women. Taryn also wanted to work on social impact projects because she has been engaging with NGOs and other organizations in impoverished nations in Africa and South America since 2005, promoting children’s physical and emotional well-being. Impulse4women invites both female and male leaders to join social impact projects. Taryn co-founded Impulse4women after combining her love for entrepreneurship with her finance skills and seeing the challenges female company leaders face in obtaining funding.
Taryn offers an ecosystem with a variety of initiatives through Impulse4women, and the firm is positioned worldwide, allowing entrepreneurs to be viewed by investors all around the world if they meet the requirements. During COVID-19, the firm was forced to change its services, and it began to offer a variety of online solutions to assist entrepreneurs in their growth (mentoring sessions, pitching sessions, webinars, podcasts).
The staff at Impulse4women is passionate about female entrepreneurs’ success. It provides companies with a free service that allows them to network with top investors, venture capitalists, business angels, and industry experts. In addition, its events, mentorship, and pitching sessions are aimed at helping entrepreneurs on its platform prepare for funding rounds and grow.
The most significant asset is the team and advisers who have volunteered their time and expertise to help Impulse4women. It comprises about 75 members, half of whom are professionals in their respective fields. The other half is made up of ambassadors, mostly women, who wish to help promote the female entrepreneurial technology ecosystem in their areas.
Below are highlights of the interview conducted between Taryn Andersen and World’s Leaders:
Describe who you are as a person, inside and outside of the workplace.
Inside the workplace, I am an entrepreneur. I set up all of the strategies that we are implementing. And check progress, any mistakes we may be making in the short term, and how we are improving. Outside of work, I am a mother to two grown up daughters, and I care about being close to my family, sharing experiences together, and having a nice time.
Describe your background and what did you do before you started/joined the company?
I began working in private banking in 2000. In 2011, I created Pluribus United Foundations along with 15 private foundations in order to work together and create synergies between them. I left banking to become an entrepreneur and, in the meantime, worked with Startup-Bootcamp, before beginning a job as the Investor Relations Director at THCAP Venture Capital in 2016.
What has made you successful? What do you value?
My experience as an investor has certainly helped, as it means I am used to searching for investors, dealing with deal flow, and analyzing startups. So, from a practical point of view, this has helped. Regarding success in entrepreneurship, this comes from knowing when something is working, and when to pivot and make that change. Being resilient and adaptable in changing circumstances has shaped my journey.
What are the most important aspects of a company’s culture? What principles do you believe in and how do you build this culture?
The most important aspect is the team, particularly a team that is aligned and respectful of each other. I encourage my employees to give me feedback in order to add value and richness to the company, which will enable us to grow and develop as best as we can.
What is the significance of innovative ideas in the company?
Innovative ideas are central to the company. We work very closely with startups, so we always see the new trends and technologies coming into the market, which change how we act on both a personal and professional level.
Give us your opinion on; do organizations rely heavily on individual heroics or team processes?
A company cannot accomplish anything without a strong team. A team is central to success. We can use technology or strategies, but without a good team to implement them, there would be no success. Having the best open-minded people as part of the project is a huge value-add to any project.
What are your responsibilities as the CEO of the company? What is the happiest part of your daily routine?
The role of a CEO is to make decisions, think about the business strategy, and identify any opportunities that are out there in order to implement them. A CEO must set clear short term objectives in order to know the path that the company is taking. In the medium term, all the decisions that we have been taking over the last 1-2 years will start to achieve company objectives. In addition, recognizing that you do not know everything makes you understand the power of your team’s success. The happiest part of my daily routine is when we are working on a project, and are successful at it through our teamwork. It makes my day. All the little projects finally come together into one big project, which really shows the team’s success.
What advice would you give someone going into a leadership position for the first time?
It is important to be brave, resilient, and surround yourself with a supportive team who want to be part of the project, and who love it too. Ensuring you have good mentors means you will be able to avoid making mistakes that could take a long time to resolve. As well as resilience, leaders need the intelligence to recognize when to continue or when to stop. It is about persevering whilst also seeing your limitations. Leaders today have to be very open to new market movements, trends, and issues in technological terms that are coming in. They must be aware that we are in a technological revolution and remain adaptable and up to date.
