Developing women’s enterprise to create sustainable communities

Programme

12:00 – Registration and networking lunch

• 12:45 – Welcome to the ESRC Festival of Social Science at MMU Business School
  Professor Carol Atkinson, Associate Dean for RKE, Faculty of Business and Law at MMU
• 12:50 – Welcome to Our Women’s Enterprise Event
  Introductions by Dr Kate Cook, Leader of the Gender subject cluster, Faculty of Business and Law at MMU and Lorna Treanor, Co-Chair of ISBE’s Gender and Enterprise Network.
• 13:00 – How Gender Affects Life Course Pathways to Entrepreneurship
  Dr Julia Rouse (MMU) will draw together evidence from a wide range of research conducted over 15 years to discuss how gendered family responsibilities affect whether and when women start- up, the types of businesses they start and the rewards they earn from entrepreneurship. She will also present evidence about how childcare and maternity policies affect entrepreneurship.
• 13:45 – Workshop: Supporting Entrepreneurship Within Gendered Life Courses
  Small groups of stakeholders from the practice, policy and research communities will be facilitated to discuss the research evidence regarding how gender affects women’s life course pathways in entrepreneurship and to identify future directions in the improvement of enterprise support.

14:30 – Tea and coffee break

• 14:45 – Trading and Caring in Local Community Contexts: The Mumpreneur Phenomena
  Dr Carol Ekinsmyth (Portsmouth) presents evidence about the experiences of women who carve their enterprises around family care: so called ‘Mumpreneurs’. Is this a helpful label? When do women use or reject it? And how do the experiences of ‘Mumpreneurs’ relate to the local spaces and places in which they live?
• 15:30 – Workshop: Policy to Support ‘Mumpreneurship’?
  Small groups of stakeholders from the practice, policy and research communities will be facilitated to discuss the research evidence regarding the phenomena of ‘Mumpreneurship’ and to identify future directions in the improvement of community-based enterprise support.

16:15 – Tea and coffee break

• 16:30 – When Is Enterprise a Viable Option for Women Far From the Labour Market?
  Dr Julia Rouse will present research conducted in partnership with Oxfam that scrutinised support for British Bangladeshi women to transition from economic inactivity to start-up. She will discuss her impressions of the policy and support practice changes required to make start-up viable for women far from the labour market.
• 17:15 – Workshop: Supporting Women Far From the Labour Market
  Small groups of stakeholders from the practice, policy and research communities will be facilitated to discuss the research evidence and to identify future directions in the improvement of enterprise support for women far from the labour market.
• 17:45 – Summary and Future Directions
  Led by Lorna Treanor, Co-Chair of the Gender and Enterprise Network (University of Ulster) and our visual scribe, who record the event throughout, providing us with a beautiful and lasting representation of our discussions.

18.00 – Close

Downloads

• Flyer