I’ve spent my whole career working to help women gain entrepreneurship skills because I believe it’s the key to financial freedom. When I taught my first class at Elon, there was only one woman in the room. When I asked my department chair (a man) why, I got a shrug. So I went across campus asking questions, and figured out how to get them in the door. By the time I left, my classes were at least 50% women.

Fast forward to my own career—I moved to California in my late 40s, and suddenly I was the one being shut out. I kept making it to the final round of job interviews, but time after time, they hired the younger guy. Then, when I finally landed a role and helped scale a startup to acquisition, I got laid off. And in my next job? I was the only woman over 35 in my department, completely sidelined, isolated, and pushed out.

My final straw? A job interview where the CFO—who clearly hadn’t read my resume—asked if I was even qualified for a job I’d already done. I left that interview, drove down the Embarcadero in San Francisco, and thought: That’s it. That’s the last job interview I’m ever going on. I was done trying to prove myself to people who had already made up their minds about me.

And then the pandemic hit, and I saw so many women—just like me—being laid off, pushed out, or burning out of corporate. But they didn’t have the skills to start their own businesses. That’s when I knew exactly what I wanted to do: help Gen X women take control of their careers and build businesses on their own terms. 

Let’s be real. The career ladder is broken for GenX women. But that’s ok. We can build jet packs.