Fearless Founders is Nordea’s new community engagement programme for anyone who is interested in entrepreneurship and starting their own business, and especially for future founders. Our aim is to make it easier for women to become entrepreneurs and through this narrow the gender gap which currently exists.
The Fearless Founders mentoring programme consist of four parts with inspiring speakers, live mentoring and networking opportunities.
Background
The idea was born from a Master’s thesis written by a Nordea employee. The thesis addresses the question of why women found fewer startups and also aims to find ways to increase the number of female entrepreneurs in growth companies. The results particularly confirm the hypothesis, that there is actually a big need for mentoring programmes directed to women. The thesis addresses the question of why women found less startup companies and also aims to find ways to increase the number of female entrepreneurs in growth companies. This gender imbalance was also noticed in Nordea’s Startup and Growth unit in Finland.
The programme
One of the main themes that emerged from this thesis seemed to be the lack of mentoring programmes for women and the lack of female founder role models. In our four Fearless Founders events we offered both of these. In this programme everyone could participate in mentoring session – we had ten Nordea volunteers as a mentors in each event.
The Fearless Founders programme is part of Nordea´s Community Engagement activities. In our community engagement activities we focus on financial skills and entrepreneurship. Everyone should have the necessary financial skills to enable their financial wellbeing – and we also believe that the ability to start your own business should be made easier and available for everyone who is interested. We work with partners, create our own programmes and our employees can volunteer to support during their paid working hours.
