Tech Boss Lady

March 25, 2019
Skimpy advice for founding a company arrives from Girls in Tech founder Gascoigne. Purporting to relate what’s really involved in starting a business, the book is aimed at first-time founders of any type, title notwithstanding; every business, Gascoigne points out, needs technology to scale, even if it’s selling a physical product. She uses her own story—of founding her foundation to help women in tech find and support each other—as a case study, along with those of high-powered women such as VC Heidi Roizen, former Basecamp COO Mercedes De Luca, and Gascoigne’s own mom, a former Mexicana Airlines employee who started her own successful travel agency. Topics addressed include “intrapreneurship” (entrepreneurship within organizations), managing stress, maintaining partnerships, hiring a team (she advises founders not to neglect finding a good HR person early on), and facing failure. More of a go-get-’em cheer than a compendium of usable advice, the book is undercut by Gascoigne’s desire to appeal to a young audience, leading to exhortations for business-founder hopefuls to “cut the manis and pedis” and warnings that, at pitches, one’s ideas are “suddenly public AF.” This slim offering is a natural graduation gift for entrepreneurial young women, but it delivers little.

May 1, 2019
In an unblushingly straightforward and familiar style, Girls in Tech founder Gascoigne's first book refreshes with its honesty?and tons of moral support and personal anecdotes. Every chapter features a What did you learn? brief at the end, summarizing the teachings (and frequent streams of consciousness) of other entrepreneurs. Conquering fear is at the top of Gasciogne's prescribed to-do list, followed closely by heeding a sense of urgency, embracing a growth mindset, and focusing?and that's just for starters. Stories from companies like SheEO, Moxxly, and Stella + Dot validate the needs for managing stress, asking for help, mastering the essentials of pitching, and the importance of continuous improvement, whether it's learning from mistakes or investing in resources. Lessons like these might seem familiar and common-sense to serial entrepreneurs, but newbies will appreciate a full schooling on Gascoigne's rules.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)