The Lip Gloss Gap: Simona Di Vietri, Entrepreneur & Investment Proffesional

Simona is an entrepreneur and investment professional with deep experience in financial operations. Simona has worked for a range of highly regarded financial institutions in London and the Middle East. With a proven history of success in driving financial operations internationally, and having navigated throughout a range of sectors and corporate environments, Simona has cultivated unique industry insight. Simona is also a founder of La Latteria, and mother to twins (a boy and girl).

To be honest I do not have a clear answer on what needs to happen to unlock a situation, that is feeding off itself. What is very clear to me is what should stop happening, which is forcing “female” focus on funds and quota on capital allocation to ensure women’s representation.is It sounds counter-intuitive, but capital allocation driven by compliance requirements (rather than on merit of growth potential, quality founder and right execution capabilities) usually generates suboptimal investment choices with subpar returns, And what’s next? You create a link between female founders and lower performing businesses which is incorrect, as in reality those businesses were picked for the wrong reasons.

Banks, corporates, and funds put their resources through constant training. That’s how they begin and evolve in their journey. Yet we expect entrepreneurs to learn a much harder job by trial and error (on the job). And while that is fine, what if we could accelerate that process? What if establishments (corporates, investors, banks) could take the social responsibility to create programs  to form and train (and then continue to mentor) young people with entrepreneurial ambitions. Imagine the pool of ideas, talents and opportunities that could come to market (also for the benefit of those institutions). And that will naturally capture a large portion of ambitious (female) entrepreneurs that could be equipped for success rather than set for failure.

My direct experience working with female entrepreneurs has been primarily on the mentoring side, i.e., people who have come to me (knowing I am both a founder and an investor) seeking guidance. Sadly, and to reconfirm the issue we are discussing, I have never yet had the opportunity to work (on the fund side) with any female founder.

My experience is that they are sharp, focused and extremely driven. What they lack, at the risk of repeating myself, is the confidence of standing in front of investors and telling them their story to convince them that they can deliver. And that is because they underestimate their ability to deliver.

As an investor, I have spent a lot of time questioning aggressive business plans from (male) founders, presenting scenarios hard to substantiate from any standpoint. But they support that with such conviction (is what she used which is stronger) confidence that you may end up doubting yourself and accepting some of their points (if not all).

When I have had the opportunity to work with their female counterparts, the story switches. The tone is always very sober and careful. The numbers are always conservative, I would dare say, pessimistic at times. I have had to argue to push projections up because they were massively underestimating their growth and profitability.  And the answer was always the same: WHAT IF I cannot archive that? WHAT IF, WHAT IF…… Better to present a lower scenario and then exceed expectations so everyone is happy.

Now the flaw with that approach is that companies are valued on growth potential, so you are damaging yourself. Let investors make a call on achievability. Do not undercut yourself to avoid “disappointment”. This is the biggest take away from me: we need to help female founders to change the narrative and believe passionately in their ideas.

The Lip Gloss Gap is a series by The Red Tree shining a light on the role that the beauty industry plays in closing the female fundraising gap. The series will feature interviews with founders and fundraisers which will be released monthly. We invite you to share your experiences as we continue the conversation.