Start-up sector ‘a breeding ground’ for inappropriate behaviour

Venture capital investor Elaine Stead is spearheading a new resource for tackling sexist harassment and discrimination in Australia’s start-up sector in the wake of multiple incidents that have left the local industry reeling.

The resource, dubbed Addressing Sexism in Australian Tech & Investment, is being released on Monday and is the result of input from hundreds of local technology executives, investors and leaders.

Human VC founder Elaine Stead.

Designed to be a living document, according to Stead, it contains industry codes of conduct, methods of reporting and enforcement measures from Blackbird, the Australian Investment Council, Southern Angels and ANDHealth operations director Jenna Polson.

Many women have either left the Australian technology start-up sector or avoided it due to issues around inappropriate behaviour, and Stead said that’s in part because start-ups are often led by young people who are flush with cash but had not been put in positions of power over other people before.

“Often start-ups don’t quite have the same corporate infrastructure and resources that some of those bigger companies have to help them,” she told this masthead. “The tech industry also is in many ways, from a cultural perspective, quite juvenile.

“They often celebrate child-like things, and that translates a lot to informality, and that informality can sometimes leave a bit more space for these types of things to fester and not get addressed. And I think these are issues that can be resolved.

“I think most people in this ecosystem want to do the right thing but some of them don’t know how to do it yet.”

A former scientist, Stead is one of Australia’s longest serving active venture capital investors and said she had long experienced sexist harassment and bullying. She is the founder of Human Venture Capital, having helped lead Blue Sky Venture Capital, which collapsed in 2019.

“Unfortunately like almost every woman in every industry I’ve been subjected to sexism, harassment and bullying ... ranging from been sexually assaulted at events, assumed I’m the junior at the fund I started because of my gender, and subject to a campaign of public bullying,” she said.

“While it’s easier to be quiet, it doesn’t change anything, and so I’m still here banging the drum, not just for me but for everyone in this industry.”

Stead said recent highly publicised incidents of alleged inappropriate conduct, which have led to multiple start-up executives resigning, served as a catalyst for the document’s creation. Stead conducted more than 40 interviews with investors and industry leaders.

“It was quite indicative of what had been happening in the shadows and in the background for a really long time,” she said of the latest incidents. “Then what we observed was so many men said to us privately ‘how do we help? We want to be allies here but we don’t know how to go about it’.”

Stead is calling for diversity, equity and inclusion specialists and more VC investors to contribute to the resource.

Founder of climate and tech-focused PR agency Third Hemisphere Hannah Moreno has worked heavily on the document and said it will exist alongside other efforts to date including The Grapevine, a platform for victims to anonymously share stories.

Third Hemisphere managing director Hannah Moreno.

”I’ve had so many experiences of sexual harassment and abuse that could have materially damaged Third Hemisphere, that I’ve actually lost count,” she said. “In every one of these cases, I agonised over how to simultaneously protect the ego of my aggressor while keeping myself safe, and also not losing critical accounts, contacts and money.

“The start-up ecosystem has become a bit of a breeding ground for inappropriate behaviour ... It’s an informal culture.”

The workforce is made up of a spectrum of people when it comes to social justice issues, according to Moreno. Some are “social justice averse”, she said, who either don’t believe change is necessary or are outraged by it because they see it as a loss for themselves.

Others are “social justice curious”, and might not have thought about the issues but recognise the mood is changing. A third group, “social justice champions”, have a responsibility to convert those in the curious group, according to Moreno.

“We need to work on converting them through positive messaging and empathy, and practical things you can do,” she said. “We realise not everyone is ready to speak out, not everyone is ready to put their head above the parapet and get it chopped off. But this is a tangible way people in the industry can help.

“We wanted to create this open-source document that anyone can access, that says ‘here are some different options’, and you can sort of pick from them like a buffet.”

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