When startups scale quickly, founders often make hurried hiring decisions that unintentionally disadvantage women, according to new study from the Stockholm School of Economics in Sweden. The study shows how the pressures of rapid growth increase the likelihood that founders rely on mental shortcuts and make biased decisions. 

Drawing on large‑scale Swedish data, the study shows that scaling—when companies hire far more people than their usual growth trend would predict—puts pressure on founders to decide swiftly, which increases the use of mental shortcuts. These shortcuts can activate gender stereotypes, shaping who gets hired and who moves into managerial roles.  

“During those moments of rapid growth, even well‑intentioned leaders can fall back on familiar stereotypes when assessing who they believe is best suited for the role,” says Mohamed Genedy, co-author and Postdoctoral Fellow at the House of Innovation, Stockholm School of Economics. 

Reduced odds of hiring female managers 

His research analyzes more than 31,000 new ventures founded in Sweden between 2004 and 2018. It finds that in male‑led startups, scaling reduces the odds of hiring a woman by about 18 percent, and the odds of appointing a woman to a managerial position by 22 percent.  

These patterns emerge even in a highly gender‑equal national context, making the findings especially noteworthy.  

Crucially, the study reveals that founders with HR‑related education counteract these challenges. In ventures led by founders with HR training, the odds of hiring a woman increase by more than 30 percent, and the odds of appointing a woman to a managerial role increase by 14 percent for the same level of scaling.  

“When founders have experience with structured hiring practices, the gender gaps shrink, and in some cases even reverse,” Genedy says.  

“This shows that getting the basics of HR right early on really pays off. When things start moving fast, founders with HR knowledge are less likely to rely on biased instincts and more likely to hire from a broader talent pool.”  

Prior experience in companies with established HR practices also helps, though less so. It raises the likelihood of hiring women as the new ventures scale, but does not significantly affect managerial appointments. 

Differences persist in female-led ventures 

The study additionally shows that these patterns are not driven by founder gender alone. Even solo female‑led ventures display similar tendencies when scaling, though to a somewhat lesser degree.  

And in female‑dominated industries, scaling increases the hiring of women for regular roles but still reduces the likelihood that women are appointed into managerial positions.  

“When scaling accelerates, cognitive bias kicks in for everyone,” says Mohamed Genedy. “Female founders are not immune to these patterns.”  

Together, these results point to underlying cognitive mechanisms that shape decisions under time pressure.

The study, Scaling with Bias? The role of founders’ HR knowledge and experience in hiring and managerial appointments, was published in Human Resource Management.

Promoting women’s ownership in wineries can boost sales among the largest group of wine consumers, who happen to be women.

Messages like “proudly made by a woman winemaker” increased women’s intentions of purchasing wines, particularly when the label’s artwork reinforced the point with feminine gender cues such as flowers. Women were also willing to pay higher prices for those wines, according to the research from Washington State University and Auburn University.

The findings are noteworthy because 59% of all wine purchases in the US are made by women, said Christina Chi, coauthor of the research and professor of hospitality business management at WSU’s Carson College of Business.

Wine is often considered a cultural product, where the winemaker’s identity plays a role in shaping the brand’s image, she said.

Women winemakers, however, are less likely than their male counterparts to include their names on bottle labels or draw attention to their gender. Their reluctance may stem from concerns about prejudice toward their products in the male-dominated wine industry, Chi said.

“Our findings suggest that women winemakers and winery owners can benefit by being more visible,” she said. “The research shows that they can disclose their ownership with confidence and leverage it as a marketing strategy.”

The possibilities include putting “women-made wine” statements on labels or packaging, and retail store displays featuring women-made wines.

Demi Deng, an assistant professor at Auburn who earned her doctorate at WSU, is the first author on the research published in International Journal of Hospitality Management. Ruiying Cai, an assistant professor of hospitality business management at WSU, also contributed.

The new findings build on earlier studies showing that women are more inclined to buy wine with feminine gender cues on the labels. The 2024 research – by Cai, Chi, Deng, and WSU Emeritus Professor Robert Harrington – received widespread publicity. Beverage trade journals carried the story, and women winemakers were enthusiastic about the findings.

“As researchers, we want our work not only to have societal impact, but to have practical significance for the wine industry,” Chi said. “From the response, we saw that women winemakers were following our research and were eager for additional studies about women wine consumers.”

More than 1,000 US women participated in the most recent research, which involved a three-part study.

First, the researchers replicated the 2024 findings about feminine cues on wine labels. Using a fictitious Columbia Valley red table wine, the women surveyed expressed higher intentions of purchasing the wine when the label’s artwork featured a bouquet of flowers versus a masculine portrait. They were also willing to pay $3.50 more per bottle – about $17.75 for wines with feminine labels compared to $14.25 for wines with masculine cues.

In the second phase of the study, a “woman-made wine” statement was added to marketing materials. Women consumers had even stronger purchase intentions for wines with both the statement and feminine artwork on labels, the research found.

In the final phase, photos of women winemakers were further added to the marketing materials. But women were less likely to buy feminine-label wines when the female winemakers were pictured. Rather than focusing on the “woman-made” messaging, consumers’ decisions may have been swayed by whether they related to the individual women portrayed in the photographs, researchers said.

The studies also tested the marketing strategies on wines with masculine labels. Adding a “woman-made” statement significantly increased their appeal to women consumers. And when female winemakers were pictured in the marketing materials, women were willing to pay $3 more per bottle for wines with masculine labels.  

Besides helping women winemakers market their products, Deng said she hopes the research will draw attention to women’s contributions to the industry. In the United States, about 18% of winemakers are women.  

Deng worked as a sommelier in New Zealand before she earned her doctorate. “I actually encountered a lot of women winemakers, but their names aren’t visible in the wine market,” she said.

A new study finds entrepreneurs become more committed to their business ventures when they are told they will fail, increasing their efforts to make those businesses successful.

“Most entrepreneurs – people who start their own businesses – actually identify with the business they’re running,” says Tim Michaelis, corresponding author of a paper on the work and an assistant professor of psychology at North Carolina State University. “So being told that your business, your idea that you are committed to, will be a failure can almost seem like a personal attack.”

“We wanted to see if being told that their business will fail actually gets entrepreneurs to commit even more deeply,” Michaelis says. “We were somewhat surprised that researchers had not already examined this. Most of the literature in this area is from the field of developmental psychology and hadn’t explored potential business implications. Fundamentally, we wanted to know if having an underdog mentality can motivate entrepreneurs.”

To explore the subject, the researchers conducted three studies.

For the first study, the researchers recruited 423 entrepreneurs; of those, 213 were in a control group that was not asked about a time they had been told they would fail. One hundred and seven participants were asked about, but could not recall, a time they were told they would fail. The remaining 103 participants did recall a time they were told they would fail. The researchers then asked all study participants questions designed to capture how committed they were to persisting with their new businesses.

“We found that entrepreneurs who could recall being told their business would fail displayed a deeper commitment to persisting with their business ventures,” Michaelis says.

For the second study, the researchers worked with 579 entrepreneurs. In this study, the control group consisted of 289 participants; 234 participants couldn’t remember being told they would fail; and 56 could recall a time they were told they would fail.

This time the researchers essentially replicated the first study, but rather than asking questions designed to measure persistence, they asked questions designed to measure the extent to which study participants were motivated to prove someone wrong. The 56 participants who could recall being told they would fail were asked about their motivation to prove that specific naysayer wrong – the so-called “underdog effect.” The remaining study participants were simply asked about their motivation to prove something to general stakeholders.

“The results here were consistent with the first study – recalling a time when someone told them they would fail led to increased motivation to persist with their business venture,” says Michaelis.

For study three, the researchers recruited 417 entrepreneurs. The study participants were surveyed once per month for three months. The first month’s survey served to establish a baseline, measuring the extent to which each study participant was motivated to persist with their venture by the underdog effect – a desire to prove any doubters wrong.

The second and third surveys varied slightly, but were essentially designed to assess the extent to which motivation and persistence were driven by the underdog effect. The surveys also accounted for other variables associated with motivation and persistence, such as confidence, past experience, financial benefit and passion for the work.

“The third study reinforced what we found in studies one and two – the underdog effect is a powerful motivator that increases an entrepreneur’s motivation and persistence regarding their venture,” says Michaelis. “In other words, the underdog effect leads to people working harder, focusing on their venture, and really committing to the success of their business.”

But the studies also revealed something unexpected.

“There were a surprisingly large number of study participants who had never been told that they would fail – they had only ever received positive feedback, or possibly no feedback, about their business ideas,” says Michaelis. “And we found that those study participants were less committed to their business ideas and had lower levels of persistence.

“This work offers real insight into what motivates entrepreneurs, and it raises some interesting questions,” says Michaelis.

“How do you give entrepreneurs enough support to encourage their initiative, but enough resistance to help them develop the drive they need to succeed? How can we train entrepreneurs to distinguish between doubts that can serve as motivational fuel and constructive criticism that highlights real flaws in a business plan? These are issues we can explore moving forward.”

The paper, “I’ll prove you wrong! The underdog effect as an antecedent to entrepreneurial action and venture persistence,” is published in the Journal of Business Venturing. The paper was co-authored by Jeffrey Pollack, the Lynn T. Clark II Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship in NC State’s Poole College of Management; Jon Carr, the Jenkins Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship in NC State’s Poole College of Management; April Spivack of the Hanken School of Economics in Finland; Nicholas Smith of Northern Illinois University; and Alexander McKelvie of Syracuse University.