Women Entrepreneurs in Ukraine: Another Kind Of War Story

By KATE ISLER, CEO and CoFounder, WMarketplace | Author, Breaking Borders | Speaker | Global Sales and Marketing Leader | C200 Member

For over two years we have been hearing about the war in Ukraine. In the United States, most of the stories center on the internal political fight over whether to supply military support to Ukraine. There is no question that weapons and outside help for a country embroiled in war is critical. But I want to bring to light another story about the war in Ukraine, one that I experienced firsthand. My story centers around women supporting women and harnessing the generosity of a population to support hundreds of thousands of people in need. This is a story of support that goes beyond the basics of food and shelter. This is about women welcoming women into their lives, supporting them and their children to begin rebuilding their lives and their businesses. 

The WMarketplace Accelerator "Live from Warsaw" April 2024 Photo Jacek Waszkiewicz

This all began over a year ago when I was asked to speak during a webinar hosted by the Us Department Of Commerce as an element of the Empower HER Program. The program included a two-part series of webinars aimed at providing information and support to women entrepreneurs in Ukraine during the war. The speakers featured an impressive list of representatives from larger multinational corporations and large Ukraine-based companies. 

Each of the speakers talked about the support that their companies were providing to women entrepreneurs, and most of that talk referenced large monetary investments. By the end of the second webinar, the cash investment mentioned was a significant amount of money. After the program concluded, I reached out to the speakers and asked how women in Ukraine could access this impressive funding commitment. 

Here is it important to give some insight into my business and why I was invited to participate. My current business is an ecommerce accelerator program where we focus on supporting women entrepreneurs to sell and scale their business online. Before I started this company, I worked for a large multinational technology company and lived and worked in Eastern Europe. The cultural context I had gained from my work experience, coupled with my current business presented a perfect opportunity to offer tangible support for women entrepreneurs. We could assist them to continue to build their businesses during the war by selling online and learning to export products to the US and Europe. The pledged funding seemed like the ideal catalyst to enable these businesses to take advantage of the growing opportunity in online selling. 

Despite hearing firsthand the enthusiastic pledges of support made by the large businesses during the webinar series, I received no response from the speakers to my inquiry about how to access funding for the women in Ukraine. I am not easily deterred, so I developed a survey to ask the almost 300 women that attended the webinars about their businesses in order identify good candidates for an ecommerce focused accelerator that included a small cash grant and that would allow them to continue to grow their businesses during the war. 

The entrepreneurs enthusiastically responded to the survey and provided detailed information about their businesses. There was great enthusiasm for a proposed program that would help them keep their businesses and families thriving and allow them to continue investing in their local communities. 

We narrowed the field to the most viable 15 prospects that encompassed over 60 jobs in Ukraine. I went back to the speaker group again with a more concrete proposal to support these businesses, only to be ignored again. It appeared to me that the funds pledged were not easily accessible, to say the least. After working with a dedicated Department of Commerce and American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine team we found a sponsor for a pilot program and off we went. 

The pilot was a huge success! The entrepreneur that participated increased her sales by 15% and was able to hire 2 additional employees in Ukraine. We had solid evidence of the efficacy and impact of our program. 

During this same timeframe, I pitched the idea of supporting women entrepreneurs in Ukraine everywhere I could and found a supporter in the Us Department Of Commerce The SABIT Program. We developed a plan to present our program that typically is delivered virtually over 6 weeks in just two days, in person, in Warsaw, Poland. 

Almost a year to the day from that first Empower HER webinar, I stood in a conference room in Warsaw in front of over forty-five Ukrainian women entrepreneurs now living in Poland as refugees. These women represented all types of businesses, selling both products and services online and were from every age group. Over the two-day course they shared stories of restarting their businesses or launching a business for the first time. They shared their experiences of moving and reestablishing their lives, learning a new language and a new culture and customs. They share photos of family members in uniform at the front lines of the war, and of parents and friends still in Ukraine. They laughed, they learned, and they participated fully in the program. They shared how they have been welcomed and embraced by the Poles. 

Throughout the year my co-founder and I spent putting this program together, we met so many others working to support Ukraine. One of those introductions led to my attending an event hosted by the Polish-Ukrainian Women's Chamber, following the two days of training in Warsaw. This was an inspiring and energizing gathering of women from Poland, Ukraine, Germany and Brussels working together to support one another and to continue economic development in Ukraine. 

Having spent many years living and working around the world, I am not a stranger to global business. But what stood out to me during my trip to Poland, and in the year of preparation that led to it, was the amazing story of economic collaboration that is not being told. While the billions of dollars invested in military support grabs the headlines, this untold story has impacts beyond the relationships developed and training delivered. Research shows that women-owned businesses return significantly more for every dollar invested in them. And we know that when women's businesses are successful it has a direct impact on her family, community, and the greater economy in her area. Investment in women-owned businesses in Ukraine will be instrumental in rebuilding Ukraine as the war continues and beyond. 

The program I conducted was made possible through the U.S. Department of Commerce The SABIT Program and is evidence of the commitment of government agencies’ support for Ukraine. With the success of training program, we are making plans to expand the program to many of the over one million women entrepreneurs who have been displaced from Ukraine. We will deliver this training and connect with Ukrainian women in three additional countries in Europe where they are living and working to maintain their businesses, their families and their communities. 

The program I conducted was made possible through the U.S. Department of Commerce The SABIT Program and is evidence of the commitment of government agencies’ support for Ukraine. With the success of training program, we are making plans to expand the program to many of the over one million women entrepreneurs who have been displaced from Ukraine. We will deliver this training and connect with Ukrainian women in three additional countries in Europe where they are living and working to maintain their businesses, their families and their communities.