A sustainable-leadership lens asks how a business creates value, for whom, and who carries the costs or risks - Yael Nevo, Gender Rise

She is a Listed External Expert for the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), has collaborated with organisations including The Guardian, UNDP, GIZ, Amnesty International, and ASEAN and is the Founder & Director of Gender Rise, a consultancy delivering strategic equity, diversity, and inclusion (DEI) interventions.

Yael works with companies across a wide range of sectors, including corporate, nonprofit and public organisations. Through this experience, she has identified a useful way to distinguish genuine commitment to DEI from efforts that are more about appearances: do an organisation's public commitments reflect people's everyday experiences?

“Posting about inclusion on occasions such as International Women’s Day, Black History Month or Pride can raise awareness, but meaningful progress should also be visible in how the organisation hires, manages people, makes decisions and develops its products or services throughout the year.

Representation across the organisation and at different levels is one indicator. It is also important to understand whose views shape decisions, who feels safe to disagree or raise concerns, and whether people with less power see their concerns acted on. Written policies should be compared with actual practice: for example, whether all employees feel able to take parental leave, request adjustments or report harmful behaviour without negative consequences.

Startups can begin with a focused set of measures, a named owner and regular reviews. They can track the employee journey from applications and hiring through pay, performance reviews, promotion and retention; assess whether people can speak up and whether concerns are resolved; and review who can access and benefit from their products. Quantitative measures should be considered alongside confidential conversations, so that the organisation understands the reasons behind the results. Each identified gap should lead to a realistic action, deadline and review point. In this way, inclusion becomes part of responsible business performance.”

Inclusivity and representation go far beyond gender balance. Yael emphasises that startup founders need to look at a broader range of indicators to understand whether their organisations are truly inclusive. 

“Founders should track representation by function, seniority and decision-making level, as well as outcomes at each stage of the employee journey. 

These include who applies, progresses through recruitment, is hired, receives strong performance ratings, gets a pay increase or bonus, is promoted, and stays or leaves. 

Other useful indicators include pay differences, access to development and flexible work, requests for adjustments, and whether people feel respected, included and safe to raise concerns. For complaints, organisations can track themes, response times and actions taken while protecting confidentiality.

Where the data allows, it can be disaggregated by relevant characteristics to examine how experiences intersect. In a small company, very small groups may be identifiable, so findings should be handled carefully and combined with qualitative feedback rather than shared in unsafe breakdowns. 

Founders should select measures that help them understand and manage risks, deliver on their growth strategy, assign responsibility and review progress regularly.

The EU pay-transparency rules include reporting for employers with at least 100 employees, with obligations varying by organisation size and implementation. The UK’s statutory gender pay-gap reporting requirement applies to employers with 250 or more employees. These are reporting thresholds; however, smaller employers can also review pay fairness and act on unexplained differences.”

The diversity of a founding team can influence much more than internal company culture. It can shape the problems a startup chooses to solve, the solutions it develops and, ultimately, the people who benefit from its products and services. Yael explains:

“A narrow range of experiences, combined with limited psychological safety or authority to challenge assumptions, can lead teams to miss needs or design around a default user who does not represent the people affected. 

Diversity alone does not guarantee a better product; teams also need ways to hear, consider and test different perspectives with users.

A relevant example in this case is Onfido, a UK startup founded by Oxford students. It built an online identity check used by banks and other services: customers photograph their ID and take a selfie, and the software checks whether the faces match. In 2020, Onfido said its system made more errors for customers with darker complexions and that its training data included far more light-skinned faces. 

In other words, the team’s lack of consideration for diversity led to concrete consequences that disadvantaged darker-skinned users, who then had to find alternative ways to confirm their identity and gain the same financial credibility lighter-skinned users received through the product. Onfido has since retrained its system to improve performance across groups and was acquired in 2024, but that does not take away the initial error or its impact on users.

A contrasting example is Starling Bank. Founded by Anne Boden to disrupt the traditional, male-dominated financial elite, the digital challenger bank built an inclusive team that rejected the industry’s insular echo chambers. By leveraging these varied perspectives, Starling replaced confusing legacy banking systems with intuitive, empathetic features like visual savings goals and streamlined mobile tools for underserved entrepreneurs. This deeply user-centric approach won over millions of customers, earned multiple “Best British Bank” awards and drove the company to massive, sustained profitability—proving that when a product team looks like the society it serves, it builds software that solves real-world human needs.”

Diversity is not only about who builds a product, but also about who that product is designed to serve, as Yael exemplified above. As startups grow, involving diverse communities in decision-making becomes increasingly important. How can founders ensure they continue listening to and learning from the people affected by their products, services and business decisions?

“Affected communities should be involved throughout the decision-making cycle: in identifying the problem, shaping the design, testing the service, reviewing its impact and deciding what should change. This can include paid user research, accessible testing, a community advisory group with a clear remit, and regular opportunities for people to challenge the company’s assumptions.

A sustainable-leadership lens asks how a business creates value, for whom, and who carries the costs or risks. Startups should adopt a triple-bottom-line approach to consider social and environmental outcomes alongside financial viability. As a startup grows, suppliers’ and community perspectives should have a formal route into governance and product decisions. 

Organisations should close the feedback loop by explaining what they changed, what they could not change and why.

Startups can track who can access and use their products, who benefits, who may be excluded or harmed, and whether outcomes differ across groups. They can also consider who owns the data, captures the economic value and has access to remedy when something goes wrong. This keeps impact connected to the people the business says it serves.”

A very important principle she highlights is “nothing about us without us”, that basically means that people affected by a system should have a meaningful role in shaping and evaluating it. This becomes more and more important in the age of AI:

“AI can amplify patterns in its data, design choices and operating context, so inclusion should be considered throughout the system’s lifecycle, starting with whether AI is the right tool for the problem and who may be affected by its use.

Before launch, people likely to be affected should be involved in defining the problem and acceptable outcomes. Organisations should examine where training or reference data came from, whose experiences may be missing, whether sensitive traits are involved, and how privacy and consent are handled. Systems should be tested across relevant groups and real-world scenarios, with limitations documented and routes provided for people to challenge or correct consequential decisions. Human oversight needs named responsibility and the authority to intervene.

After launch, organisations should monitor errors and outcomes across groups, make it possible to report harm, investigate incidents and update or stop the system when needed. For a small company, this work can be proportionate to the risk and include a clear impact assessment, documented testing, a responsible owner and ongoing review.”

As startups scale and expand into new markets, they may encounter different cultural perspectives and approaches to equality and inclusion. Yael stresses the importance of maintaining a consistent ethical foundation while adapting how these principles are put into practice across different contexts.

“That foundation should include dignity, safety, fair treatment and a clear response to discrimination. Communication, consultation and delivery may need to reflect local context, language, law and risk.

Before entering a market, organisations should understand applicable law and assess practical risks for employees, customers and partners, using qualified local advice where needed. They should consult people who understand the local context, including affected communities, rather than assuming that an EU-based perspective applies everywhere. Where a person’s identity could expose them to harm, organisations should protect privacy, assess travel and disclosure risks, and ensure that employees are not asked to enter situations they have not freely agreed are safe.

Where local law or practice conflicts with the company’s principles, the tension should be acknowledged and possible actions assessed for safety and legality. Business coalitions or trusted local partners may help raise standards, provided that engagement is guided by local people and takes account of possible consequences. The aim is to maintain shared commitments while adapting their implementation to each context.”

Finally, we approached the topic of investment, where underrepresented founders continue to struggle. Yael comments on what would need to change to make the investment ecosystem more equitable.

“The goal is to apply relevant standards consistently and ensure that strong businesses are not screened out because their founders have less access to established networks or investor familiarity. 

I see this as a systems issue: gaps can build at each stage, from who gets introduced to investors and which sectors are seen as investable, to whose communication style or track record fits an investor’s idea of a promising founder. 

An intersectional gender analysis also asks how gender interacts with race and socio-economic background, since founders do not all face the same barriers.

The figures show both the overall pattern and how it compounds. In the UK in 2024, teams with at least one woman received 27.5% of equity deals but 16.6% of investment value. Within that, all-female teams received 7.3% of deals and 1.9% of the value. Older UK data found that only ten Black women received venture capital between 2009 and 2019, amounting to 0.02% of total VC funding. That figure is historical, but it shows why looking at only one aspect of diversity can hide severe differences between groups.

Investors can act at the points where these gaps emerge: widen sourcing beyond familiar networks; create sponsorship and introduction opportunities for founders without established investor connections; use clear, consistent criteria and comparable questions; and record the reasons for decisions. They can then review who progresses from first meeting to due diligence, investment and follow-on funding, breaking down the data by relevant characteristics where it is safe to do so. 

This makes “pattern matching” visible and gives investors a practical way to broaden their view of what a strong business and founder can look like.”

Thank you, Yael Nevo!