Diversity, equity, and inclusion at Pi Labs: A year in review
This time last year we published an article outlining our our work around diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), our commitments going forward, and the actions we were taking in an effort to promote DEI across our team and our portfolio companies.
One year on, we wanted to update you on our progress and share some of the new initiatives we’re putting in place. We fully recognise that we still have work to do here, however we are insistent on continuously learning and improving — and we’d like to be as transparent with you as we can through this process.
What did we set out to achieve
- We committed to carrying out internal work required to create a DEI strategy which would see us drive meaningful action from within. For example:
- implementing inclusive programmes and policies aimed at improving female career progression
- rethinking our hiring processes with the view of removing inherent bias
- getting involved in programmes which support access to the venture capital industry
2. We committed to tracking our deal flow data and evaluating gender in all of the deals we were seeing
3. We committed to listening more and learning from angels, VCs, female founders and leaders so that we can get a better understanding how to reach and support more female founders
What actions have we taken since
We set up a DEI taskforce consisting of a selection of team members from across the business (with varying levels of seniority) who come together on a quarterly basis to develop and execute various initiatives. Anyone in the business can get involved and have a say. Crucially, it is attended by our CEO, Director of Finance, and Investment team — meaning it has the highest level of buy-in.
We have taken action to promote equal opportunity for all across our hiring process. First, by working with organisations like Future VC to meet and work with individuals who may not have otherwise had the chance to enter the VC industry. Second, by working to minimise unconscious bias by committing to using a blind hiring platform (Applied) which sees us assessing candidates based on merit and relevant skills rather than based on introductions and CVs (according to research conducted by Applied, 60% of hires made through the platform would have been missed in a traditional CV sift!).
We are now actively tracking gender in all of the deals that we‘re seeing. We hope this will help us to stay accountable and monitor how effective (or ineffective) our different DEI initiatives are. This is, and will continue to be, an ongoing effort. We’d like to expand on the data points we’re collecting to encompass a broader set of criteria by this time next year.
We ran events aimed at reaching out to and learning from female founders in our sector. This included a female founder meet-up, and weekly office hours for founders (and pre-founders) from diverse backgrounds. We also commit to our events having speakers that are representative of genders and commit to uphold this standard when participating in external events.
Where are we now?
The data
To date, 14% of our total capital allocated went to female co-founded companies (startups with at least one female cofounder), and this is set to increase to approx. 22% within the next six months with several new investments in female-led companies upcoming. Though we are by no means where we want to be, we are encouraged that these stats demonstrate that we are moving in the right direction.
Please note, currently our stats are limited to gender but we plan to expand on the data points we’re collecting to encompass a broader set of criteria by this time next year.
Market data:
While we always want to strive to do better than the industry average, we think its important to see how we stack up against our peers and the wider market:
- Between 2017 and 2021, 13% of all capital raised went to female co-founded companies
- In 2021, 1.1% of all capital raised went to all-women founding teams, and 8.8% to female co-founded companies.
- On average, the top European VCs invested in 12 female co-founded companies between 2016–2020 representing on average 15% of their investments in Europe.
Growth programme — Cohort 10
Last year, cohort 9 was our least diverse to date (in terms of gender) with no female representation across the 7 companies that took part. It goes without saying that we reflected on this as something we had to learn from and improve on.
For cohort 10, we set out to improve the diversity of the participating teams and with the help of Georgina, who joined us via the Future VC programme, our investment team met with 82 female co-founded companies, and ultimately selected 4 to join the programme, representing 40% of the final line-up of the cohort.
Analysis carried out by our investment team evaluating how female founders progressed through the growth programme application process:
- Of the 973 companies that we reviewed for this year’s programme, 8.4% were female co-founded.
⬇️ - Of the 82 female co-founded companies, we progressed 17% to a first meeting (vs 21% progressed for all companies)
⬇️ - Of the 14 companies that progressed to a first meeting, 29% ended up gaining investment committee approval (vs 5% for all companies).
Key takeaway: while we need to do more to attract and meet more female founders, the stats show that we are more likely to commit capital to an underrepresented founder.
Our team
Female representation across the team remains just under 30% . We believe that the work carried out this year to debias our recruitment process may not deliver immediate results but will have a long-term and sustained impact to the team.
Regarding the investment team, we are really excited to be onboarding a female partner onto the team (see our latest announcement on this here), especially since research shows that venture capital firms with female investment partners are four times more likely to invest in female CEOs (Dubow & Pruitt, 2017).
What’s next?
While its clear that there is still much work to be done around empowering more women to enter the industry in the first place, it’s also crucial that we continue to help level the playing field and take a proactive approach to diversifying our investment pipeline by building on the work that we’re already doing. We understand that we won’t see changes over night with a lot of the initiatives in place but we are focused on doing the work that will have sustained long-term impact.
This is just the start of our commitment to creating a fairer, more inclusive business and ecosystem. We’d love for this to be a collaborative effort from which we can all benefit (we’re already seeing encouraging signs of this through our participation in VentureESG) so if you’re interested in learning more about our initiatives, have feedback to share (we’re always open to this!) and/or your keen to connect over this, please do get in touch directly: sophie@pilabs.co.uk. ✉️
Lastly, if you are a female founder working on a solution that is digitising the future of our physical spaces, we encourage you to get in touch . We can offer, funding, expertise, access to our network or even just a chat, we’d love to hear from you! Incredibly excited for what’s to come from the female-led businesses within our portfolio and to meet and see a growing group of women entrepreneurs in this space. 🚀
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