For a female business owner, the benefits of living as her ideal entrepreneurial type are numerous, including a high level of personal contentment, a satisfactory amount of income, passion for her work, and an acceptable work-life balance.
At Jane Out of the Box, in-depth professional market research of more than 2,500 female entrepreneurs has revealed five distinct types of women in business. Each type has its own strengths, challenges, and desires. Jane Out of the Box’s most recent article, “Changing Your Type: How Entrepreneurs Can Become Exactly Who They Want to Be,” provides 5 steps for entrepreneurs to consider when changing their entrepreneurial type. The first step is to Choose a Jane, and this article provides more information about each of the Janes – so that those wishing to change their type have a well-rounded idea of the pros and cons of being a member of each group.
Accidental Jane is a successful, confident business owner who never actually set out to start a business. Instead, she may have decided to start a business due to frustration with her job or a layoff and then she decided to use her business and personal contacts to strike out on her own. Or, she may have started making something that served her own unmet needs and found other customers with the same need, giving birth to a business. Although Accidental Jane may sometimes struggle with prioritizing what she needs to do next in her business, she enjoys what she does and is making good money. About 18% of all women business owners fit the Accidental Jane profile.
Many Accidental Jane business owners eventually evolve into one of the other entrepreneurial types. However, many run successful businesses as Accidental Jane for years, fulfilled by their work without being overwhelmed by it. Accidental Jane enjoys her freedom, and her biggest challenges include maintaining an even workload and keeping the workload at a manageable level.
How Accidental Jane defines success: