More than half the entries to the Social Entrepreneur Awards came from women—a fact that has surprised and delighted Clare Logie, director of the “women in business” team at Bank of Scotland Corporate.

The bank’s research into what motivates entrepreneurs suggests that both genders desire autonomy, but that many women are also determined to give something back.

“We found it very interesting to see so many women in this sector,” Logie says. “Often they have come out of the corporate world after reaching a senior position and they want to do something for the community by starting a social enterprise or working for a charity. It satisfies their value system, but it still allows them to use their business skills, which is rewarding.”

The recession may also be playing a part, suggests Dame Julie Mellor, former head of the Equal Opportunities Commission, who is now a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers. “The research that we have done onwomen in the recession shows that 72 per cent say that it has got them thinking about a new start,” she says. “And nearly half of them want to shift into a small business or a social enterprise. I think that there is an attraction because women can see that these organisations are more in tune with their values than some of the corporates that they are leaving behind.”

Moving into the sector can be sensible for purely pragmatic reasons as well, says Mellor. “Larger social enterprises are growing as their role in delivering public services increases, so there are many career opportunities. Women are being very sensible.”

They may also be more willing than men to take the risk involved in changing sectors. “They are used to making these difficult choices, to saying, ‘I don’t like what I amseeing in the corporate world, so Iwill take the redundancy money, move into a different sector and spend more timewith my kids.”

Nina Ross, who founded the Young Parents Project in Brighton and Hove, which offers nutritional advice to parents aged 25 and under, says the sector offers a lot of part-timework and is generally flexible around family commitments.

However, this flexibility does not erode business commitment. “I am target-driven and all for making money so that the organisation can keep going,” she says. “Having a work environment where nobody gets stressed because they are not home in time to put their children to bed means that people work hard and are willing to stay with us. It also means that volunteers don’t cancel their shifts and the organisation as a whole can be more successful.”

Penny Newman, former chief executive of the Fairtrade coffee business Cafedirect, is head of the Fifteen Foundation,which trains disadvantaged young people to become chefs. She thinks that womenmay have the edge when it comes to balancing the dual financial and social demands of a social enterprise. “I wanted to take my skills and use them towards more than just a financial bottom line,” she says.

Newman is wary, however, of assuming thatwomen are naturally suited to the not-for-profit sector simply because their gender gives them a natural capability for nurturing others. Ultimately, she says, it’s more a question of individual motivation.

“Women are well represented in the sector, but there’s no definitive answer as to why that is,” agrees Seona Shand, head of fundraising at Inspire, a Scottish charity that helps people with learning disabilities. “Women do bring awhole range of things to social enterprises, but I don’t know that it is particularly about them beingwomen. Both men and women can be extremely caring.”

Inspire currently has an all-female senior management team, but that is simply because the best candidates happened to be women, not because of any deliberate choice, Shand says.

A sense of business awareness is just as vital as being socially aware, she says. “You have to have the technical and practical skills to do your job, as well as a core inside you that wants tomake a difference to people’s lives.”

Seven Stories

The Seven Stories children’s book museum in Newcastle upon Tyne was founded in 2005 by two women who wanted to inspire local children to love books. It is now run by an all-women management team of five and has a high proportion of women among its 40 paid workers and 25-plus volunteers. But that’s not by design, says Kate Edwards, the chief executive, pictured leftwith her management team. “We had a man here as operations director when we first opened and he was very good.”

However, she thinks that the child-focused nature of her organisation tends to attract women in much the same way as teaching and childcare are largely female-dominated professions. “We have always been a very woman-friendly organisation,” she says, “partly through necessity.” As a small not-for-profit museum, Seven Stories has to make a little money go a long way. “This means that a lot of the work we offer is exciting and challenging but is also part-time,” says Edwards. The work tends to attract mothers who want an interesting job that fits around childcare needs.

Women also tend to be less concerned about their status, which is useful, because small organisations value people who arewilling to be a Jack of all trades, she says. “We don’t have much money, so nobody can get too precious about their job role.We have to turn our hands to anything and bewilling to muck in.”

Edwards says research suggests that women tend to be more collaborative and less competitive than men, which also suits the nature of organisations in the not-for-profit and charitable sector.

“None of this is to say that men cannot have these characteristics, too,” she adds. “There are lots of men working in the so-called third sector who provide excellent examples of all these things and who are also driven by strong social consciences.”