A regular refrain is that not enough has been done to reduce hurdles in front of women in business - but there are signs of progress, and this is clearly relevant to wealth management when thinking of future and present clients.

As part of a series analysing issues relevant to the global wealth management sector, Sebastian Dovey, managing partner at Scorpio Partnership, the consultancy, takes a look at the growing role of women in the higher echelons of the business world. For a long time, the complaint has been that women face a “glass ceiling” in advancing upwards in business – how much has actually been done to improve the situation? Dovey argues that real progress is being made. The wealth management sector needs to note this because as more women entrepreneurs and managers make their mark, so will the industry, traditionally a male-dominated one, need to grasp their requirements. The editors of this publication are grateful to Dovey for sharing this insight and invite readers to respond. The article is by Scorpio in association with BNP Paribas, as part of the 2015 Global Entrepreneurialism Report. The report drew from for over 2,500 successful entrepreneurs across 17 countries.

In the context of the influence of gender in the world of entrepreneurialism there are some interesting notes of discovery. A key point that came out of the study is that within the community of entrepreneurs there is very little evidence of bias or disadvantage against the likelihood of success between male and female business owners.

All point to success being directly correlated to the gender-neutral factors of vision and drive. However, many remark that they consider there might be a notable lack of confidence around becoming a committed entrepreneur among females. In the words of one French entrepreneur: “There is no difference between a man and a woman in the entrepreneurial world. However, women often lack the confidence to start a business. They need to believe in themselves more.”

This statement is a revealing one when considered against the data from this research. In fact, our findings suggest that women have no reason to lack confidence and indeed there is a verve toward entrepreneurialism that is actually more pronounced among women.

Of the nearly 1,000 women that participated it was significant to see that the average age for commencing down the entrepreneurial path was on a par with men. Moreover, the time lag between thinking and acting was virtually identical to male entrepreneurs. So, there is no sign of hesitation.

Moreover, once the female entrepreneur starts, they typically launch slightly more businesses than their male counterparts. And, more importantly, the average annual business turnover of their primary business is $700,000 more.

Looking to the future of female entrepreneurial activity, there is a slight variance in sector focus compared with men. While the sectors are broadly similar, there is a higher level of preference toward focusing their entrepreneurial talents in retail and the industry of fashion makes an appearance at a level that is higher than for their male counterparts.

What is marked is that perhaps the women that do venture down the path of entrepreneurialism may have a slightly higher legacy of entrepreneurial activity within their family, but only just. Indeed, both male and female entrepreneurs noted how important this legacy could be in venturing down the path themselves.

Considering this legacy factor as a stimulus there could be an argument that we are at a point of inflexion where female entrepreneurs should now begin a process of encouraging a new wave of female entrepreneurs that do not have such a family history. Indeed, when looking at their male counterparts the research findings hint at a growing number of entrepreneurs joining the community with no entrepreneurial family backgrounds. However, the proportion of these that are male is markedly higher than female.

An adjustment to this ratio may be influenced by the growth in the number of role models that provide the catalyst for the internal vision and drive in each potential female entrepreneur.

In this context, an interesting guide of where the future hotspots of female entrepreneurial activity might be is based on the volume of responses to the research programme here. It is noteworthy that in this research programme there was no gender quota or bias, with the topic open to all. The participation rates in the individual countries are thus a revealing sign of the levels of engagement among gender.

On this basis, there is a suggestion that India, Hong Kong and France could be strong locations for future female entrepreneurialism. The three markets with the current lowest levels of participation among successful female entrepreneurs appear to be Taiwan, Singapore and Belgium.