Behind the Headlines: Seeking Their Place in Business, Israeli Women `come out of Closet’

A longtime social worker, Judy Amiran says she “woke up one day and decided to change careers. After 15 years in the profession, I had only debts to show for it.”

After exploring her options, Amiran, a veteran immigrant from the United States, opened a small business, acting as a liaison between printers and clients needing stationery and mailing labels.

Just a few months into her new endeavor, Amiran admits to feeling overwhelmed by the responsibility of running her own business.

“I’m all alone. I don’t even have an accountant,” she says. “I’ve been running the business all on intuition. I realize I need to come out of the closet, to act like a professional and to get some proper advice.”

Judging from the turnout at this month’s first annual Jerusalem Businesswomen’s Conference, Amiran is not alone.

Attended by 320 women – due to lack of space, dozens more were turned away at the door – the half-day conference provided unprecedented networking opportunities for Israeli businesswomen. The conference also featured workshops on such topics as financing and marketing a small business, assertiveness training, how to juggle a business and family, and sexual harassment in the workplace.

According to Uri Scharf, director of the Jerusalem Business Development Center, “About 50 percent of Jerusalemites are women, yet only one out of five of those who come to us for business assistance are woman.”

The business center provides advice and mentors for those wishing to start or expand a small business.

Asked why so few of the applicants are women, Scharf Said, “Many women are afraid to take on the responsibility of running a business. We need to help women overcome these fears.”

While several of the conference participants were highly successful businesswomen, raking in millions of dollars in profits each year, most said they were either planning to start a venture or to expand an existing one.

Given the country’s 15 percent rate of inflation, many said they were simply trying to stay afloat and figure out how to hold off the tax authorities.

Though women’s business conferences are old hat in most Western countries, the Jerusalem event was the first of its kind in Israel.

Organized by Elana Rozenman, a recent immigrant from Canada, and co-sponsored by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel and others, the conference set out to fill a void.

Rozenman, who runs monthly business seminars for women, believes that businesswomen have been ignored by much of the business sector in Israel.

“There’s a need for women here to learn how to progress in business,” Rozenman says, “but there’s almost no one serving them.”

Panelists and participants alike swapped horror stories about the obstacles they face every time they want to finalize a contract or collect what is owed them.

One woman said, “I simply don’t receive the same level of respect as my male counterparts. When I approached a bank for a small business loan, the manager insisted I bring in my husband.”

The image of Israel as a male-dominated society also found its way into the workshops. Through a role-playing exercise during the assertiveness-training session, a struggling businesswoman named Lee re-enacted a scene between herself and the man she described as her “condescending six-foot-three Israeli” distributor.

Standing in front of about 50 women, her shoulders drooping, Lee said, “He owes me a lot of money and he flatly refused to pay it. I’ve already sent him two lawyer’s letters. What should I do not?”

The onlookers offered several suggestions, from changing her body language in order to appear more forceful to hiring another lawyer.

Observing the group dynamics, Rozenman said, “This is what this conference is all about – women sharing their expertise with others, women empowering others to achieve their goals.”

For Judy Amiran, the printing liaison, the event was invaluable.

“It pushed me to find an accountant, to take myself seriously,” she said. “All I needed was some inspiration.”