What can schools do to empower future women business leaders?

Schools can play a decisive role in creating opportunities for the next generation of business leaders. This is particularly relevant in the UAE, which ranked among the world’s top five for Entrepreneurship Education at School in 2025–2026.

Strong education can shape ambition, skills and confidence before gender stereotypes influence career choices. For young women, early exposure to leadership, financial literacy, technology and entrepreneurship can make the prospect of building an own business feel realistic rather than exceptional.

Students should feel free to explore careers, industries and entrepreneurial paths based on their interests and abilities, without gender shaping what they see as possible. This article examines how schools can help build that foundation, which skills and experiences matter most and how early education can support more young women in developing the confidence and capabilities to pursue leadership and entrepreneurship.

Challenge stereotypes early

Gender differences in entrepreneurship often take shape long before funding enters the picture, influenced by early expectations around leadership, risk-taking and technical ability.

Schools can challenge these expectations by presenting a wider range of role models. The images pupils encounter in lessons and career programmes matter. Seeing a female entrepreneur building a company, female founders raising capital or a co-founder solving problems in areas such as finance or health can make leadership more tangible. Examples of male entrepreneurs who support inclusive workplaces can reinforce the same message: leadership and innovation are not defined by gender.

Moreover, global perspective also helps. Entrepreneurial examples from the UAE, Asia, Africa and Latin America demonstrate how businesses respond to local demand, limited access to resources and wider societal challenges. Some ventures may improve essential services, create employment or address poverty, while others may focus on commercial opportunities.

The overall aim is to prevent a perceived glass ceiling from narrowing ambition before a career has even begun, while recognising that success still depends on several other factors.

Encourage participation in future-focused sectors

Careers are changing rapidly, with artificial intelligence, digital platforms and new technologies reshaping various industries and sectors.

GEM’s 2024/2025 research found that women were less than half as likely as men to be active in the ICT sector and were 11% less likely to recognise the potential benefits of AI for their businesses.

Schools can respond through coding programmes, innovation labs, enterprise competitions and projects that require pupils to create ideas, test a solution, assess market needs and present commercial plans.

Participation should extend beyond just being aware of the technology. Careers in wellness, consumer goods, financial services, healthcare, creative fields and other dynamic areas can all offer routes into leadership and entrepreneurship. The focus should remain on giving girls the knowledge and confidence to explore different options and choose the path that feels right for them.

Develop skills important for female entrepreneurs

Schools also have a major role in developing practical commercial skills. Pupils can learn basic concepts such as money management, pricing, risk, revenue, investment and sustainable growth through practical projects.

OECD research points to entrepreneurship training, mentoring, coaching and business advice as effective ways to build entrepreneurial skills. 

Student clubs and enterprise challenges can teach how to work with team members, search for information and make decisions when the answer is not obvious. Moreover, they can learn how companies are founded, why investors evaluate risk and how an idea develops into a viable commercial model.

Building a professional network is equally important. OECD research finds that entrepreneurial networks can improve access to finance, suppliers, partners and customers, while women entrepreneurs tend to have smaller and less developed professional networks than men.

Mentoring and networking at school can therefore provide useful support before a student enters professional life.

Prepare pupils for the realities of entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship should not be presented as an uncomplicated path. GEM found that one in ten women started a new business in 2024, compared with one in eight men. It also found that women were 47% more likely than men to close a business for personal or family reasons.

The finding highlights the importance of understanding how professional ambitions can interact with responsibilities to families. Schools cannot remove every structural barrier, but they can help pupils become more confident in evaluating risk, asking for assistance and adapting when circumstances change.

Access to finance remains another challenge. IFC research published in 2025 analysed more than 2,000 businesses financed by 170 private equity and venture capital funds across emerging markets. Only 13% of the capital went to women-owned, women-founded or women-led companies, and a funding gap remained even after accounting for factors such as company size, location, sector and type of equity financing.

Understanding how investment decisions are made can therefore be valuable for any future female entrepreneur. It can also help students recognise that securing finance requires more than a good concept: investors assess execution, commercial potential and the ability to generate sustainable results.

The UAE provides a strong foundation

The UAE offers a supportive environment for young people interested in entrepreneurship.The country ranked first for the fifth consecutive year in the National Entrepreneurship Context Index. Entrepreneurial education at school scored 5.4 and ranked third among the 27 upper-income economies assessed. 

Entrepreneurship education is also supported through government initiatives. The UAE Ministry of Economy and Tourism’s SkillUp Academy includes a K–12 entrepreneurship programme designed to introduce students to how businesses are created and operated. The wider academy also provides training, internships and other practical opportunities intended to develop entrepreneurial skills and experience.

Schools and government programmes can be strengthened further through exposure to people with direct business experience. Perspectives from entrepreneurs, investors and business leaders, such as Amira Sajwani, Co-Founder and CEO of AlphaHAS, can help students understand how commercial decisions are made, how ideas are evaluated and how businesses respond to changing customer needs.

Entrepreneurship has become an important part of economic development, making commercial awareness increasingly relevant even for students who eventually choose other career paths. Learning how to assess opportunities, solve problems, work with others and adapt to change can be useful across a wide range of professions.

For girls in particular, access to the same knowledge, networks and practical experiences can widen the range of careers and opportunities they feel able to pursue.
Stronger entrepreneurship education helps ensure that talent and ambition have room to develop regardless of gender.