Annoying masculine legal-ese

I’ve been waiting for the new Australian financial year to begin on 1 July before I incorporate the business. I did this to avoid time-consuming tax paperwork when I haven’t sold anything yet. So, with July now only two days away, today I worked on the company’s constitution (the company rules).

The easier way of doing this would have been to pay for an online package like with Legal Zoom or Clear Docs. I’ve had a company before, and I used a similar service then. However, because this is a social enterprise, I needed to add some additional clauses which aren’t standard, but lawyers are obviously expensive.

Since I already had a Constitution from the previous company, I decided to use that as a template. What I didn’t realise was how annoyingly masculine that document was. So, of course I had to change it. Example below:

I cringed every time I read the word, “he.” I ended up using the more neutral, “they” as a wrote the new constitution, but I was seriously tempted to use “she” just to watch a new male director cringe the way that I did. In fact, I may still do that just for fun! 😉

When women in business make us all look bad

Went to a women’s “green” conference in Sydney over the weekend. I was hoping to see what other products were being made that were good for the environment. Unfortunately, it was really hard to see anything with the large crowd and the way the booths were set up. I tried to buy something at one booth, but found they couldn’t break a $50, nor did they have EFTPOS options. They told me to come back later and maybe they could make change. It’s a wonder that they’re even in business.

Women entrepreneurs networking

Attended a women’s entrepreneur networking lunch. There were so many interesting women doing amazing things. One trait that seemed interesting to me – most of their businesses were purpose-driven even if not set up as a social enterprise.