Celebrating Dr. Sarah Glova: Entrepreneurship Mindset Champion at Meredith College

This Saturday, March 1st, Meredith College will welcome Dr. Sarah Glova as a keynote speaker for our Entrepreneurship Challenge. As we prepare for this exciting event bringing together over 40 students from across campus, I had the opportunity to sit down with Sarah to learn more about her journey and the wisdom she'll be sharing with our future women business leaders.

"I know so many entrepreneurs who are really successful by sharing the kinds of things that they're interested in, growing and building community, and then offering multiple products—whether it's a woman who has a coaching business, has a consulting business, does speaking and has books, or somebody who has a product, has a SaaS solution, but also does consulting."

-Dr. Sarah Glova

Embracing Authenticity in Entrepreneurship

When I asked Sarah what drives her passion for supporting women entrepreneurs, her answer was refreshingly candid.

"When I started in entrepreneurship, I made the mistake of thinking I had to be different," Sarah shared. "It was the early 2000s. I was trying to be the 'girl boss' that we were seeing on TV, trying to embrace that pencil skirt mindset—and there's nothing wrong with a pencil skirt! But I was putting one on because I thought that's what I needed versus what felt like me."

Sarah explained that it took years to realize she could be herself and be a successful entrepreneur simultaneously. "I didn't have to shift my personality, change how I spoke, change the things I was interested in, or change the tone of my voice. Now, if you meet me as a friend versus if you see me in a business meeting, we talk about different topics, but I'm really the same person."

This authenticity extends to all aspects of her life. "I'm unabashedly a Taylor Swift fan, and I just love how much I love Taylor Swift. I'm a huge book nerd, but I don't hide my Goodreads account in embarrassment because a lot of the books I enjoy are about dragons and not the latest business bestseller."

An Entrepreneur Born from Necessity

Unlike the stereotypical entrepreneurial origin story we often hear, Sarah's path wasn't driven by a lifelong ambition to start a business.

"When I was in grad school, they paid me a few hundred dollars outside of my scholarship but told me that I couldn't have another job, and the money wasn't good enough to also live," she explained. "So I had to do things on the side. It very much came from need."

This need-based beginning aligns with research Sarah has studied about gender differences in entrepreneurship motivation. "When you profile men, a lot of times it's things like, 'I've always been interested in entrepreneurship' or 'I care a lot about solving this problem with the solution I've created.' But when you look at women, it's often need—and not just financial needs, but the need for independence, the need for a flexible schedule, the need to escape some kind of work system that doesn't work for them."

Sarah was so uncomfortable with the title "entrepreneur" that when filling out her LLC paperwork, she couldn't bring herself to write "founder" or "CEO." Instead, she put "president" because she'd been president of her college's lacrosse club. "I felt more comfortable with that," she laughed.

Beyond the Single-Lane Business Model

What Sarah wishes more people would ask her about? The evolution of business models for entrepreneurs today.

"If you talked about entrepreneurship a few decades ago, there was always this focus on 'go niche or go home.' It was very much 'you have to drive your product, your service, the problem that you solve, and then you just have to hammer that and find your niche audience.'"

Sarah believes today's entrepreneurs have more options. "We're not holding things back by publishers or the media being who gets to decide where attention goes. We have micro-influencers. We have platforms that we can grow and leverage on our own without those big media groups controlling the narrative."

This accessibility has created new possibilities for business growth. "I know so many entrepreneurs who are really successful by sharing the kinds of things that they're interested in, growing and building community, and then offering multiple products—whether it's a woman who has a coaching business, has a consulting business, does speaking and has books, or somebody who has a product, has a SaaS solution, but also does consulting."

Sharing Stories, Creating Possibilities

For the Meredith College Entrepreneurship Challenge, Sarah plans to focus on how an entrepreneurial mindset can transform anyone's career journey, whether or not they intend to start a business.

"I want to pull some real examples from my life where it's been really life-changing to have that entrepreneurial mindset," she explained. "I want to focus on the experiences that I've had that are centered in a female experience—not just the time that a job I was hoping for didn't come through, but what that looked like as a mom and a wife trying to figure out an exception, how having an entrepreneurial mindset in that moment was the biggest difference-maker for how I ended up with the career that I have."

Looking Forward to Saturday

As we prepare to welcome Sarah to campus, I'm struck by how her story embodies exactly what we hope to instill in our students: the courage to create your own path, the wisdom to leverage your unique strengths, and the resilience to transform challenges into opportunities.

Dr. Sarah Glova's keynote promises to inspire our students to develop an entrepreneurial mindset that will serve them throughout their careers and lives. We're honored to have her join us for this special event that celebrates women's innovation, creativity, and leadership.

Dr. Sarah Glova is a researcher, writer, and speaker focused on how people achieve really big things. She is the founder of Reify Media, a tech company supporting elearning and professional development. Her recent TEDx talk, "How to achieve your goals with a single page," has garnered over 200,000 views. Sarah is an inductee in the North Carolina Women Business Owners Hall of Fame and continues to advocate for and amplify the legacies and impact of women entrepreneurs.