Social Media as a New Opportunity for Female Entrepreneurs: An Analysis of the Fashion Industry

Abstract

This paper aims at analysing new entrepreneurial organization models resulting from the integration of female and male elements and at finding a valid facilitator instrument for the sharing of values and objectives in the use of new technologies and communication, such as social media. On the basis of the theoretical framework of the androgynous organization, the study concentrates on the field of fashion that, in the last few years, has experimented new forms of female business connected with the creation of new markets deriving from development of the Web 2.0. The main objective of the paper is to provide greater comprehension of the role of new technologies and in particular of the social media in the development of female entrepreneurial activities, thanks to greater visibility of these new businesses, with the phenomenon of the fashion influencer at the base. The methodology of the study is based on a qualitative analysis related to the elaboration and application of the theoretical framework of the androgynous organization (Granelli and Robotti in Il valore premiante delle diversità, Harvard Business Review Italia, StrategiQs, Milano, 2016), in the case study by the fashion influencer Chiara Ferragni, at the first place in the Forbes’ Top Influencers list 2017. Through an analysis of a case study in the field of the fashion industry, an attempt has been made to illustrate the characteristics of organizations that are handling technological change in the best possible way, from the point of view of gender questions. The study carried out identifies a model that allows organisations to be much more generative and, in particular, to identify the specific characteristics of women that companies must introduce in order to become more generative. The archetypes identified are essentially hospitality, fertility and generativity, consistency, intimacy and practicality.