Entrepreneurial Ecosystems’ Narratives and Women Entrepreneurs’ Identities:Women Can(’t) Have It All!”

Entrepreneurial ecosystems are often portrayed as meritocratic and gender-neutral spaces. However, such portrayals obscure gendered narratives and socio-cultural norms that continue to shape women’s entrepreneurial experiences. Drawing on role identity theory, this paper explores how gendered narratives persist in both a mature and an emerging ecosystem and how they intersect with women’s multiple role-based identities. Based on 39 interviews with women entrepreneurs and ecosystem enablers, we identify two dominant gendered narratives, Be a Good Girl! and Be One of the Guys!, that simultaneously grant conditional legitimacy and constrain women’s agency. These narratives are reinforced by socio-cultural boundaries of gender roles and actors’ perceptions of inequality in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. We show how women respond by blending, separating, or negotiating conflicts between their work and non-work role-based identities to sustain entrepreneurial participation. Our findings advance theory on gendered narratives, inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystems, and women’s entrepreneurial identity and offer practical insights for building more gender-intelligent and inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystems.