Prime Highlights
- Women own nearly half of all businesses in Hawaiʻi, one of the highest female ownership rates in the United States.
- Mana Up co-founder Meli James described leadership as the ability to act, build, and be accountable, not a title earned over time.
Key Facts
- Mana Up is a Hawaiʻi-based business accelerator founded in 2017 that supports locally made products and has guided over 100 companies through its programme.
- A McKinsey and Company report found that women hold just 29% of C-suite roles at U.S. companies, a share that has remained flat in recent years.
Background
Women continue to hold a minority of top corporate roles across the United States, but in Hawaiʻi, many are finding a different path to leadership by building their own businesses.
A McKinsey and Company report found that women hold just 29% of C-suite positions at U.S. companies, a figure that has shown no improvement in recent years. With corporate advancement remaining slow, women in Hawaiʻi are increasingly stepping outside traditional workplace structures.
According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, women own nearly half of all businesses in Hawaiʻi, one of the highest female ownership rates in the country. Most of these businesses are small and run without additional employees, but they represent a growing leadership pipeline built through entrepreneurship rather than corporate promotion.
Meli James is one such entrepreneur. After deciding that the corporate route was not the right fit, she co-founded her first company in Silicon Valley before returning to Hawaiʻi. She described leadership not as a title earned over time, but as the ability to act, build, and remain accountable.
Nine years ago, James and partner Brittany Heyd launched Mana Up, a business accelerator focused on Hawaiʻi-made products. James said she noticed that women in Hawaiʻi shared strong ambitions but lacked key resources, particularly access to capital and experienced mentors who had successfully scaled businesses. Mana Up was founded to bridge those gaps. Since its launch in 2017, over 100 companies have completed the programme, with many of them being women-owned businesses.
