Encouraging women to become entrepreneurs was a central theme of the second annual Badger Startup Summit, held Tuesday at the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery.

The first three sessions saw keynote speaker Erica Gruen, a principal at media consulting firm Quantum Media and former Food Network executive, as well as Heather Wentler and Amy Gannon of the Doyenne Group and a women’s business panel discuss their experiences and provide a state of affairs.

For example, Gruen cited a study that showed women currently own 9.1 million businesses that generate $1.4 trillion yearly; however, they only employ 4.2 percent of the workforce.

“It’s not just starting the business but providing support to grow the enterprise (that’s important),” Gruen said.

Gruen added that attitudes into action, constraints in moving across phases, going it alone, setting targets and access to finance are “holding women back.”

That’s why the Doyenne Group aims to “tell the stories, build the network and partnerships, develop the entrepreneurs and fund the ventures.”

“We want to make sure women are there (at the networking events), women are connected and women are engaged,” Wentler said.

A panel comprised of Natasha Vora of Iristocracy, Laurie Benson of LSB Unlimited and Tera Johnson of Tera’s Whey echoed earlier sentiments and shared their own advice.

“Right now is a great time to be a woman entrepreneur,” Benson said. “The number one barrier for women is their own perception.”