Women are under-represented in entrepreneurship through acquisition (ETA) – and it's not because they lack the skills. Stefania D'Andrea, Operating Partner at All Interests Aligned, has a clear diagnosis of the problem – and a clear prescription for fixing it.
Watch her video on this page, and you'll hear someone who has spent more than two decades navigating complex organisations, leading transformations, and managing P&L responsibility across large and mid-sized companies. She knows exactly what it takes to run a business. She also brings a frank, first-hand perspective on why the MBI landscape still skews so heavily male – and why that needs to change.
Stefania D'Andrea joined All Interests Aligned as its first female operating partner in March 2025. She brings over 20 years of experience in the cosmetics industry, where she built a career by actually running things – shaping strategy, leading teams through transformation, and taking ownership of long-term value creation.
ETA wasn't a sudden pivot for Stefania. It was, in her words, "a very natural evolution" of everything she had already been doing. She had always been motivated by leading a business, not just managing within one. When she discovered the concept of entrepreneurship through acquisition, it gave a name and a structure to something she had already been looking for: a path to becoming a CEO through acquisition, rather than starting from scratch. What drew her in was the combination of entrepreneurial ambition, operational leadership, and disciplined investment logic. It was, she says, the natural next step – one where all her experience could be applied with full ownership and accountability.
Stefania is honest about the challenges women face. She doesn't sugarcoat what women are up against. She identifies challenges that are both structural and psychological – and she argues that both need to be tackled head-on.
Access to capital is still a barrier. The finance industry continues to be dominated by men, often placing a greater burden of proof on women compared to their male counterparts. The industry is improving, but it is not yet fully welcoming.
The credibility gap is real. Even when women are fully qualified, they often have to work harder to be taken seriously in conversations with investors and sellers. The room still defaults to a certain kind of profile – and that profile is usually male.
Self-doubt does more damage than most people admit. This is the challenge Stefania returns to most forcefully. Women, she observes, tend to wait until they feel 100% ready before stepping forward. Men, by contrast, tend to move ahead when they feel 60 or 70% ready. That gap translates directly into delayed decisions, missed opportunities, and careers that stall before they need to.
Fear of failure and fear of judgement slow women down. Add to that a tendency to underestimate transferable skills – operational experience, relationship-building, strategic thinking – and it's easy to see why talented women talk themselves out of a leap they are more than capable of making.
"In ETA, confidence is as important as competence – and women already have much more competence than they usually give themselves credit for."
– Stefania D'Andrea, Operating Partner, All Interests Aligned
Women take calculated risk – not less risk. Stefania is emphatic on this point. Women are not more risk-averse; they're more thorough. They analyse scenarios more deeply, build stronger risk mitigation strategies, and consider downside protections more carefully. The result is more sustainable, resilient decision-making. That's not a weakness in an MBI context. That's a competitive advantage.
Stefania's prescription for change is practical, not abstract. She points to four things that could genuinely move the dial for women in ETA.
AIA's MBI Program is designed for experienced operators who are ready to enter business ownership. If Stefania's story resonates, find out more about how AIA supports women – and all aspiring operators – on the path to becoming a CEO through acquisition.
