Martina Tararuj: Building the Future of Women's Leadership

Martina Tararuj is the Founder of Imperfect CEO, a premium community and technology platform connecting experienced women leaders and entrepreneurs across Europe.

What started as a series of intimate dinner conversations has grown into an international community of more than 1,200 members across London, Warsaw, and Zagreb. Today, Imperfect CEO is evolving into an AI-powered platform designed to help women build meaningful relationships, discover opportunities, and accelerate their professional growth.

After more than fifteen years working across the startup ecosystem, Tararuj has become convinced that one of the biggest opportunities of the coming decade lies in the Women's Economy.

"Women already control around 80% of household spending, yet we're still largely ignored. From an investor's perspective, that made me realize the Women's Economy is one of the biggest opportunities of the next decade," Tararuj says.

Recognizing the Next Big Opportunity

Originally trained in architecture at The Glasgow School of Art, Tararuj began her career in the UK before moving into the startup ecosystem.

Over the next fifteen years, she worked with more than 200 startups as a mentor, operator, investor, and founder. The experience shaped what she now describes as her "Architect's Vision": identifying patterns across hundreds of founder journeys to understand what actually predicts long-term success.

One pattern, in particular, kept repeating itself.

Women were building more companies, taking on more leadership roles, and driving a growing share of global economic activity. Yet industries built around women's needs, from healthcare to entrepreneurship, continued to receive only a fraction of the attention and capital they deserved.

"I kept asking myself where the next major opportunity would be. The more I looked at women's health and the broader Women's Economy, the more convinced I became that this wasn't a niche—it was one of the biggest markets that was only just beginning to emerge," she says.

The conviction would soon be reinforced in an unexpected way. It began with a dinner.

Building Imperfect CEO

While travelling frequently between London and Warsaw, Tararuj found it increasingly difficult to make time for one-on-one meetings with everyone she wanted to stay in touch with.

Instead, she booked a table for dinner and invited a group of women she knew from different parts of her life. Most of them had never met before.

"Everyone came from a different industry, and the dinner turned out beautifully. Afterwards they asked, 'Will you be here next month? Book the table again.' And that's how it all started organically," she recalls. 

Those intimate dinners gradually evolved into Imperfect CEO, a community that today connects more than 1,200 female founders, executives, investors, and senior leaders.

Rethinking Networking

As Imperfect CEO grew, so did its events. What began as intimate dinner gatherings has since grown into a series of curated events across Europe. From the beginning, they were designed differently from traditional networking events.

Instead of hotel ballrooms or conference centres, events take place in boutique stores, design spaces and wellness venues. The aim is to take people out of their everyday routines and encourage more natural conversations.

Each gathering also includes dedicated networking sessions, giving participants time to build genuine connections instead of trying to network during short breaks between panel discussions.

The format reflects Tararuj's broader view of networking. She believes that many business events leave little opportunity for meaningful conversations, while few people are ever taught how to network effectively.

"There are barely any books about networking. People simply don't know how to do it. They come thinking, 'I have to do business today.' That's not how it works," she says.

For Tararuj, the strongest validation comes from the participants themselves. Around 40% return for future events, while the rest attend for the first time. 

Newcomers often tell her they feel comfortable engaging with others almost immediately, and women who regularly attend business networking events frequently comment that Imperfect CEO offers a much better experience.

From Community to Technology

As Imperfect CEO grew, Tararuj began thinking about how to make the community accessible beyond the cities where she could personally host events. Technology, she realised, could help build local networks before an event even took place.

Existing platforms, however, didn't solve the problem. In Tararuj's view, most networking apps are designed too broadly, while mixed-gender platforms often blur the line between professional networking and dating. She wanted something with a much narrower purpose.

"It has to do one thing: help women network, locally or globally," she says.

The idea is simple. A member travelling to a new city should be able to open the app and instantly discover a handful of relevant women to meet.

"I fly into Milan, I check in, and it suggests six brilliant women, managers and founders I could grab a coffee with," she says.

AI powers the matching behind those introductions. The platform combines location, professional background, and psychological profiling, including Gallup and Human Design, to recommend relevant connections.

Members can choose whether they want to meet someone with a similar profile, a complementary perspective, or a deliberately different one.

The app also serves as the community's hub, allowing members to browse upcoming events, register directly through the platform, and stay connected between in-person gatherings. 

Members also receive exclusive offers from partner businesses across the beauty, wellness, and lifestyle sectors.

Why the Women's Economy Matters

For Tararuj, Imperfect CEO is rooted in a broader belief that the Women's Economy remains one of the world's most overlooked growth opportunities.

"I looked at women's health five years ago and thought this would be one of the next big trends. Now we're starting to see that confirmed," she says.

The disconnect, she argues, is striking. Women make around 80% of household purchasing decisions and control the majority of consumer spending, yet businesses addressing their needs continue to receive only a fraction of available investment.

Menopause is, for her, one of the clearest examples.

"Every woman goes through menopause. That's 50% of the population. When investors tell me it's a niche, I just laugh," she says.

Tararuj believes part of the gap is structural. Decision-makers at investment funds are still predominantly men, making products built around women's experiences less familiar and often harder to evaluate. 

She also points to the lack of specialist investors: despite the size of the region, Central and Eastern Europe still has no dedicated femtech fund—a sign, she argues, of how overlooked the sector remains.

Building the Future of Women's Leadership

What Tararuj is building goes beyond a networking community. Her ambition is to create an ecosystem that supports women throughout their careers, from networking and education to leadership and access to capital.

The next step is expanding into major business hubs, with local chapters operating under a consistent global model. Alongside the app and events, she envisions educational programmes developed with universities, practical AI training for founders, and initiatives that help more women secure board positions.

Physical spaces also form part of the long-term plan. Tararuj believes Europe still lacks professional women's members' clubs of the kind that have become established in the United States. She hopes to help fill that gap.

"There's a gap, a huge gap, and I think this is the moment," she says. "You either wait, or you pull the capital together and try."