Goodbye gender gap – how the University of Bern’s Innovation Office supports young female entrepreneurs

Common denominator #

Bern, 8 March, 14:04: the lecture hall at “sitem – Swiss Institute for Translational and Entrepreneurial Medicine” is slowly filling up. One of the topics of today’s talk, “AI Med-Tech Founders”, is equal opportunities and the question of whether it is more difficult for women than for men to found a company in a STEM field. In my role for the UniBE Foundation, I am sitting in the audience today alongside researchers and entrepreneurs in the fields of medical technology and artificial intelligence. To explore the question of equal opportunities in entrepreneurship in a little more depth, I am hoping for an interview with Dr Stefanie Dobitz from the University of Bern’s Innovation Office, who deals with these questions, among others. There are already measures in place today that address the issue of equal opportunities: for example, the University of Bern’s Innovation Office has organised the event series “Women who start up”, which discusses possible obstacles and opportunities for women. In addition, diversity is consciously represented and there are role models who show what heterogeneous teams – and not only in terms of gender – look like and how they work. Furthermore, bodies such as the Institute for Equal Opportunities and FemSpin (see below for more information) have been created to make a difference.

Since its foundation in 2021, the UniBE Foundation has also been committed to equality and has made diversity, intercultural knowledge and promoting talent central concerns of its work. Diversity in particular is important because it provides the best conditions for solving complex challenges. In this way, the UniBE Foundation supports the University of Bern in implementing and shaping these key areas. The issue is also important to me: as a woman and a Master’s student in clinical psychology, the topic affects me personally, because I too would like to keep open the option of pursuing an academic career myself – ideally with intact chances of equal treatment

Interview with Dr Stefanie Dobitz #

UniBE Foundation: Dr Dobitz, what does your work as Innovation & Startup Advisor Health and Medicine involve? #

The idea behind the Innovation Office is to support students and researchers at the University of Bern and the Inselspital who conduct translational research and plan to turn their research into a start-up. In my area, health and medicine, everything revolves around future patients and the development of new medicines and diagnostic tests. Specifically: how are patients currently cared for, and how can they be cared for better in the future?

What attracted you to this work? #

I previously worked in sales at a contract manufacturer, where I was able to support customers who were developing future medicines and diagnostic tests. The exciting thing was being involved in these projects so early on and knowing what would be possible for patients in 5 or 10 years. And exactly the same thing fascinates me at the Innovation Office: understanding what research can do for people in everyday life. The second point is that you can watch people grow. I have now been at the University of Bern for about a year, and there are projects that I have accompanied since then. I find it great to see how these people have grown as personalities, even if the start-up might not work out as planned afterwards. That is also what I tell everyone: take it as an experience, no matter how well it works out afterwards.

In your view, what are the biggest challenges for young female researchers? #

Part of it probably has to do with role models, i.e. whether there are female role models. In addition, there are fundamental questions such as whether we even have the same number of male and female students in a degree programme. This question ultimately led us to ask ourselves what we, as the Innovation Office, can do in concrete terms.

With the event series “Women who start up”, we want to offer women a space to develop further and to form an inspiring group whose members support one another.

In your opinion, how can the gender gap in academic careers be explained? #

That is a very good question – and a very personal one for me: I studied chemistry and was always in the gender minority. To be honest, I never gave it much thought. But when some of my female colleagues became pregnant, I noticed that in the natural sciences this can lead to a temporary absence from the laboratory because of workplace regulations. The growing number of part-time positions in companies and academia certainly helps to improve the compatibility of family and career, though. In this context, there is also FemSpin, a project that tries to find out how we can support women in academia.

How realistic is it to be a part-time researcher or entrepreneur? #

It is crucial to create a good, supportive environment for yourself. There are certainly
still people today who are convinced that researchers or entrepreneurs have to work full-time. Personally, I believe you can do everything part-time. And I know a great many colleagues who work part-time but give 200% for the company while they are there.

What can the University of Bern’s Innovation Office do in concrete terms to support young female researchers and entrepreneurs in their work? #

The event series “Women who start up” was a really good starting point for us to get a feel for what people need and want in this process. We took this feedback on board and designed the second edition of the series, which starts in the autumn, accordingly. When it comes to role models, we at the Innovation Office are quite unintentionally setting an example: my colleague Elsa is a physicist, Jennifer is a business economist, Sara is a psychology student and our research assistant, and I myself am a chemist. So female empowerment is taking place at the Innovation Office. And we also put ourselves out there again and again, attend events and give talks. It is about living this role-model function and not just talking about it.

What successes can you already look back on? #

As the Innovation Office team, we have grown together well. We all had different backgrounds and ideas about how an Innovation Office at a university works. Together, over the course of 2022, we then developed our vision: A thriving ecosystem shaping our society of tomorrow – I am personally very proud of that. Since our own founding, we have been able to accompany many projects at the University of Bern and the Inselspital; three companies were founded (2021), and funding from BRIDGE and Innosuisse was successfully obtained. We have also awarded the first round of UniBE Venture Fellowships, actively supporting four projects with CHF 100,000 each and with our know-how. In the area of promoting women, we received a great deal of positive feedback for the “Women who start up” series. Everyone who attended felt that their needs were really addressed. We are therefore looking forward to the start of the second edition in September 2023.