The Entrepreneurial Puzzle: Explaining the Gender Gap

Career Advancement Through Academic Commercialization: Acknowledging and Reducing Barriers for Women Engineering Faculty

“…15,[50][51][52][53] Unfortunately, in relation to commercialization, this disparity puts women at a disadvantage with venture capitalists who tend to select scientists of high stature, with high productivity, for investment and/or to sit on scientific advisory boards. 4 Interestingly, there are also positive findings, which are seldom heard in reference to women engineering and science faculty. In addition to showing that external factors influence productivity, Colyvas et al 50 found that women's inventions secured licenses to firms at the same rate as men's inventions.…”

“…15,31 Furthermore, women disproportionately sit on Scientific Advisory Boards (8.5% of members are women), found companies (12% of founders are women), or work as venture capitalists (10% are women) compared to men. 4,28,[33][34][35] The Approach…”

“…This specifically occurs when women with the same qualifications and accomplishments as their male counterparts are treated differently, in a negative way, based solely on gender. 4 In one study, exploring the careers of high achieving men (N = 361) and women (N = 99) in science, 73% of the women interviewees reported experiencing gender discrimination. 13 These rates are expected to be similar in engineering in particular as women in male dominated workplaces experience more discrimination than those is female dominated situations.…”

“…57,58 Stephan & ElGanainy hypothesize that this explanation could be playing a part in women faculty's decision to engage (or not) in commercialization. 4 Furthermore, Rosa & Dawson interviewed female founders of spinout companies from 20 universities in the UK to assess differences in behavior. 28 The findings explained, "Just when the financial and status rewards of years of academic research are about to be realized, it can be a major decision to dilute this competitive specialization with commercialization… the fact that women have to struggle harder to establish a career and move up the promotion ladder makes this even more important for female academics."…”

“…[1][2][3][4][5][6][7] As research has shown that inventions by women are frequently designed to address important social problems, addressing the gap in engagement in academic commercialization activities has growing societal relevance. 2,8 This gender gap can largely be explained by the significant obstacles that women faculty in engineering face as they advance their careers and as they engage in academic commercialization.…”