International Women’s Day is an opportunity not only to celebrate the achievements of women, but also to highlight the ongoing need to accelerate gender equality.
Although the number of women working in STEM has been increasing in recent years, men still make up a significantly larger proportion of the workforce. Challenges, including pay inequality and unconscious bias, continue to exist, preventing many women from achieving their potential and pursuing a career in STEM.
A lack of visible female role models is widely recognized as a key factor in perpetuating gender stereotypes and preventing a more inclusive culture for women. Increasing the visibility of women in STEM can help efforts to address some of these disparities and reduce the gender gap.
Technology Networks recently had the pleasure of interviewing an inspiring role model, Dr. Alice Schlichtiger, project lead LumiraDx at Roche. After completing a PhD in chemistry at the Technical University of Munich, Schlichtiger has built an impressive career, contributing to a range of successful product launches and market expansions, including the commercialization of automated mass spectrometry (MS) for clinical diagnostics.
In this interview, Schlichtiger discusses her journey from academia to industry and shares her advice on achieving a good work-life balance and building a successful career in science.
Anna MacDonald (AM):
How did your interest in science begin, and were there particular role models who inspired you to pursue this path?
Alice Schlichtiger, PhD (AS):
During school it quickly became evident that my talents lie in science. I’ve always enjoyed chemistry, physics, and maths, and discovered my interest in these subjects quite early on in my life.
But it wasn’t only school that had an impact. I’ve always been immersed in science thanks to my family. My grandparents were chemists, my mother is a physician, and my dad works as a computer scientist. I come from a very science-focused home, which had a big influence on my interest in this area, and inspired me to pursue a career in the field.
What motivated you to make the move from academia to industry in 2012, and how has it shaped your career?
After completing my dissertation, I led a research team which gave me the opportunity to collaborate with partners from industry. I really enjoyed the shift from the rather theoretical and foundational perspective in academia towards the more tangible product focus in the industry field.
Knowing that there’d be a result in the form of an actual product at the end of a working process has always driven and motivated me. This mindset strongly shaped my career, working towards a tangible goal like a product launch.
Compared to academia, where you’re in a rather homogeneous environment, I am dealing with a more varied set of stakeholders in industry, collecting lots of experiences in different settings. As a result, you get a broad perspective on topics instead of focusing more on specifics.
For example, I was working in the Clinical Chemistry department in the hospital before I started working in industry. This allowed me to get to know one field of our customers and helped me a lot throughout my whole career.
Being exposed to new and different settings on a frequent basis helps you to be open-minded towards new paths.
Academia taught me many things as well, such as being resilient and thinking creatively, especially when being confronted with backlashes.
What do you enjoy most about your work, and what achievements stand out as particularly meaningful to you so far?
I do enjoy the substance of my work a lot, working on exciting projects and creating innovation that makes an impact.
One success that stands out to me in particular is my development and growth as a people leader within the industry setting. This involves working and thinking strategically, setting up teams and working environments and facilitating peoples’ development. The latter definitely plays a big role in the course of my career and it is very meaningful to me.
What unique advantages does MS bring to the clinic compared with other diagnostic technologies? How do you see automation transforming mass spectrometry in clinical laboratories, both for patients and healthcare providers?
MS offers significant and unique advantages in the clinical setting compared to other diagnostic technologies, largely centred around its analytical performance. The integration of automation and standardization is seen as a major revolution that promises to expand these benefits across clinical laboratories for the benefit of both patients and healthcare providers.
MS stands out due to its superior analytical performance, making it the “gold standard” for measuring certain analytes in various clinical situations. It is set apart from other testing methods, particularly immunoassays, by its very high sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy.
Historically, MS has been hindered by high operational complexity, a need for highly skilled operators, and a lack of integration and standardization. Automation allows MS to be seamlessly integrated into the routine laboratory, rather than remaining confined to specialized labs.
This integration provides clear benefits such as increased accessibility and integration as well as workflow efficiency and speed. MS becomes accessible to more labs globally, particularly routine labs, without requiring dedicated MS expertise. Labs can manage increasing testing volumes faster, helping to reduce delays in diagnosis and treatment monitoring.
The transformation of mass spectrometry technology ultimately supports better patient care. Automated MS reduces the waiting time from sample collection to patient result, enabling faster diagnosis and intervention.
Increased access to the high sensitivity and specificity of MS means more patients receive accurate, precise, and standardized results, regardless of the facility’s location. This strengthens healthcare systems by helping to improve diagnostic quality and supporting informed clinical decisions.
Automation of mass spectrometry involves immense technical hurdles. What have been some of the biggest challenges, and how have you and your team addressed them?
Automation of mass spectrometry means losing a certain degree of flexibility when it comes to the requirements for the individual analytes. You need to find common ground to have a working solution, being able to measure all analytes on one device. This goal came with challenges that required us to think outside the box: We had to focus on ease of use on the one hand and technical robustness on the other hand, considering the conditions in a routine lab.
Following an approach aligned with In Vitro Diagnostic Regulation requirements was a crucial part of the process of making the automation happen and at the same time providing the required performance. The latter is essential to guarantee the added value of mass spectrometry analytics.
In your opinion, how important is fostering an inclusive and supportive culture in science, and what role has this played in your own journey?
It is immensely important. Not only in science but in all areas, a diverse set of opinions, skills, and mindsets is needed to have a comprehensive perspective and, based on that, make the right decisions. Still, in sciences as well as in leadership we’re not yet where we should be in terms of fostering an inclusive and supportive culture. There is still lots of room for improvement.
Looking back at my own career journey, it was not an easy path to take.
Speaking of my own experiences, role models are particularly important. Women need to see other women working in science, women with children, women in leadership positions, and so on. This shows how much is possible and encourages people to follow their own path.
It’s important that we rethink the current structures, many of which are excluding people from the start to pursue certain careers.
How do you strike a good work-life balance? What more can be done to help women to begin and build a career in science?
I believe that striking a good work-life balance is mostly connected to individual decisions about what is important and how priorities are set. These decisions then contribute to making life easier.
What helps me a lot is the flexibility I have when it comes to my working hours. I can decide how I organize my working time and am therefore able to prioritize family responsibilities like taking care of my children when planning my days. In my case, striking a good work-life balance is also easier because I enjoy my job a lot and mostly don’t perceive it as burdensome.
When it comes to helping women to begin and build a career in science, I believe that it should ideally start early on. In school for example, I remember the perceived stereotypes of boys being good at math and logical thinking and girls being good at languages and creativity.
This impacts children from an early age, telling them where their talents should be, not where they actually are. Therefore, we need to break through these attitudes early on, for example by ensuring visibility of women working in sciences.
If you could give one piece of advice to a woman who is considering a career in science, what would you say?
If you want to have a career in science, go for it and don’t let anyone talk you out of it. What definitely helps a lot is having a strong network and finding a mentor to support you.
From my experience, many women prioritize work responsibilities over their professional progress and development, by attending networking events for example. This needs to change as it is a fundamental part of a person’s career, and their ability to have an impact.