Dr. Michal Tsur, Co-founder and Co-CEO of Remepy, a company that is developing hybrid drugs, which contain a therapeutic software component, and Dr. Iris Dallal Shwartz, product manager at Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), discussed trends and challenges in innovation at the Jerusalem Post Women Leaders Summit at the Google for Startups Campus in Tel Aviv on Wednesday evening.
Shwartz, who earned her doctorate through IAI, said that students need to have the drive to succeed and should find mentors both in the academic and industrial spheres. “An academic mentor is a professor who will guide you correctly and lead you on the proper path. I had the privilege to have mentors who really invested in me. They called me to their office at six in the morning and tutored me. I invested time and effort, and they opened doors for me and really believed in me.”
She added that managers at Israel Aerospace Industries encourage company engineers in their work and try to eliminate any barriers that may present themselves in their work so that they can reach meaningful accomplishments in their work at the company.
Tsur said that tech needs to be marketed and presented properly to women in order to increase their numbers in the field. “Being women, we like to solve big problems, and frequently, tech is not marketed well enough as a vehicle for achieving massive global audiences for solving problems faster and better. A lot is about how you package tech so that it is appealing to women. I think that’s part of the solution to advancing women in tech.”
Learn more about The Jerusalem Post's Women Leaders Summit.