Women and careers

Women have careers - images immediately spring to mind, terms such as career woman and ravenous mother. The fact that female careers can be very different, that careers are not just about advancement in positions, but can also be a formative force, that children always play a role and that leadership skills can be learnt - we want to understand all this and more by career, whether in academia or outside of research.

The Viadrina therefore supports women who are embarking on an academic career as well as women who aspire to a management position in administration. Women should be represented at all levels and in all areas and be treated fairly.

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A good third of professorships at Viadrina are held by women (35.7%, 2023). This varies from faculty to faculty: while parity (46.7%) has almost been achieved in the Faculty of Social and Cultural Sciences, women make up just under a third (32.1%) of professors in the Faculty of Law and a good quarter (26.3%) in the Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.

By 2028, Viadrina has set itself the goal of increasing the overall proportion of women to 40.7% and recruiting women in law and economics in particular.

Central to this are the gender equality-oriented appointment procedures, which are supported by the Gender Equality Officers. They inform and advise chairs and committee members, support the active recruitment of women and ensure compliance with standards, e.g. by using the Brandenburg-wide checklist.

The Viadrina continues to successfully participate in the federal and state government's programme for female professors. After three Professorships (one per Faculty) were funded in the second phase of the programme, a W3 Professorship for Cultural Philosophy/Philosophy of Cultures is currently being funded.

Viadrina is currently able to implement and fund the following measures to promote gender equality through the programme:

Start-up scholarships for female doctoral candidates in the Faculty of Social and Cultural Sciences
Co-financing of Viadrina Mentoring and the Family Office

In August 2024, Viadrina once again applied for the Women Professors Programme 2030 with its Equal Opportunities Concept.

More information on the Professorinnenprogramm can be found here.

Women are often perceived as less innovative, assertive or committed in selection interviews, whether in an appointment committee or when being selected for an administrative position, and their potential is generally considered to be lower. Prejudices and distorted perceptions as well as unconscious behavioural patterns still play a role here.

Further aspects of the different realities of applicants' lives are given even less consideration in selection procedures, e.g. of trans*, inter* and non-binary people or people who experience racism.

The Viadrina has therefore set itself the goal of analysing and rethinking selection procedures in order to identify unconscious patterns of behaviour and reduce unequal assessment. The following measures are intended to contribute to this:

Clear rules for advertising and recruitment procedures
Professionalisation of active recruitment (longer-term planning)
Further education and sensitisation of commission members (building gender and diversity competence)
Structured onboarding

The compatibility of care work and study or work is an issue that concerns many Viadrina parents and continues to affect women more than men.

This is where the Family Affairs Officer advises and supports all Viadrina members.

For female academics, the Network Motherhood and Science offers support, further education and networking.

The Viadrina supports women, trans*, inter* and non-binary people on their individual career paths through further education and coaching. Examples include Viadrina Mentoring and the Women in Leadership training programme (video below).

Women in leadership

With its equal opportunities policy, Viadrina is pursuing the goal of stabilising and increasing the proportion of women in management positions. The "Women in Leadership" training programme enabled a total of 12 women to gain further qualifications in 2022/23.

The programme was specially designed for Viadrina to provide dynamic, sustainable and professional support for women's own professional development. Both women with leadership experience and women interested in leadership from all areas of the Viadrina (science, science management and administration) were able to participate.

In a one-year, modular programme, the participants dealt with leadership images and roles, leadership skills and design options. Key topics such as communication as a leadership task, diversity, shared leadership and presence, together with two accompanying career coaching sessions, rounded off the training programme.

What makes the programme so successful and how the participants experienced it can be seen here in our short documentary video.