What is sponsorship?

Sponsorship is an action or a process in which someone, generally though not exclusively with more influence and power than the person they are sponsoring, facilitates an opportunity for an individual that might lead to career benefits including, but not limited to, accomplishments required for academic rank promotion and that can be documented on a CV.¹

Women make up the majority of the healthcare workforce in the United States (US) and many other countries. This means that the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of disease as well as the care of patients largely falls on the shoulders of women. Women also comprise a large proportion of researchers; thus, the advancement of science is dependent upon them. Despite society’s reliance on the intellect, care, and compassion of women in medicine, they are often not valued, respected, and treated equally with men. The Sponsor Her campaign aims to highlight the urgent need to sponsor women in medicine. Valuing women in medicine has a net positive effect on the health of all.

Every year, the Harvard Medical School course Career Advancement and Leadership Skills for Women in Healthcare³ launches a new strategic initiative aimed at supporting women in healthcare. Once again, the American Medical Women's Association (AMWA) and the Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine® (ELAM) and Executive Leadership in Health Care (ELH) programs ⁴ are partnering in this campaign. This year's Sponsor Her campaign is a call to action to sponsor women in medicine.

Sponsorship Party: An event, in person or virtual, in which participants present prepared sponsorship “asks” and the guests actively focus on supporting the asks by using their power and influence.

Spentorship: The act of sponsoring someone and then mentoring them through the process to build their confidence and success.

When a physician leaves an institution, the loss of clinical revenue, recruitment fees, and other costs are significant—reported to range from $270K-960K.⁷ Example uses $500K.