Teaching companies how to interpret their data: Elisa’s work in healthcare
Technical high school, computer science background, and a mission: giving back all the value and know-how developed in-house.
She says she feels more like a computer expert than a businesswoman. But when it comes to the facts, her career path took her to helm of her company. “Perhaps it’s because I’m from Piedmont that I downplay my achievements”, she jokes. Elisa Ervas is 48 and has been a partner at Innovo, an agency that helps healthcare companies interpret their data, since 2019.
Right from the start, her life has been full of challenges. “I studied at a technical high school when these schools didn’t even have toilets for girls. I was one of the very few girls there”. It was difficult but worth it: “I chose this high school because it was innovative and challenging”. It was her passion for computer science that cleared up any doubts: “I’ve always seen it as a way of making people’s lives easier”. Although it has been a long time since then, the statistics still show that few girls decide to enroll in these schools. “I think it’s all about expectations and role models: until someone starts rethinking these, some study choices may continue to seem strange”. At the end, it all boils down to choosing to do whatever you want, “and everything becomes possible, even the things that you thought you wouldn’t be able to do”.
After a number of jobs and courses, she has now put her heart and soul into growing her company. The goal is to “help healthcare managers interpret and communicate their data in the most effective way”. It may seem strange but the most difficult part often comes right at the beginning: “We have to make companies aware that data contains valuable information they can use to make well-pondered decisions” But it is not just that. “Data is fundamental for quick, effective planning and monitoring”. Elisa plans to focus even more on “building added value for the community” by trying to obtain B Corp (Benefit Corporation) international certification which is issued to companies for their social performance.
Every career comes up against obstacles. Sometimes we are our own biggest obstacle “because we are afraid that we will not be able to tackle new situations”. And then we realize that, most of the time we are perfectly able to. “I discovered this through the Women Will project which the SheTech association suggested”. Elisa attended a workshop on work management and extra workloads, which she claims to be an expert in: “I find I’m always wanting to take on too much, saying yes to more things than I can handle”. Talking with other people made her realize that she is certainly not the only one who sometimes comes up against problems: “This can happen to everybody, but you can learn how to reduce these moments”.
Elis owes this to the Women Will project, which also helped her to organize her family life. As the mother of two girls aged 14 and 18, she has had to find a balance between her work and the time she spends with her family. Sometimes you need to be able to distinguish which “moments you cannot miss out on and then choose”. It’s not so much a gender issue – she maintains. “The fact is that families are not given any help”. If she thinks about her daughters’ future, she sees them as being free to choose: “Not just in this job or that”. Young people now are looking for offbeat career options. Her advice is to “weigh all the opportunities carefully but most of all to create them”. Without leaving your friends behind: “A network of friends is what keeps you going when things get tough”.