karlawithakey

Jumping in when clarity, speed and results are essential

Work

Product PersonKarla Schönicke is an award-winning product management professional with 12 years of working experience in the dynamic Berlin startup scene. She has a strong customer focus combined with an agile mindset and advanced technical understanding. Additionally, she's an excellent communicator fluent in English, German and Spanish, and a design thinker focused on building the smallest usable unit that provides new learnings.Her cross-functional teams appreciate her human-centered approach to leadership and especially value her context-setting skill for improved collaboration. Colleagues and managers alike are impressed by her ability to think on her feet, quickly switch between the macro and micro level of issues, and always provide new inspiration and perspectives. At the same time, she tracks relevant success metrics, deducts action items from usage data, and keeps an eye on the bottom line.

Venture Scout & Angel InvestorIn 2020, just 1% of Venture Capital in the CEE region went to female-led startups and 5% to mixed teams. This means a whopping 94% went to all-male founder teams. Learning about this shocking imbalance, Karla decided that instead of becoming a founder herself, she needed to get to the root of the problem and become an (angel) investor with her personal investment thesis being overlooked tech founders in Europe.
And so the journey began: In summer 2021, she was selected for the investor track in #createF - The Female Founder Show and also became part of the female business angel networks evangelistas and encourageventures.
Together with Svenja Lassen, the founder of the Female Investors Network, they launched the first Female Business Angel Academy in DACH #FINacademy - a 6-week online program to get women started with angel investments. In 2023, they both won the #FemaleFinanceAward by FOCUS MONEY in the category startup with their academy, which launches its 6th cohort in April 2024. So far more than 160 women already graduated.
As of June 2022, Karla joined Ananda Impact Ventures as a Venture Scout for their 4th Core Impact Fund of 108 million EUR and in that role, she is looking for ambitious European founders with grit and impactful ideas.

Tech Startup AdvisorDuring her time working in different roles at startups in several stages, Karla gained tremendous insight into both building and also scaling tech companies plus all the challenges that come with that.
In her role as a startup advisor, Karla serves as a sparring partner to tech founders for their most pressing issues - be it creating the storyline for the pitch deck, hiring, searching for investors, or validation/prototyping for product-market fit.
In the past, Karla shared her knowledge with: Up2B Accelerator, Grace Accelerator, REAKTOR.BERLIN, SIBB Deep Tech Accelerator, HPI School of Entrepreneurship.You are looking for an experienced operator on your board or to work with you through the pains of scaling? Get in touch!

• LinkedIn
• Xing
• Malt

About

Karla strongly believes that technology should benefit people and advance us, so we can focus on what makes us human.
Currently, a lack of diversity in tech/founder/investor teams produces non-inclusive products, algorithmic bias, a 4.4 trillion dollar funding gap, and exclusion in the workplace. This is causing further harm to already vulnerable groups in our society (i.e. LGBT+, BIPoC) and inhibiting true innovation, which is unacceptable.
Therefore, Karla is a vocal advocate for diversity, inclusion, equity and justice, at the intersection of the tech industry, VC firms and product development. You will frequently see these subjects covered in her social media and wherever she's on stage!

Karla is a passionate community builder and also keen on continuously acquiring new knowledge, growing professionally and personally. She is an adept speaker and enjoys interacting with audiences at conferences, meetups and panels, both nationally and internationally. Check her speaker profile.

• Instagram
• Twitter

Projects

With her entrepreneurial spirit, Karla founded and supports many initiatives that #changetheratio, meaning they get more women and minorities into tech, leadership, and entrepreneurship. Here is a selection:

Media

As a trailblazer and role model, Karla has published think pieces, given a number of interviews, and received several awards. For media inquiries please use the existing social media channels linked on this page.