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This week on Papa PhD, I’m sharing my conversation with scientific writer and amazing human behind the Biomed Badass website – Vicky Sherwood.During our conversation, Vicky shared great advice based on her own career transition experience from academia into industry, but also on her experience helping other people make the jump.So, be sure to have pen and paper at hand for this one – there are a lot of gold nuggets in there you’ll want to remember!
VIDEO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uul2wj5kJfo?sub_confirmation=1Dr Victoria (Vicky) Sherwood is an Expert Scientific Writer at Novartis in Dublin, Ireland. Prior to transitioning to the pharmaceutical industry, Vicky was a Principle Investigator, running a skin cancer research lab at the University of Dundee, UK.In her current role at Novartis, Vicky writes medical communications that disseminate the results of clinical trials, real-world evidence, and clinical opinions to the medical and scientific community. Her work supports Novartis Oncology to effectively communicate clinical research findings from their pipeline and across brands.Vicky also supports STEM professionals secure meaningful work outside academia through her website: www.biomedbadass.com. She helps academic researchers understand the non-academic job market, identify careers that align with their values and skills, network productively, prepare applications that get noticed, and interview effectively for private sector jobs.
What you’ll learn about in this episode:
The pharma project/product life-cycle and the different places scientists fit within itNever feel stuck in a pharma position – there are a lot of opportunities and directions to pivot your career once you’re inThe importance of finding higher-ups that will champion you and your career development goalsWhy you should put yourself out there, socially and ask yourself “who should I be talking to next?”Defining 3 positive messages about your career goals and work-related interests and reinforcing them in your conversationsHow informational interviews can teach you the language that will make you shine in your next job interview”Job boards are just candidate magnets” – you need to follow a multi-channel approach to finding your jobDon’t forget your alumni network!
Thank you, Vicky Sherwood!
If you enjoyed this conversation with Vicky, let her know by clicking the link below and leaving her a message on Twitter:Send Vicky Sherwood a thank you message on Twitter!Click here to share your key take-away from this interview with David!
This episode’s resources:
Vicky Sherwood | TwitterVicky Sherwood | LinkedInBiomed Badass | Website
You might also like the following episodes:
David Giltner – Reconciling the Research and the Development MindsetMrim Boutla – The Pillars of Career Readiness for PhDsAlana Rister – Marketing Your Research Skills After Your PhDNatalia Bielczyk – Figuring Out Where You Fit in the Job Market as a PhDAs always, if you find value in Papa PhD and in the content I bring you every week, click on one of the buttons below and send some of that value back to me by becoming a supporter on Patreon or by buying me a coffee 🙂 Now with the added perk of receiving the brand new Papa PhD and PhD Dojo stickers!
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Hi this week on Papa PhD I’m sharing my conversation with scientific writer and amazing human behind the Biomat badass website Vicky Sherwood during our conversation Vicki shared great advice based on her own career transition experience from Academia into industry but also on her experience helping other people make the
Jump so be sure to have pen and paper at hand for this one there are a lot of gold nuggets in there you’ll want to remember I think you’ve got to try and be quite proactive and and you do need somebody who’s going to speak for you um
Be it a mentor or even a line manager somebody that you know is in a position to speak for you especially in an organization that’s as as large as a big farmer company um because it’s it’s very difficult to get lost in the the weeds
In a company that size are very easy to be pigeon holded as the writer in that therapeutic area or the R&D scientist working on those vaccines you know I think it’s if you want to diversify out of course if you want to stay specialist perfect because within industry you know
You can specialize and become that specialist and stay as that specialist that go-to person for that Information welcome to Papa PhD with David Mendes the podcast where we explore careers and life after grad school with guests who have walked the road last traveled and have unique stories to tell about how they made their place in a world of constantly evolving Rules get ready to go off the beaten path and hop on for an exciting new episode of Papa PhD welcome to this week’s episode of Papa a PhD this week I have with me Dr Victoria or as we know her on the on the social media Vicki Sherwood Vicki is an expert scientific writer at novaris in Dublin Ireland prior to transitioning to the pharmaceutical industry Vicki was a
Principal investigator running a skin cancer research lab at the University of Dundee in the UK in her current role at novaris Vicki writes medical Communications that minate the results of clinical trials real world evidence and clinical opinions to the medical and scientific Community her work supports novaris oncology to effectively communicate
Clinical research findings from their Pipeline and across Brands Vicki also supports stem professionals secure meaningful work outside Academia through her website www.bi biomed bass.com she helps academic researchers understand the non academic job market identify careers that align with their values and skills Network productively prepare applications that get noticed
And interview effectively for private sector jobs welcome to Papa PhD Vicki thanks so much David thanks for the introduction uh it’s it’s my pleasure and um that that’s you know all that I just said is uh you know is a lot of why I’m excited to have you here today but
But to begin maybe uh what would you what would be one thing you would add to this bio so that people who are watching and listening get to know who Vicki surewood is a little bit better okay can I just start with something not that interesting but a dis disclaimer really
That everything I said today is is is from my own opinion right not narst I’m not here to represent narst although I do I do work for them as you explained so for people to get to know me a bit better um H well I’m a bit of a I was a
Bit of a sports Enthusiast I I I used to play a lot of sports before I had kids um and I still try to get out and do outdoorsy stuff I like surfing I like hiking um I used to play I used to play football sorry soccer to most people and
I did that for years and years and years but I just don’t have time for these things anymore but so now I watch sports more play them so the healthy side of sports I guess sitting on yeah to live vicariously so I’m curious so surfing in in the UK yeah it’s not
Great okay but but there is there is there are spots okay okay there’s a few I mean and actually the surfing’s better in Winter which is a shame right because it’s it’s too cold and I like I like my water sports Frozen in the winter you
Know I like to SK and stuff like that so um yeah I’m not I’m not keen on going in the sea so so I tend to go out it’s not great in the summer um but yeah I mean it’s not Hawaii right so of course
Course no no I I I understand even even in Portugal where I come from the winter sea is it’s really freezing it’s it’s really hard you need to have really thick uh um how do you call it wet suit or something yeah but it but you have
Great you have great surfing there in some spots yeah there’s there’s some really great spots yeah for sure yeah cuz I know that because a lot of people that I I see surfing in Ireland they go to Portugal for holidays or or like surfing treats it’s it’s a popular
There’s a bunch of spots it’s true it’s true and in the summer is really Pleasant and the beaches are really nice too and the food and the people blah blah blah don’t get me going do you get to go back much or not uh not not too much but they like
Next year I’m supposed to go in the summer great yeah but uh it’s you know with we tried to get my parents to come we tried to share the load of coming and going not not easy during a pandemic and no no we had to stop completely and I I think it’s the
Reality for a lot of people who were abroad when it hit was that uh unless they could I don’t know uh even going by by land it must have been difficult for for people to just cross borders so yeah I mean I live in Ireland and I’m from
The UK and the flight is less than an hour and I felt like I might as well have gone and lived in New Zealand you know for as much as I didn’t go back for nearly two years that’s yeah that’s it yeah there was there was a trip my parents were supposed to
Come right when it hit and of course that was you know they couldn’t they had to to uh get to um cancel their tickets and there was until today there was no uh no possibility to to meet but next year next year fingers crossed fingers crossed yeah fingers
Crossed so today we are here to talk about something that might you know that a lot of people are curious about especially if they’re still at the lab in Academia which is Big Pharma which is what’s what does the life look like in
Big Pharma how how do I fit as a PhD or you know as or someone who went to grad school in big Pharma and uh and I know you you have experience there but also I’m sure you’ve had a lot of uh conversations about that and I know
You’ve helped people do that transition uh so so yeah I’m really really excited to have this this conversation because I’m sure for a lot of people in the in the bio the biomedical domain in the the life sciences it is one of the the doorways that you kind of see if you
Want to to leave Academia but that can leave you you know can be daunting a little bit there are huge organizations uh the culture you you know people don’t before experiencing it people don’t really know what it is so yeah I uh I’m really really looking
Forward to to talking about it yeah so it’s a oh well that’s a that’s a huge question David where do I start so working in big farm I mean it’s completely completely different to Academia but I mean farmer look to stem professionals particularly to help them
Do most of the work that they do right because it it’s Technology based um and if you think about a farmer product you know you go through that development phase that long leading phase before you get launched and then at the point of launch it goes through you know a life
Cycle of quick sales well I’m sorry growing sales and then eventually it will it will start to once it’s reached maturity then Peter off as you reach that patent cliff and um I think it’s it’s often quite common for scientists to think well the best place that they
Fit is obviously in that very early preclinic iCal development phase and I think traditionally that’s probably a bit how the farmer industry saw scientists as well that that was their place but I think it’s bring them to the lab so yeah bring your skills to the lab
Right and and that transition in some ways is easier because your skills are directly transferable to the lab right those technical skills um but actually I think as as things have progressed technology has increased um as patients want to know more about their disease we’re all living for longer we’re the
You know the global population is expanding people are living with chronic diseases and they want to understand what what is the best technology to help them manage their disease into late life they want you know good long life right with um you know they don’t want to be
Incapacitated for for the rest of it they want they want to have the best life they can have right and I think that general interest from the public has changed Healthcare and on top of that Healthcare is becoming more and more expensive and it’s becoming more difficult for payers insurance companies
Governments whoever’s funding the Health Care system to be able to access all those Technologies and a farmer works it operates in that Marketplace of healthcare and so all these challenges and things that the farmer company are facing they they they go into after the products have been launched right
Throughout the entire product life cycle and I think what a lot of scientists don’t appreciate is farmer needs scientists throughout that entire spectrum of a product life cycle to communicate to talk with doctors to there’s so much more than just the preclinical development and there’s of course all the clinical development as
Well so there is so much space within Pharma for people with stem training and I think that’s a message that you know is on us in Pharma to get that out so that people understand you know that we need them and we need their talents um and we need that message too to
Academia mhm this is really interesting to me because one of the things that I try to to tell people when they when they come to me is you are you’re not just a person who knows how to do a western blot how to pipet how to
Sequence people are you know a host of things people have you know passions people have uh Hobbies you know they like to do Sports uh they they uh there’s there’s they’re complete beings and uh as a young researcher different you know there’s a gamut of different skills that people have that are not
Related specifically to the technique uh that they’re using to the to the technology that they’re using but some are great speakers some are great at uh uh you know creating posters or actually have blogs on um on their research on their research domain uh and I think
More and more uh people and even even graduate schools are helping young researchers spread a little bit more into those domains of communication uh um well science yeah science communication Outreach sometimes and it feels to me that in that um in that life cycle that you said that you
Just mentioned if someone is really more te technique technology inclined they can fit in in more of a beginning part like you like you said which is kind of the natural natural thing you you think of immediately but someone who loves to write you know or even writes articles for let’s say a
Science journal or whatever there’s other places where the diff there there’s going to be different let’s say job descriptions where they will fit along that path of of the life cycle right you yourself are in the writing part of things right yeah yeah I’m in the communication so I work across the
Whole product life cycle depending on which brand or um you know before it’s even a brand right early in the in the pipeline I work just numbers and letters yeah exactly exactly so we work across that whole spectrum and and you’re absolutely right you know there are so many transferable skills that scientists
Bring that they learn you know during their studies in grad school um that the Pharma Pharma companies need and and it’s not just Communications because if we think about a product coming through that I talked about that life cycle of the product so you get through the clinical development phase you show that
Your product is effective it’s safe in a very predefined population right in your clinical trial in your phas through clinical trial and in that randomized control trial you’ll take that to the FDA and you’ll say look in in this population it works it’s safe we would
Like to now take it to the market and we would like to sell it to this these people under this indication and at that point if you get approval from the FDA you’re licensed to go and sell your drug and and so at that point it becomes
A brand right and it becomes on label a lot of things change but the FDA aren’t stupid they know that you are going to take this into a much larger population you know more genetically diverse in the clinical trial you’ve been asking people to come in with set criteria you know
How many drugs have they taken in the past you know and and so it’s a very predefined population so when of course when you’re going out into the marketplace and there’s maybe you know hundreds of thousands maybe more getting your drug the FDA want to know is there
A safety indication that pops up is it still effective you know with all the things that people are doing like they haven’t controled what they eat their diet or whether they not they’re sticking to the dosing all these sorts of things and you have to as a Pharma
Company to maintain your license you have to gather that data you have to keep retelling the FDA you know yes it’s safe here’s our data this might be an indication we need to investigate this F that you need to be upfront and transparent about that um and we know we
Know of examples where you know drugs have gone into the marketplace and they’ve been withdrawn because of that data and so you know we need scientists to interpret that data as well and keep feeding that back and communicating that to the agencies so there’s a whole gamut of you know technical support that’s
Needed across that product life cycle um you know well in well into launch and Beyond so it’s a really exciting space I think um and I’m just Keen to get that you know that message out there that there is so many options and somebody gave me great advice when I first
Started working in Pharma and as you you mentioned I work in Communications and they said to me you know there’s so many different things you could work on there’s so many therapeutic areas there’s so many types of communications there’s so many you could work on Brands you could work on really early products
You could work with this company there’s so many companies there’s so many options don’t ever feel like when you get into the industry and and you you find yourself in not the right place don’t ever feel stuck because there’s plenty other things to try um if you
Find yourself in some way you don’t like or you’re not finding it interesting or it’s not intellectually stimulating enough or whatever there’s so many other things to try just keep looking um and that that’s that that was very reassuring when I first broke into the industry to know that there are options
There um and you know once I’ve got a bit of experience I can start you know diversifying my skill set further so it’s a great space to be that’s really interesting and I I really want to there’s so many things that you’ve said that I want to talk
About but let’s follow up that that that that what you just said is you know if if you once you uh have your foot in the door let’s say and you you have this position how how does it work in terms of the Dynamics of I
Really I okay I got into this position it’s not fulfilling me completely how do you get to from point A to point B of I I I’d really like to try going you know to work with the marketing team let’s say say on blah or how do how does that
Mobility within an organization within a corporation and within teams how does that work how is that negotiated how do you go about then you know once you get at the ground floor moving along up up sideways whatever but how does that go yeah that’s that’s a really interesting question and it’s
Actually something I would like to talk a bit more about on various platforms I think it’s quite important and you know I’ve learned a lot of I’ve only been in I have to say the caveat is I’ve only been in the industry for about five
Years so I I I’m still learning as well but what I’ve picked up in these five years is that you have to be fairly proactive about that right you have to be able to put your hand up and say I think I’d be interested in in learning a
Bit more about this um I think it’s very it’s very typical that as a scientist you know with technical expertise and therapeutic area area expertise you come into something and you almost become pigeon hold as somebody with that technical expertise they think okay Vicki she works in
Oncology as a writer right so it’s easy for me to be pigeon hold as an oncology writer and and I think you know to to a large degree that’s what my my resumé screams right because that’s what my experience shows so if I want to try and
Learn a new skill set or diversify I’ve learned that very early on I have to find the right people so people who are connected within that company people who have a voice when you’re not in the room right who are going to say oh I think
Vicki might like to try that you know she said she’d be interested in learning more about this and this is an interesting project and I think she’d be well fit you know be a good fit and I’ve learned to try and and figure out and navigate that and then try and get my
Messages across you know saying I would like to to learn more about this area and I think you’ve got to try and be quite proactive and and you do need need somebody who’s going to speak for you um be it a mentor or even a line manager
Somebody that you know is in a position to speak for you especially in an organization that’s as as large as a big farmer company um because it’s it’s very difficult to get lost in the weeds in a company that size and very easy to be pigeon H hold as the writer in that
Therapeutic area or the R&D scientist working on those vaccines you know I think it’s and if you want to diversify out of course if you want to stay a specialist perfect because within industry you know you can specialize and become that specialist and stay as that specialist that go-to person for that
Information but likewise if you want to diversify I think it’s kind of on you to almost put yourself out there and show you want that and maybe do some training in your free time um and say to your boss you know I’ve done these LinkedIn
Courses I want to learn more about x y and Zed what it what what options are there for me are there any projects I could get involved in is there anyone I could work Shadow or maybe a team that I could go and work for for three months
And so you’ve got to be quite proactive I think that uh that sounds really logical and uh and um so self- advocating is important networking also but um I kind of I kind of want to go back and and talk you know you talked about the life cycle of the of a
Pharmaceutical product but I kind of want to go and talk about the life cycle of the young researcher who jumps into big farma and how you know and how what type of conversation what type of habits they might not have from coming from research from Academia and that they
Need to pick up right away because what I’m feeling is you need to learn the culture and then you need to gain some habits that are going to help you you talked about something that I I’m always very curious about uh because I I didn’t
Get uh I didn’t find someone that I can consider a mentor during my my graduate school uh and a mentor it’s you know it’s someone not not in your lab it’s someone who who kind of is your champion and and is kind of an outside has an outside look on what things are
Happening and um seems to me that uh there’s there there must be some habits that you must gain to allow yourself within an organization to find someone who can play this role of Mentor because if you’re a little bit more reserved shy I don’t know um it might be difficult uh
Anyway I I’m I’m putting there’s a lot of layers to what I’m saying but let’s talk about this thing of finding a mentor and I think this is useful not only for people outside Academia but also inside but how do you go about within a large organiz ation how do you
Go about finding someone who can become potentially a mentor for you yeah and a champion for you I think you used the right word that champion because you know a mentor’s great and someone you can bounce ideas off but ideally you want someone who’s going to Champion you
Which is what I was saying about behind that closed door what that conversation is who’s going to put their hand up and say I think Vicky’s a good person for that that’s kind of what you’ve got to find and I’m afraid you do find that through doing a bit of networking and um
Early on in my career I was not good at men networking I mean I just was not I just thought what a frivolous activity you know it’s for sales people it’s not for me I’m a serious scientist you I’m not going to work the room or dress to
Impress or any of these things you know I didn’t I thought it was sley and below me um and actually you know it was a pretty arrogant Outlook I think because actually what I’ve discovered over time is that networking is more about building relationships and I started to
See as I do this anyway right I have friendships you know with people I build relationships with them why should being in a professional environment be any different right professional networking is about building relationships and that’s all about you know building Rapport finding common grounds and all
Those types of things so I think what you’ve got to do is is pretty much try and talk to as many people as you can within the organization of course that’s difficult now that we have a lot of remote working um a lot of people you
Know are not in an office there’s no water cooler chat as such um and and so it boils down to pretty much putting yourself out there and just asking the question blatantly who who should I be talking to next you know who should I be
Talking to about this and I think one of the best things that served me is really boiling down a few key messages that I want to get out there um and then using those messages to kind of reinforce where I wanted to go next or what I wanted to learn more about so
I’ll give you an example when I was transitioning out of Academia obviously I was leaving Academia it’s a new identity um I was coming into this new industry I didn’t know anything about it but I’d realized that how I’d got the job in the first place was by explaining
That I like to take complex scientific information and I like to distill it to simple messaging and I also knew the other thing I knew was that you know I’d been a pi so I was obviously older coming into this industry I was coming in with people who were in their their
20 right starting off um and so I I thought it would be quite important to explain where where I’d come from in my background and I had this 18 years of oncology experience work or cancer research experience working in in Academia so I used these three messages
Right I I use these two messages all the time so when somebody introduced me I said oh hi I’m Vicki um I’m an xpi I used to work in skin cancer research I’ve always enjoyed taking complex scientific messages and and condensing scientific information condensing simple messages and I would use that
Reinforcement way of of introducing myself all the time to begin with and then people would say oh this Vicki she she always liked writing so she come into the right you know the academic sorry from an academic background into the industry um and she’s got a lot of
Oncology experience so we’ve got this new project starting with this new drug in prostate cancer maybe Vicki would be interested in working on those projects and through that messaging I realized things were coming my because I kept reinforcing the message um and it was all about really learning how to how to
Change people how to influence what people were saying when I wasn’t in the room in a way reinforcing all the time those messages because I wanted those cancer projects I wanted to learn more about that I wanted to use my skill set that I was bringing with me and so that
Set me in good stad and when I started to think you know later on I might like to diversify my skills further I would start incorporating new messages into things that I was saying to people um and sometimes it happens where you get introduced to your boss’s boss’s boss
Right they come to the office or there’s you know I don’t know a round table event and they say oh hi who are you and it’s a perfect time when you’ve got those messages you know that you can get them out there so in the back of your
Mind they’re there and there doesn’t need to be many I would say no more than three you don’t want to be implanting more than three pieces of information because the mind can’t process more than three or four things at any one time but that continuous reinforcement really
Does help and I just wished I’d used that earlier on in my career I think i’ have gone faster quicker um but it’s been a really good thing and so when I started at narus and I started at narus at the beginning of the year I came in
With a certain few things I wanted to say and I realized pretty quickly I need to know people who understand the part of the organization in which I work which is the the scientific writings team and so I started to find people um within that scientific writing team that I
Thought would would be able to have a voice for me and I would be able to implant those messages on and so kind of it sounds very strategic and and very um pre-planned but it’s kind of just you can incorporate it in into your daily
Work and and meet people and and kind of reinforce that messaging and it really does go a long way because I used to make a big mistake when I was in Academia because I used to always tell people when my grant when I hadn’t got a
Grant I used to go oh no I haven’t got that Grant again and you know oh what is going to happen to me it’s terrible and I realized what people were saying was you know they wer they were saying oh Vicki you know over coffee or whatever
Talking my name would come up and they say oh Vicki didn’t get that Grant again you know and and so that messaging would be reinforced that negative messaging all the time and and I didn’t realize you know that that is damaging like to have that kind of reinforce negative
Messaging so I thought I’m going to change this and I’m going to enforce what I want the messaging to be um and I think that is generally a good strategy for for any career really so anyway it’s working out for me no no for sure and it it makes total
Sense to me it makes me think that yeah the words have more power than we imagine when they when especially when they start echoing in other Chambers either positively or negatively like you just said and um it makes me think about different things but one thing that it
It makes me think and I just uh published so this week’s episode that came out on the podcast is about marketing yourself as a young researcher and it makes me think of personal branding and there’s books about um business model you let’s say and what it
Sounds to me is like you are working the way you this method that you that you found out works uh is uh it’s kind of a a personal branding method but projecting to to where you want to go it’s kind of a it’s like if you in
Unconsciously or you know you found out you found a way to always have kind of short elevator pitch of you m and of of where you want to be be it could be in Academia but it can also be within an organization and and this way if you
Somehow are in the elevator with the boss of your boss of your boss you have that like 90c am this person I like doing this I’d love to do that these are my strengths ding we arrived at the seventh floor let’s and thank you bye-bye and you’ll you’ll have planted
Those ideas in the person’s ear and in the person’s brain and eventually you’ll come up you know top of mind whenever that that that R I love it I really really yeah that is so true but I I don’t like to pitch or I try not to give
It as a pitch I try to give it more conversationally so it doesn’t necessarily all have to come together the way I said it but I will implant those kind of messages into the conversation somehow I will try to get them in there somehow um so yes it is
It’s exactly that it’s personal branding but yeah we’re ditching the pitch idea yeah yeah yeah it just it just made me because it has all the elements of it right but of course it can sound artificial if you if you do it if it’s too scripted for sure right and I don’t
Think anyone likes to be sold to do they certainly not in an elevator or over table coffee discussion or something yeah I think pitches have have their moments where they’re you know where they’re they they are logical to you you know it’s they’re supposed to be used
But yeah I I I understand what you’re saying and but I think that the process of finding these three points the proc of of working to towards having them and knowing them it the process is the same as if you were finding out okay what do
I need to what do I need to say in a in a pitch that’s why it came to mind yeah that’s so right though that’s so true the process is the same because I always try to have a super skill in there or super strength you know something that I
Want to be remembered for for you know because I think I found as well when you when when you ask people what do they say about you in a closed room when you think about that question what do you think people say about you when you’re
Not there a lot of people say oh I’d like to think I hope they say that I’m nice or I’m friendly or very rarely I find people are talking about somebody’s personality they might tag that on to something but usually they’re talking about oh they’re skilled in this oh and
They happy to be they happen to be also really easy to talk to you know they might tag on a personality thing but that your name usually comes up when there’s a skill or a need or something being talked about so if you’re reinforcing what your strength your
Super strength is or your skills in some way that when your name might come up at the right moment so I always in those three elements that I’m talking about any one time I always try to have a strength in there some kind of a
Something I want to be noted for so in the example before it was you know obviously taking complex information you know because I wanted to break into the writing field um into the scientific writing field but when I was in there I also wanted to be known as somebody with
Expertise in oncology so I just told as many people as I could that I came with these expertise in cancer research and and so I always try to have those kind of things in there as well as I said so that if projects interesting projects
Come up maybe my name will at some point um yeah and they and they did it they did it it seems they did so far so far that’s that’s really really really great advice now and I think this can be used at different steps because you know I was
Talking about the the life cycle of of the the the employee coming straight out of of Academia and uh the first step that that usually I mention is while you’re still doing your research uh in Academia is start talking with people you know do informational interviews and
I feel that having also this this these three messages uh you know on the back of your mind can also help in that setting is that is that something you’ve seen how did how did the transition go for you those first conversations that brought you to your first U Pharma job you know
I I could talk about this I could wax lyrical on this for the whole day David be warned because I am such an advocate for networking because that is exactly how I made the transition I didn’t do the scattergun approach of apply for everything I basically decided what I
Wanted to do through informational interviewing and at that point I spoke to more writers because I knew I decided I wanted to be a writer in the farmer industry doing various types of writing and Communications I I spoke to people across the Spectrum then I discovered that I was specifically interested in
Medical Communications which is an area of scientific writing in the farma industry and so at that point I wanted to talk to more medical Communications writers um and it was at that point through talking to them and learning the language of what they did that I started
To to start to be able to use that same language which made me more of a credible candidate and and through those conversations I actually got introduced to the decision makers people at their companies who were hiring or had influence to influence the hiring managers right um and to those
Conversations I got invited to interviews so in the end I I started to to realize which companies I thought were the best ones and I had a list of five that I wanted to Target I was based in the UK at the time and they were all
In London and um I was in Scotland so I knew we were going to have to move down to London because there was no remote working this was pre pandemic and um or no remote working sorry for entry level there was remote working for senior stuff um and so I I pinpointed those
Five companies I targeted employees in those five companies and through those conversations I then started to as I said get linked through to the hiring managers um and it was through those conversations with the hiring managers I got the interviews and I think from those five companies I got invited to I
I I applied for four in the end I got invited for three interviews and I got two offers so you know it was very very targeted but it’s time consuming because you know you have to have that that lead in so you have to give yourself time
It’s it’s no good submitting the thesis and then worrying about getting a job you you have to be leading into this six to 12 months in advance if you want to do that approach but I think it’s a far more effective approach because you have more chance of getting something that’s
Right for you rather than just falling into something because it’s available or because you you’ve managed to get it at the last minute exactly I totally I totally agree and and it really talks to the power of networking and and I’m really happy that you share this
Because especially if uh you know if you were you know very involved or you know exclusively involved in your research and and didn’t any networking you you know what will happen is that what you said you’re going to send CVS you know to to I don’t know how
Many uh job postings and um and it’s it can take the same time and you won’t be building any relationships through that process you’ll just be a you know a couple of sheets of paper on someone’s desk that they’ll look through and maybe you’ll interest you’ll interest them and
Here it feels like yes it takes time and and you know building relationships Human Relationships takes time uh but it feels that the the you know one convers ation the next the next you always are there’s always a brick that you’re adding to this wall after one conversation it maybe it’s a terminology
That you learned maybe it’s uh a new job a new job description that you didn’t know existed and then and then there’s just a human aspect of having of building this network I think I I would uh advocate for that 100% uh like you said you you you could talk a lot about
It I think it’s the way to go it’s uh networking networking networking and now we’re you know you can you can network with people who are across the globe today through Linkedin let’s say and uh so I think it’s a missed opportunity to not do it even if
You’re shy you know it’s it doesn’t come easily on a on a platform that’s you know that’s built like LinkedIn it’s there’s no um it’s not menacing at all people are ready if they’re on LinkedIn they’re ready to be approached so don’t be scared of uh bugging them and you
Know if they don’t answer it’s probably because they’re too busy but you you’d be surprised how many people are ready and happy to to share some of their of their path some of their knowhow and just to talk with someone who is interested who has same who has common
Interests with them I think if you do Target people who’ve been through the same Journey right anyone who’s come out of grad school and struggled with that same transition they’re often willing to give back I was so pleasantly surprised how many people gave me time there’s a
Few rules to to follow and and the first is to try find that common ground and then I think stay you know I I will only take 10 or 15 minutes of your time and then be really strict with that because often that’s all you need right just to
To make that first approach and build that connection and start to to learn that that terminology and build your your your candidacy your credibility as a candidate it um I don’t think it takes a lot of time up front and and often once it gets to the 15 minutes that you
Said you would have people will allow you an extra five or 10 minutes often if the conversation’s flowing and youve built Rapport you know they they’ll allow that just be very upfront and say I realize we’re at our time um you know we can follow this on later maybe I
Could reach out to you later on and and then notten there say oh no we can you know continue the conversation so um I think you know don’t make it easy for somebody and the chances are you will you will receive a you know a positive
Response and they will help you and and the other thing is to to not ask them for any great things like don’t ask them for here’s my CV in advance my resume can you please check it or is there any jobs going in your company you know
Anything like that of it’s not what those kind of conversations about those informational interviews they’re about research they’re about learning about the job whether it’s right for you whether it’s interesting what’s happening in that industry um who are the key players who could I talk to next
They’re the questions you want to be finding out because at that point as you said you’re building that wall with those individual bricks it’s a great analogy because that that’s what you’re doing and it takes a few conversations it takes a long time to do but it’s well
Worth it and as you said the scaton approach of just sending your resume out hoping that it sticks somewhere I just would I would have found that so demoralizing you know to you hear about people who say applied for a 100 plus jobs and you think how did you get to
That point without you know being so miserable the level of Rejection it must have been so difficult to to get through that I I didn’t I didn’t want to do that and also I felt like I didn’t know anything outside of Academia I’ve been
In Academia for so long I felt I had to do I felt compelled to do these information interviews just to figure out what was what else was out there that’s exactly what I was going to say which is apart from everything that you just said you by having conversations
You can you’ll you know you’ll glean information organically and slowly but but surely about the culture of this organization about the day-to-day of this type of job that that by sending a CV you get nothing back yeah absolutely yeah you’ll get no feedback right for most of them that’s it yeah that’s it
Vicki we’re you know we’re getting to the end of the interview and and this has been so interesting and we focused mainly on on one thing which is networking but I think it’s important to say it because uh it’s it’s it is key it is key to
Getting your your foot in the door and then it is key to evolving within the within the the organization we didn’t talk about the day-to-day about the culture about what culture shock you can have getting in the way I I I’d like to talk about it is you have the website
Biomet badass you help people do this transition and considering your experience with biomed badass from people who who come to come see you asking for your help what are like three or or two let’s say two key things that you teach them or that you open their eyes to uh that that
Help them smoothly transition to to this new universe that has you know different habits different culture different pace uh of you know of of projects Etc is there one or two key things that either people come to you anxious about or that when you when you show people these
Things it kind of is in a Harmon moment for them the two key things that people come to me mostly about is what we’ve spoken about which is actually that application and how to get that job and I do get a lot of those people who say I
Have been applying for over a year and I’ve got nowhere and I know exactly what they’ve done they’ve done the shotgun approach and they hav’t done that kind of networking um so I get a lot of that so then I I try to direct them down the
Route that I took and say start building these Bridges and also you know you can you can send your applications out as alongside doing this networking why not do both right why not build both of that and I and I talk about this um on my
YouTube channel I talk about it on my blog and through my newsletter I was just going to say if anybody wants to subscribe and learn more um go to the bed Bas website and you can hit the Subscribe button for my new letter uh and I send out all the
Updates but basically I talk about this kind of multi-channeled approach to the job search not just focusing on job boards because those job boards are candidate magnets right and a lot of those people coming to those job boards and we hear about you know at least 200
Applicants for most roles at the minute we’re reading which is you know a huge amount and for the the biggest companies it’s more than that right um a lot of those people would be coming with prior industry experience and it’s just natural for hiring managers to think
Well I know this person can do this job so I’m going to give them the job I don’t know exactly if this person coming from Academia can do it so they they seem a bit more of a risk um so so in that sort of a scenario we’re up against
You know maybe over 100 people some of whom have got industry experience your chances transitioning academic is greatly reduced right which is why you need to take this multi- channel this different approach because essentially you’re taking a career change um even if you’re moving into a lab where you’re
Using the same techniques um into an R&D lab you’re still going from one culture one one academic environment where you everything’s based on knowledge creation into this industry environment where you know this commercial you know it’s driven by commercial activity that’s a completely different culture shift and
We mentioned culture a bit um and it is different um so that’s that’s probably the first thing that that people come to me for and the second one is a lot of people are just very unsure they just don’t know what there is out there um
And as I as we described at the beginning the farma industry is enormous there’s so many things for stem folks to do I’m not sure I still know them all um you know I know a lot of the jobs I know a lot of the areas but I’m still
Discovering new roles and I see new things advertised um and I think wow that’s that’s a really interesting job and they actually they’re changing all the time you know the industry is being revolutionized in a digital way and we’re seen more jobs coming on that we’ve not seen before right and that’s
Just going to keep going and going so I think it’s just important to talk to people right and to get that understanding and learning and try and learn from people in the industry I think it’s very it is difficult in Academia because you’re in your little academic bubble but a lot of people
Within that system have never been anywhere else they’ve always been in Academia and so you can’t really learn from them you know what the industry Trends are what the jobs are out there because they’ll be able to tell you a bit right but they’re getting that information often secondhand so it’s
It’s far better to get the ins and outs and the nitty-gritty details from people in that industry so I guess my answer to both of this is get on LinkedIn you know and network and talk to people and that’s an important strategic part of of your job search and your transition it’s
So so important um for any career changer yeah or if you are you you like to organize things and events get together with other students and bring people bring alumni from where you are who are now in industry in these positions bring them to your Center and
And have like their Prime you know some prime time with them to ask them all these questions and the fact that you have this commonality with them will make it that you can even you know you can go deeper into the questioning they’ll you know they’ll they’ll be
Happy to come and give back to to their to the the cohorts that came after them that’s another way to go and I’ve I’ve you know I’ve talked about it with with other guests and you know this sometimes uh this was Adriana Bankston this program that she started when she was in
Grad school it’s still going on people come regularly alumni to to visit and talk with current students and that’s another way to go it’s it’s a little bit more involved in a way but you know some people are really good at these things and and really Thrive organizing these
Types of of of things and U I think it would be a way to go but definitely talking talking with people who are where you think you might want to be for sure yeah absolutely and and that is a great approach but even if your institution doesn’t have something as
Great as that um you can use LinkedIn to find alumni um and Linkedin in some research actually about Connections they they looked at which were the most popular con connections that people are most likely to respond to you if you have a connection with and one of the
Most common is if you’ve been to the same school right if you’ve been to the same University had the same educational background um and so you can hit the alumni tab on LinkedIn it will pull everybody up who’s being to your University or your institution and then
You can search through those alumni for your key companies that you’re interested in working in this is another key fact that I think is really important try to as I said narrow down companies to maybe your top five that you want to focus on and then start
Looking for people there because it will give you a Target it will give you somewhere to focus your effort um and that really stood me in good stad as well for the transition so so LinkedIn is is an amazing tool and I think even more now there’s there’s so
Much out there information for people that didn’t even exist you know six seven years ago when I was thinking about this transition when I was starting to think about it you know if I think about even the papa PhD podcast would have been great for me during my
Transition um if if we’d had it back then so there was there’s so much more now you know on the internet that you can find and support and help you can get so uh it’s good times I think if you’re thinking of making that move into
Industry it’s true it’s true and and uh you just to go back to the alumni aspect it makes that first conversation so much easier because of the commonality because of the of of that kind of maybe Nostalgia that they might have and uh so for sure follow that that U that lead
Because it’s it’s a really really good one Vicki sadly we’ve we reached the end of the interview uh we’ve talked about your website and you know if people who’ve been watching or listening if this resonated with you and they want to ask you more questions follow up on your projects
Maybe ask you about what you do what’s the best way to to reach you uh let’s say on social media yeah well I’m very active on LinkedIn so so you can you can find me there um I’m on Twitter as well but you know sign up for the newsletter
As well talk to me and correspond with me through that I focus a lot of my efforts on the farmer industry on medical Communications which is a specific area I work in as a scientific writer um and generally on transitions out of Academia to Industry so if you’re
Interested in any of those or all three of them definitely you know feel free to reach out to me and I try to get back to as many people as I can and answer as many questions as I can um perfect yeah so so just look for Vicki surewood on
LinkedIn and you’ll find her for sure and then if you look for biomed badass also you will find her work uh and I’ll put all those links in the show notes uh and in the show notes of of this of this interview uh Vicki this this was really
Really cool it’s it’s funny because we really Dove deep into that aspect of networking and it’s the I think it’s the first time I spent almost a whole interview working talking just about that but I think that no but I think that the the what was really cool is
That first you connect connected it to your story of how you did things second it it’s very logical to me what what you said and it totally totally makes sense and Third I think people need to because you hear networking a lot like now it’s one it’s a term that comes up
So much and people might be tired of they see they might glaze over and and ju and just by just seeing networking okay someone’s again talking about networking and I think just uh the fact that this is a is you know geared this this show is geared to a specific
Population who might have been so busy during these I don’t know three to six years of the PHD that they might have not invested at all in networking I think it was it’s necessary to kind of normalize it and make people think about it first like top of mind when thinking
Of transitioning careers because uh that the the shotgun approach is really it’s it’s uninspiring and uninspired demoralizing and demoralizing and it’s there’s this there’s this human aspect of communicating with other people and and establishing relationships that it lacks completely and I think in the end what gets people
Jobs is that human aspect yeah and uh and so I’m really really grateful that you came and that and that uh we ended up following that uh that rabbit hole and also um absolutely it’s important for your transition but those skills you will take through right which which I’m
Using now you will take through it through your career wherever you end up even if you stay in Academia the best academics the most successful professors you know they will be fantastic networkers of course of course Vicki um this was great thank you so much for having been on Papa PhD it’s
It’s been a really really great pleasure thank you so much David for the invite really enjoyed the conversation times thanks for listening to another episode of the papa PhD podcast head over to papap pd.com for show notes and for more food for thought about non-academic postgrad careers I’ll always be happy to share
Inspiring stories new ideas and useful resources here on the podcast so make sure you subscribe on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts to always keep up with the discussion and to hear from our latest guests