After an increasing demand on career advice
from my friends and colleagues I have decided to write this article that I hope
can be useful for some of the people who wish to transition after
completion of their PhD straight to the non-academic world. In this article I
would like to describe my own personal experience in the search for a dream
job. I would like to state right away that I was not interested in working as a
scientist in the industry (start-ups included), neither to pursue an academic
career or create my own company. So I have tried to make a summary of my
activities and the steps I undertook to nail a position of Innovation and
Development Manager for a non-profit organization.
1.
Identify what you want to do after
your PhD. This is
the hardest and the most crucial step among all of them. You have to know
exactly what position you want to apply to, because once you have that figured
out, you will need to develop the skills required for that job. But how can you
find out about multiple career opportunities out there? That is an easy one.
There are multiple career events organized on campus all the time: career
fairs, seminars organized by pharmaceutical or consulting companies. Find
something that inspires you. Go to all of these meeitngs, meet people, ask
questions and try to learn as much as you can about their jobs. Learn about
pros and cons of their jobs and identify what would you like to do after your
PhD. When I still had 2 years left of my PhD I have decided that I am
absolutely not interested in quality control, clinical trials, regulatory
affairs or everything linked to intellectual property. However I was interested
in marketing, scientific communication, project management, business
intelligence and consulting. That is still a very big list which I managed to
narrow down further on. However I had a clear idea of the things I did not want
to do and that was already something.
2.
Acquire the necessary skills and
education. Unless
you want to continue a scientific career, skills developed during your PhD are
not enough for any job outside academia. Therefore after you have identified
what job you would like to apply to, learn about the required skills. You can
either read about them on the internet or simply look for the job adverts. If
this is really something you want, you will have to invest in your education,
and not only time, but money. It is hard to combine additional webinars and
courses with a PhD, but this is something you will have to do. Go to a project
management course, learn how to work with SAP software, subscribe to a course
on intellectual property, scientific writing, regulatory affairs or clinical
trials (most of them you can find on-line), learn new languages or prepare for the interviews in consulting
companies. It is a very tough world out there, the desired qualifications are
often extremely high and keep in mind that you are competing with people who
already have a business degree and work experience, which makes it even harder.
There are a lot of courses on campus or seminars organized for PhD students for
a reduced price. Profit from them while you are here! As for myself, I have
obtained a degree in management and attended seminars on drug discovery and
intellectual property while doing my PhD. I went to workshops and seminars
organized by McKinsey, Roche and other companies all over Europe and
participated in different scientific communication campaigns. I have learnt many
useful things and connected with a lot of people. As I was interested in
scientific communication, I have also started a blog. This is a great way to
improve your writing and learn to communicate scientific topics to wide public.
Do not forget to notify your social network about current updates on your blog
in case you start one. Another very important point is finding out how you can
enter a desired field. For instance, there are existing training programs in
pharmaceutical companies in intellectual property or regulatory affairs. On the
other hand, you can nail a position in consulting straight after your PhD.
There are many options and your goal is to learn about the ones that are
interesting for you.
