How do you promote yourself into management roles in biotech companies?
At both Quest Diagnostics and Roche (my previous employer), it was plain nepotism and/or sitting around the same company forever that got a few severely under-qualified individuals into director and senior director (bioinformatics) roles. Not kidding. At Quest Diagnostics, no one that calls themselves a director/senior-director of bioinformatics actually even has a day’s training in the field (or even a related quantitative field) but some of these clowns actually micromanage! What’s worse, none of them have even kept up with the biology either ( for being biologists!). These overpaid garbage pretty ask for updates 2x a day to get-by and show that they are keeping up. They obviously won’t leave, because they are un-hireable. The situation wasn’t any better at Roche Molecular either (Genentech maybe an exception, although I’ve heard that it can be a hit or miss over there). Beginning to lose hope here about raising the ranks in this industry, inspite of my fantastic background (I trained with world-class leaders in bioinformatics originally and have an established track record from genome centers and national labs). Anyone here that made it, and is willing to share a few tips? Thanks.
There are a lot of terrible management staff across the Healthcare space but you probably find this in every industry. I work in Healthcare IT and the best decision I made was to go consulting. I went from 85k salary to over 200k. The biggest misconception people have is you don’t have to get a leadership position to “make it.” Is there consulting opportunities in your line of work?
Wowsa why do healthcare IT consultants make so much more?
Thanks for the tip, I’ll look into it a bit more seriously. I have been heavily contemplating moving into healthcare analytics with a big consulting firm like Accenture or Deloitte, or even Booz Allen Hamilton. Any thoughts in that space...? I’d really appreciate a referral if someone can help..?
I’m not a huge fan of the big consulting firms personally. You will make good money but good luck fighting for a spot at the top with all sorts of people who have been around for a long time. I like what other folks are mentioning in this thread about the start ups to mid-size. You’ll find a lot more opportunity and growth although there is more risk with company success, job security, etc.
This has 100% been my experience in pharma :/ compared to my friends that work in other industries, I feel like poor management is even more endemic within pharma specifically because the industry is incredibly formulaic and basically a dinosaur. It’s actually getting ridiculous the number of people that get promoted in to management positions with no leadership skills or sometimes even functional expertise.. so unfortunately I can’t offer you any solutions but I feel your pain. In addition to healthcare analytics, look at tech companies that are branching in to health like google, apple, etc and also digital health companies
OP, I don't have a great opinion of big/legacy Pharma myself, especially the ones based in Europe. Have you looked into small to mid-sized Biotechs? Verily/Calico have been hiring as well. Also, you have the skills, you can consider similar/related opportunities like RWE/Digital Health. Genentech/Roche both have their data science groups if that kind of work interests you any.
Agreed with small to mid-size. Going from a biotech giant to a start up or mid-size can still provide a lot of opportunities and growth
@OP, this is an old post and my friend is also struggling with same situation. did you make any changes or joined some where else to make changes in job positions?
I don’t have much positive news for you but the old adage, “it’s not what you know but who” reigns supreme at most companies.