CRO Archives - NonClinical Physicians

Embrace Stage 2 of the 12 Month Roadmap to a New Career – 312

John Jurica — Tue, 08 Aug 2023 13:45:23 +0000

Months 2 Through 4

In this solo episode, John explains how to embrace Stage 2 of the 12-Month Roadmap. It is a plan he originally designed to guide you from full-time clinical practice to chief medical officer of a hospital.

However, this comprehensive roadmap can also be adapted to other nonclinical roles, in industries such as pharma, consulting, insurance, education, and health system management.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country. It has over 700 graduates. And, the program only takes one year to complete.

By joining the UT Physician Executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills you need to find a career that you love. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office at (865) 974-6526 or go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.

Navigating Your Nonclinical Career Path: A 12-Month Roadmap

Welcome back, fellow explorers! As we move ahead on our nonclinical career journey, remember that while this roadmap spans 12 months, the timing can vary based on the time you can commit and competing commitments.

Flexibility is key. Our stages overlap, and some might warrant revisiting. Do you lean towards pharma's diverse roles or health systems' intricate landscape? Perhaps insurance or benefit management intrigues you. Focusing on proven strategies will guide your way.

If you're unsure, don't fret. As we venture into Stage 2 (months 2-4), brace yourself for illuminating insights and useful tools.

Navigating Stage Two: Building Networks and Enhancing Credentials

As you embrace Stage 2, you'll seamlessly integrate into professional networks, expand your connections, and explore new certifications or degrees.

This phase is a focused and engaging three-month process, marked by strategic steps that gradually propel you toward your nonclinical career goals.

Join a Professional Organization
Start Networking
Explore Certifications and Degrees

Summary

During this discussion, John highlights valuable resources to aid your journey. Access a comprehensive list of nonclinical jobs at 70 Nonclinical and Nontraditional Careers. And gain insights into the services of professional organizations in this resource: Professional Organizations for Nonclinical Careers. Your nonclinical career path is just a step away.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode.

EXCLUSIVE: Get a daily dose of inspiration, information, news, training opportunities, and amusing stories by CLICKING HERE.

Links for Today's Episode:

Download This Episode:

Right Click Here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

If you enjoyed today’s episode, share it on Twitter and Facebook, and leave a review on iTunes.

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton

Today's PNC Podcast Transcript

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Transcription PNC Podcast Episode 312

Embrace Stage 2 of the 12 Month Roadmap to a New Career

John: All right nonclinical nation, let's talk about stage 2 of the 12 month roadmap. This is a roadmap to any nonclinical career. It probably would apply to applying for clinical careers, but there's some things that are very different. This one is specifically for nonclinical jobs.

I did address stage one or phase one, which is really month one, back in a podcast episode. I think it was October or November of 2022, so it wasn't that long ago, but I've been remiss in not getting to step two or phase two.

Now, I want to tell you that the 12 months is somewhat arbitrary. With effort, the process could probably be accomplished much quicker. But on the other hand, 12 months is a nice round number and it takes into account the need to give up maybe up to six months' notice for some employment contracts for you to leave. It might be 90 days, might be one 20 or maybe even six months or longer. That kind of fits in with the 12 month timeframe.

Today I'm going to talk about, like I said, stage two, which covers months two through four of the process. Now, everything I'm going to discuss today have been discussed in other podcast episodes and sometimes other videos and courses. But I'm putting this course together in nice bite-sized pieces so that you can actually work along with the steps if you'd like. I'll put a link to the episode where we covered step one or phase one.

With that, remember too that the stages do overlap and in some cases may need to be repeated, depending on what's happening at that stage. I'll remind you that stage one included basically four tasks. Overcoming limiting beliefs, myths and misconceptions. Reviewing job descriptions more as a learning process than actually for application. Identifying mentors and starting to engage with the mentors. And then setting up your initial LinkedIn profile. It doesn't have to be complete.

However, now we're moving into stage two. You've done all that and stage two includes identifying and joining appropriate professional organizations, growing and accessing your network and exploring degrees and certifications. Let's get to my presentation right now and dig into those topics.

The other prerequisite when starting this 12 month roadmap is that you already have some idea at least what industry you want to pursue. In other words, do you want to do something in pharma? You could select that single industry because it has dozens of different types of jobs, and many of them are entry level. Or do you want to do something in health systems and hospitals? Do you want to do something in insurance company and on the benefit management side like UM or do you want to pick two or three of those and dig into it a little bit before narrowing it down? You can do that, but you have to have some idea.

If you start this process with absolutely no idea, you need to do a little bit of pre-work, I guess is what I would call it, by just learning a little bit about some of these jobs. And then you can get into more detail and narrow it down during this 12 month process.

Maybe just to give you an overview of the entire process. I've talked about stage one. Stage two we'll talk about today includes things like joining a professional organization, starting more intensive networking and exploring certificates and degrees or just coursework.

Stage three, you're going to start really searching job listings, access some of the courses you may have identified, perhaps pursue that certificate. There are certificates you can get in 10, 15, 16 weeks, whatever, three months that can help you in your job search. You can be continuing to consult regularly with your mentor, and then you can really focus on networking and finding sponsors, which I'm using that term means somebody at a company or at a recruiter's office who will stand up for you, will look at your resume and will help facilitate your transition.

And then stage four, we're getting really into the nitty gritty, resume, writing, creating your template and a cover letter that you'll customize. Update your LinkedIn profile so it really is on target. And then start making some phone calls to employers and HR departments and recruiters.

And then the next stage five is where you are selecting job opportunities. You're doing really heavy research on the places where you've been asked to do at least an introductory visit, probably online screening call, really customizing your cover letter and resume, preparing for telephone interviews and face-to-face interviews, attending the interview and then following up. And then really the sixth stage is, either start the new job or repeat the process, go to the beginning and starting over if let's say you've had two or three or four interviews and they haven't gone anywhere. That's the overview.

But let's get back to stage two here. We're really serious about moving into a nonclinical career. There are things that are just different when you're looking at a nonclinical career. That's why although there's probably parallels in maybe applying for a new job as a clinician, this would apply to physicians, nurses and anybody really who's a licensed clinician. There's a lot of similarities partly because what drives us away from clinical care and taking care of patients is pretty much the same in terms of many of us are driven to that by being overworked, being underappreciated, not really being considerate of our time and our work-life balance. Trying to keep our salaries to a minimum even though we're all extremely well educated and committed people that are doing these jobs. A lot of this applies to really anybody in healthcare making the change.

What I've put in stage two, it's some homework. And I make this about a three month process because this takes time. Meeting with a mentor, you can do that in 15 minutes, 30 minutes, and once a month really. You shouldn't overburden a mentor. Like I say, that comes in the next stage, really, although you should be doing that all along. But doing the steps in stage two do require some effort and some focus and some time.

The three major steps that I've included in that phase to try and really get you up to speed is number one, to join a professional organization, or two or three. Number two, to start networking in earnest. And then number three is explore certifications and degrees. Because by the time you get done with your month one, kind of looking through those job descriptions and looking at these organizations and learning more about a potential industry, you're going to find that there may or may not be requirements for some kind of certification and a degree or even just taking some courses.

Let's go through each of these separately. And again, I'm probably going longer than I want to, but let's just kind of go through this quickly and see what we can do. And I have resources for you too. That's the only reason I wanted to bring this up today. Many of you follow my podcast or been to my website and you probably already have these, but I have some pretty useful resources.

Joining a professional organization. Let's say that you've gone through the first phase, you've narrowed it down to an industry or two, and now maybe you even narrowed it down to a job within that industry. In hospital management, there's a pretty standard procedure. You do part-time work as a physician advisor, you might start doing part-time work as a medical director, either of a service line or quality improvement or CDI or informatics, something like that.

And then if you're really serious, you may move into a full-time position as a medical director. And in some organizations that are big, you might become a senior medical director or executive medical director or something like that. In pharma, there are different jobs in different divisions that we talk about. And there are organizations actually for each division in a sense, or at least there's more than one organization if you're working in pharma.

That brings me to the handout I was going to mention. Most people that I know are following me have already gotten the handout on 70 nonclinical and unconventional careers for a physician. That one is a basic one that has 70 plus different jobs by title described, but I mentioned it here, under joining a professional organization because it actually lists a resource for each of those jobs. And the resource is oftentimes a society or an association. And you can find that if you go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/70jobs.

But I have another handout that is not as well known, and I don't push it that often. And the thing about this handout is it is a list of professional organizations for nonclinical careers. The nice thing about this handout is that it tells you some of the factors for each of these associations or professional organizations. And since we're also talking about exploring certifications and degrees, some of these organizations have some type of certification or degree.

But let me mention just before I get into that, what the organizations are for some of the more common nonclinical positions. If you're thinking about looking at CDI, you would probably want to look at either the American Academy of Professional Coders or the Association of Clinical Documentation Integrity Specialists. Those are the two that can really help you prep and get ready to apply for a job in utilization management and or clinical documentation improvement or both, because the billing and the coding go hand in hand.

If you can become an expert in billing and or coding or understand how to use protocols for doing benefits management, meaning approving or not approving certain requests for procedures or for meds, then that would be really helpful. If you're looking for a job in pharma and you're thinking about becoming a medical science liaison, there is the MSL society, which is msls.com. If you are looking for a job in public health with the government, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America might be a good one to take a look at.

You can get this list, which I don't know what we've got here, 5, 10, 15 or about 20 organizations more or less, that you can access by going to nonclinicalphysicians.com/polist. That's professional organizations list. It's nonclinicalphysicians.com/polist. And it'll also show you the answer to the question, the third part of this particular step in my model, and it lists which of those organizations have certification and or certificate programs.

It also lists things like is there formal mentorship? Do they have recorded courses, do they have live courses? Do they have a newsletter? Do they have a community of peers? All these questions are answered. Yes, there's a few that, depending on what we're talking about, they might not offer, but a well-developed and mature professional organization typically has all of those things.

For example, there is certificate programs through the American Academy of Insurance and Medicine, the American Academy of Professional Coders, the American Association for Physician Leadership, the AAPL, which is the major organization, the organization, if you're working to become a leader in almost any industry, but particularly in hospital and health systems or in pharma or in the insurance company. Things like that.

Again, if you go to that nonclinicalphysicians.com/polist, it'll give you all that information on one page and will help you to figure out whether you should pursue certification or even a degree. I usually don't promote pushing for a degree very often because you can get the degree after you're already in your first nonclinical job and it'll be more pertinent anyway to what you're doing. Let's say you decide to go to the AAPL and try to get the CPE, or you try to get an MMM from a university which is a master in medical management or whatever.

And those are relatively long, those take years to accomplish, but you can do shorter certifications, even shorter degrees, and they'll be much more applicable to what you're doing if you start doing those once you've already got your first nonclinical position. And on top of that, you will be able to get the employer to sometimes pay for that.

And the other big thing in this section is to start networking. Networking means really talking to people. And the one caveat I want to give to networking when you start doing that is, if at all possible, you want to find out if there's something you can do for your mentor, if not initially, at least along the way. In other words, it's not rude, but it's too lopsided just to look for someone that's going to teach you for free. Most mentors will mentor for free physicians, nurses, we've always done that with students.

And so, just keep that in mind. Try and connect to let's say a mentor that you don't know through someone that you do know. You can do a lot of research on LinkedIn. You can start to grow your network on LinkedIn. And on LinkedIn most people will accept almost any request to connect if it's from at least a second degree or particularly if you have an introduction from somebody else.

And then on Doximity, it's fantastic for finding people from your med school class. Remember too, that med school alumni are good. Same thing with residency. You can look for your residency class. You may have kept in touch with those people. But if you can look for your residency alumni, it really expands and you just put something out there saying, "Hey, I'm getting tired of practice and thinking of a nonclinical job." And you might be able to tell on both LinkedIn and or Doximity if they're doing one. If not, then you can always just send the note out and ask them about it and say, "Hey, contact me if you're doing a nonclinical job. I just like to know what you're doing as they start this process."

And sometimes if we're working in a hospital or in a clinic and we find that some of our colleagues have already moved away, it's sometimes good to look them up, reach out to them if you can't tell from their LinkedIn profile what they're doing and say, "Hey, you left here. Are you still practicing or are you doing something nonclinical? Or are you doing a combination of both?" And that can be very helpful.

I think that's all I want to say about the 12 month roadmap to a new career today. I hope you found that useful. I did mention some resources during the discussion where you can get a list of nonclinical jobs. That one's at nonclinicalphysicians.com/70jobs. And a list of professional organizations and their benefits, which can be downloaded from nonclinicalphysicians.com/polist.

You can find those links and others related to today's presentation at nonclinicalphysicians.com/embrace-stage-2.

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Many of the links that I refer you to are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so has no effect on the price you are charged. And I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you.

The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life, or business.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. I do not provide medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counselor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career.

The post Embrace Stage 2 of the 12 Month Roadmap to a New Career – 312 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

Landing Your First Pharma Industry Job May Be Easier Than You Think – 311

John Jurica — Wed, 02 Aug 2023 12:00:40 +0000

What I've Learned from My Guests

In this solo episode, John explains why landing your first pharma industry job may be easier than you think.

In a recent webinar, a valuable discussion unfolded, shedding light on the allure of Pharma jobs: unveiling their attractiveness, potential for higher income than clinical work, and offering effective tactics to secure your first job in the industry. Today, John presents an excerpt from that very presentation, offering you valuable insights and guidance.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country. It has over 700 graduates. And, the program only takes one year to complete.

Compelling Advantages of Nonclinical Pharma Careers

Among the various nonclinical job options (consulting, hospital and health systems, pharma, medical writing, governmental roles, and education) pharma emerges as an attractive industry. It represents a significant portion of the United States healthcare spending, possibly more than 10%.

Here is a summary of the features that make the Pharma Industry so attractive to clinicians:

Huge Industry: Pharma constitutes a significant portion of healthcare spending. And it provides ample opportunities for diverse roles and job types tailored to individual interests.
Entry-Level Opportunities: Transitioning from clinical practice to pharma offers a fresh start. And it leverages your expertise and experience while embarking on a new career trajectory.
Career Advancement: Pharma offers growth and advancement prospects. Job options range from entry-level positions to leadership roles, welcoming physicians of varying backgrounds and experiences.
Status and Leadership: Physicians are valued for their unique skills and expertise. Many take on managerial and leadership roles due to their respected status.
Work-Life Balance: Nonclinical roles in pharma generally promote work-life balance. They offer predictable working hours and generally avoid the demanding schedules of clinical practice.
Performance-Driven Compensation: Unlike volume-based clinical work, pharma compensation is based on job performance and the ability to increase revenues or reduce costs.

Exploring Opportunities and Roles in Pharma Companies

Pharma companies have various divisions, including finance, sales, marketing, manufacturing, human resources, and legal and regulatory. However, physicians aiming for nonclinical roles often find opportunities in research and development (R&D) and medical affairs, particularly in clinical development involving human trials.

Medical affairs offer a broad range of roles, while safety and pharmacovigilance open up numerous job prospects for physicians. Contract research organizations (CROs) are vital in supporting pharma companies by providing flexible employment options and handling various tasks, such as clinical design, decentralized trials, medical writing, and safety management for multiple pharmaceutical clients.

Choosing between direct employment at pharma companies and CROs depends on individual preferences and circumstances, with both options offering distinct advantages. For physicians seeking a swift entry into the pharmaceutical world or proximity to their current location, CROs present an accessible and attractive alternative to explore.

Summary

By exploring nonclinical opportunities in the pharmaceutical industry, physicians can embark on fulfilling career paths that cater to their interests, skills, and desire for a more balanced professional life. Many physicians are surprised to find that the obstacles to securing a job in the pharma industry are not as high as perceived.

This is evident through the experiences of the colleagues John mentioned with no prior pharma experience. Pharma companies highly value physicians' capacity to acquire new skills and their sincere dedication and enthusiasm.

The full webinar describes four other physicians' journeys, along with tactics for a successful career shift. For those interested in exploring more about pharma industry jobs, the complete one-hour recording can be accessed at The Wonderful World of Nonclinical Pharma Industry Jobs.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode.

EXCLUSIVE: Get a daily dose of inspiration, information, news, training opportunities, and amusing stories by CLICKING HERE.

Links for Today's Episode:

Download This Episode:

Right Click Here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

If you enjoyed today’s episode, share it on Twitter and Facebook, and leave a review on iTunes.

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton

Today's PNC Podcast Transcript

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Transcription PNC Podcast Episode 311

Landing Your First Pharma Industry Job May Be Easier Than You Think

John: My goal today is that when we're done, you'll be able to describe why you're qualified for a pharma job, whether you're licensed or not licensed, whether you have any experience or not, and so forth.

The next thing I want you to understand and be able to verbalize is to list the reasons why you'll earn more in pharma job than you would in most clinical jobs eventually. That's not on day one necessarily, but in actual fact, you'll probably earn more in salary doing something in pharma than you will in your clinical job. And then the third is that you'll be able to implement strategies for landing your first nonclinical pharmaceutical industry job.

Now, when I talk about nonclinical jobs, there's at least nine major industries. You've got consulting, you've got hospital and health systems, you've got pharma, you've got medical writing, there's a bunch of governmental jobs, there's educational jobs.

But why pharma? Basically pharma is a huge industry. It makes up and consumes about 10% of the healthcare dollars in the United States, at least last I checked. It might be more now, honestly, because I have not seen so much drug advertising in my life since the pandemic. Maybe it's more than 10 or 11 or 12%. It's huge.

And there's a lot of job types in pharma. Depending on your interests, you're probably going to be able to find a job in pharma, unless you want something where you're 100% remote working from home. UM for insurance companies, you can do that. Probably not going to find a pharma job where you can do that, although there are some jobs where you can do some remote work.

The other thing is that this is an entry level job for us. When we're physicians and we're looking to go into pharma, for most of us, we haven't done anything in pharma in the past. So, we are starting from the bottom, but obviously it's at the peak of our career wherever we are. We're taking everything we've learned and we're going to apply it to that new job. But in stepping into that new job, you're just beginning. And so, there's a lot of steps you can still go through if you decide to look for advancement.

And for physicians, there are jobs in pharma for those that have 10, 12 years of experience, have multiple specialties, MBA and all that kind of thing. To physicians who don't have a license and they haven't done a residency. There are plenty of jobs for those and everything in between.

The other thing is that your status will grow over time, meaning that you will move up. It's natural because you're working on a multidisciplinary team, and there are some things only physicians can do in pharma. And on top of that, people look to physicians as leaders and managers. And so, there's always progress and more status and more responsibility if that's what you want.

And then the other thing is there's work-life balance. There's no such thing really as a 60 or 70 hour a week job in pharma. There might be times when you have to do something like that, depending on the level that you're at and what your role is. But typically you're going to work 40, 45 hours a week in almost any of these jobs.

And the way that you earn your money for the most part is just by seeing patients and doing procedures. It's completely volume driven. If you want to say, "Hey, I want to increase my income by 50%, what does that mean?" You got to see 50% more patients, do 50% more procedures or a combination of the two. Basically what you're saying is you have to increase your hours unless you can get a little more efficient. But mostly efficiencies are what they are.

The EMRs don't seem to be getting any easier. And so, you're locked in, you're basically locked in for the next 15, 20, 25 years to whatever you're doing. And if you want to try and make a little more money and get some bills paid off ahead of time or some loans, then that just means you got to not have time with your family, not see your kids and get burnt out. And so, that's the big difference between almost every nonclinical job and being a practicing physician.

So, let's talk about pharma. You have to have an understanding of pharma. We don't really get a good understanding in training. Yes, we hear about phase 1, 2, 3 studies, phase 4, post release, monitoring and patient safety and maybe drug safety, medication safety.

But do we really know how a pharma company works? Do we know how it's set up? I want to spend maybe five or 10 minutes the most, just so you understand, because then you'll understand where your options are for a job in pharma. And if you haven't really explored this before, then this is going to be important. You need to figure out where to go, what direction to take, because you can't really learn about everything in pharma in a short period of time. It helps if you understand it, and you can narrow it down.

There are usually about I'll say seven major divisions in almost any large pharma company. I'll start with the ones that you are not going to work in. Finance is huge. Sales and marketing, huge. Manufacturing, so far no physicians involved. Human resources, no physicians. Legal and regulatory. Well, if you're a MD/JD that might be an option. You can do that, but probably not.

Really it boils down to two major divisions and sometimes safety is broken out. But basically you've got research and development and medical affairs. There are obviously multiple. But to take it to the next step, the main departments within those major divisions are three, but might be four if you include one. One is regulatory. We don't do much in regulatory unless that's where they maybe will employ technical, medical writers that help translate the medical legal stuff into the package inserts and things like that.

But the big one is clinical development. Clinical development is kind of a piece of R&D. Because research and development can include preclinical research and development and bench work and things like that, animal studies. But once you get into human trials, now you're into clinical development. There are people in there, and I'll talk about them in a minute.

And then you've got medical affairs, which is another big massive area with different kinds of jobs. And I'll talk about the purpose of that. And then safety and pharmacovigilance, which is another area where there are a lot of jobs for physicians.

Now, there's one big thing, one big player in pharma that I haven't talked about. What about a CRO? What is a CRO? It used to be a contract research organization. Now when you start looking at contract research organizations or CROs that way, you'll come up often with a clinical resource organization.

At this point, I think they basically are very similar, if not the same. When I see something that's a CRO, it's usually smaller and focused on just two, three or four major activities of a pharma company. When I get into clinical research organizations, they seem to be bigger.

But the reason I bring up a CRO is because they hire a lot of these jobs, which support the pharma companies. Think about it this way. Pharma companies are like hot and cold. In other words, they spend years and years. I don't know how many years, it takes at least some eight to 10 years to bring a new drug to market. They spent all this time getting ready to release it, and then it's time to release it.

And leading up to that for about a year and then after it for about a year, there's a lot of activity that wasn't going on. And so, rather than hire a bunch of new people, have worked them for nine months, a year, two years and then firing all of them, they hire people from CROs. And because CROs serve multiple clients, multiple pharma companies, they can balance things out and try and maintain a steady crew of people that have long-term longevity with the CRO, but not with the pharma company.

Now, when they hire you, you work for the CRO, but there are relationships with pharma companies where you're simply a contract person. You may be someone who can be contracted and then hired, or they may actually do the hiring for the pharma company and you're actually employed by them. So it can work in different ways. Parexel, PRA Health, ICON, some of you may have heard of these. PPD. These are common CROs.

Everything from clinical design to actually running the studies, decentralized clinical trials across the country, medical writing, and then they help with clinical monitoring. They help with safety, they help with biostatistics, help with managing and handling patients. They'll do almost anything that a pharma company needs to do on a contract basis.

The advantage to this for you is that it's easier to find employment with a CRO than directly with a pharma company. Now if you're someone who has a master's degree in medical research and you've done studies as an undergrad or while you were in med school, you've got a master's degree in some related area, you could probably start with just applying it at pharmaceutical companies and maybe you already have contacts with them, which would be great, and there's no harm in doing that.

But at the same time, if you're someone who doesn't have any of those things, doesn't really have an obvious segue into pharma, but you're still interested in pharmacology, you still have managing drugs, and you have other interests, you like the lifestyle. You've read some of the information about the FDA and about clinical trials, you love looking through studies. Then a way to short circuit or shorten the process is to look at CROs as an option. And you should look at both really. And particularly if you're in a location where you don't want to travel or you don't want to move to another city or something for a job, you should look at both, see which pharma companies are nearby, which CROs are nearby.

Let's go through each of these departments and just quickly kind of give you an idea of what they do. Clinical development, pretty straightforward. These are the kind of jobs you'll see when you're looking on LinkedIn or Indeed and other places. Actually, the three places you should look for jobs when you really start looking and actually, if you're interested, you should start looking at job descriptions now, not because you're ready to apply, but you need to know what are the requirements, what's mandatory, what's nice to have, what's the language, what lingo comes up over and over that maybe you've not heard before because then it'll point you in the direction of things you need to learn.

But these are terms used in the clinical development part of pharma. Principal investigator, clinical researcher, medical director, medical monitor, and clinical research associate. There's others but if you see those kinds of terms, then you're probably talking about a clinical development job.

Medical director is pretty generic and you're going to find that in all divisions where there are physicians involved. Medical affairs, huge part of the company. Like I say, that's the company that has to take this new drug, and even before it has been finally approved by the FDA, get ready to get it out into the world, I guess is how I put it. And that includes everything from education and logistics and getting it delivered and advertising and marketing and all those things. There are people in that division or department that do those things. So, you might see a CMO, you might see a senior medical director, medical director, associate medical director.

And the other big one, which is very attractive to people who are getting started in pharma, is a medical science liaison. Now, if you get into safety or pharmacovigilance, it's the same thing. You can have medical advisors there a little more common, medical director, medical writers there as well as possibly the regulatory. And then safety scientists.

I bring up safety scientists because in one of the scenarios I'm going to talk about in a minute, if you're looking for a job in safety or pharmacovigilance, which are basically synonyms, different companies use different terms, and you do not have a license, you do not have a residency or board certification. The extent of your patient contact is basically in medical school. Then sometimes you can get a job as a safety scientist, which I'm going to explain in detail later. Notice medical is not in that term.

All right. Now I want to talk a little bit about compensation. It kind of gets back to what I was talking about under the objectives and when I made the statement about potential income. I don't have salary surveys for all of these different areas. It'd be almost impossible to do a salary survey for something let's say like a medical director in medical affairs because there's different medical directors over different areas.

There's a lot written about medical science liaisons. If you look up MSL or medical science liaison annual salary, it will pop right up and they do it every year. And the 2022 is the one I'm referencing here. They probably will publish the 2023 if they continue to do what they've been doing in early 2024.

But let me just say a little bit about salaries. A medical science liaison is probably like a medical monitor or something along those lines. Let's say even an assistant medical director. It could be down in the $180,000, that region. I think even medical science liaisons can sometimes start at $160,000. But you have to understand that a medical science liaison can be a physician, can be a PA, can be an NP, can be a PharmD. It's even possible sometimes they'll call some that's an MSL. That's a kind of master's or maybe even a bachelor's degree.

But a physician MSL is not the same obviously as a nurse MSL. And so the physicians get higher pay closer to $180,000 and the salaries go up from year one at about $160,000 let's say for the non-physicians and $170,000 for the physicians up to $220,000, $230,000 after 10 years. Now, most physicians in that period of time will have moved up the ladder, but just gives you an idea about jobs.

The other thing I found in talking with lots of physicians who have converted from clinical to nonclinical or non-traditional jobs is that sometimes they have to take a little bit of a hit. But when you compare apples to apples, if you're working 65 hours a week and getting paid, I don't know, $230,000 in a family practice clinic or something, and you become an MSL at $190,000, but you're working 45 hours a week, you can kind of do the math.

And then the other thing you can realize there is that the lifestyle is better because you have better work-life balance, as I said at the beginning. And you have absolutely no risk of being sued. I should add that to the beginning of this presentation on a comparison. If you work for pharma and other nonclinical jobs for the most part, you'll never be sued. It'd be one in a million. When you're a physician, it's more like at least 50% to 80%, depending, maybe a 100% in some specialties. So, you got to compare apples to apples.

But the other thing is, even if you do take a little dip, like I say, you'll very quickly move up in experience. You will be able to do a lateral move if you like, once you are experienced for a year or two. Because now you'll be able to apply for those jobs where they're looking for the experience and they're paying more or you'll move up in terms of promotions.

Physicians are usually one of the first ones that get promoted to the next job if they want to, if they want to take on more responsibility. But still, the hours are the same, the responsibility is different. It's maybe more, but you drop off the things that you don't need to do any longer. And so, you're still talking about a 40 or 50 hour job even as you move up the ranks.

Now let's get into the strategies to land your first job. I put it this way because that's really the crux of this whole thing. Once you've landed your first job in pharma or pretty much any other nonclinical field, that's where the biggest barrier is. That's the biggest challenge. And so, if you can get that first job, then you can A) settle in, enjoy your lifestyle, get to know your colleagues, learn what you're doing, look around, see if you like that job, and then decide, "Okay, I got some breathing room now. I can think about what do I need to do to advance, what do I need to do to get more of a salary?"

So, let's talk about some of those strategies now and break it down. And the way I'm going to do that is I'm going to use examples of people I've personally spoken with and the way that they did it.

There was a medical school grad from India and he came to the States, he passed his USMLE 1 and 2. Those are the exams you have to take. And then he decided he did not want to apply to a residency. He thought "I just don't want to go back and do three years of more work, get paid less than I really might be able to get paid doing something else." And he was really interested in pharmacology and thought strongly about getting a job in pharma.

Now, in the meantime, he did what a lot of foreign medical grads do is they keep busy doing things in the clinical setting. He started looking around and he spent a lot of time learning about the language, the vernacular in the safety field in pharma. He got involved in things. He learned a lot about patient care working as a doctor assistant. He knew about the EMR. He understood how quality in the outpatient setting was being assessed. I think he took some courses. He didn't get an advanced degree of any sort, and then he was able to, because he actually already met the requirements for a pharmacovigilance scientist because that's a master's level or a bachelor's level position. It doesn't mean he couldn't get paid more because he had the MD but a lot of the pharma positions are eligible for others than physicians.

And so, even if you don't have residency, a physician in pharma is usually at some level equivalent to a PharmD or a PhD. It's a simple way to think of it. And so, if they're willing to hire let's say a master's degree level for a pharmacovigilance scientist, they're going to do an MD as well.

But it's not going to get him at the salary that he wanted. He did that for a couple of years and then he started looking, he looked internally and he looked externally. And even though he only had two or three years of experience, he was able to convince another company to hire him on as associate medical director. And now if there's medical in the term most of the time except for medical science liaison, which includes those other specialties in other fields, but most of the time if it's associate medical director, medical director, executive medical director, that means it's a physician.

So, that's what he got. He got basically a job that most of the time would require at least five or six years of clinical experience after medical school. But he did it because he was able to start at that slightly lower position and then move up. Then I recently interviewed someone who went from family medicine to a primary investigator, which really intrigued me because when I thought of a primary investigator for some of these studies, I was thinking, "Okay, in my mind, the primary investigator is someone who comes up with the purpose of a study. They're interested in some topic. They say, okay, we need to do a study. We can use this drug or something that already exists and I'm going to design the study."

But it's not what a primary investigator is in a CRO or in most pharma companies. That would be a clinical researcher, although sometimes they will also be called a PI. But a PI, the way this physician is using it in this job is someone who's at a site and manages that site for that study.

The drug companies when they're trying to get a drug approved once they get to stage two and three, they need like 15,000 patients, I think. Something like that. It's an enormous number. And so, they've done it at multiple sites and they got to recruit to certain type of patients and randomize them and do that whole thing.

And that's done usually at a local clinical site, whether it's academic or it's a large group that's doing some kind of outpatient study. And so, they need people to basically take care of everything at that site, make sure all the protocols are followed, make sure the safety measurements are there. They may have to look at a patient if there's a question, should just be an inclusion or excluded. They'll look at paperwork or they'll actually physically look at the patient.

So, what she did, she was doing family medicine originally. She got a little frustrated doing just a broad family medicine. And so, she then started to add obesity medicine to her clinic where she was working. She was with a group though, she wasn't solo or anything like that. And after the pandemic, she was getting really burnt out and frustrated with that. So she decided to become a health coach.

And one of the things she did as part of that was she hired a business coach for herself. And so, she started to get coaching about how to create this business as a health coach, health advisor, how to set up a website, how to do your finances, how to understand accounting, how to manage things.

And one of the things they taught her was how to market both herself and her business. She used that to later on market herself and her profile LinkedIn to attract recruiters looking for these primary investigators. And she got in touch with a recruiter and basically that was it. It didn't take that much. I think the recruiter actually reached out to her, saw that she had these skills and a lot of it was just management and leadership skills plus her medical.

And so, she became a primary investigator. They trained her how to do that at the site where she's working or the company she's working for. It is a CRO. But she's put there and she may or may not end up working directly for the company. She doesn't really care at this point because her pay is good and her lifestyle's great and she's happy.

I think the barrier to getting an a pharma job is a lot lower than many of us have thought because all the guests I've had other than maybe one PhD and let's say maybe one who did have, definitely it was someone like Dr. Nerissa Kreher who's got a master's degree in clinical research. They didn't have any experience, but they had other experiences that demonstrated the skills.

And we're physicians, we can pretty much learn anything we put our mind to. They know that. They just want to make sure you're committed and you're not just doing the job or taking the job because you're just burnt out and you'll do anything. You need someone who wants to be in pharma.

Well, that's all we have time for today. During the complete presentation, I described the process that four other physicians followed during their pivot from clinical work to a pharma position. Then I summarize the other tactics to use during a career shift and share several free resources that can be obtained to help accelerate your pivot.

If you want to learn more about why landing your first pharma industry job is easier than you think, then check out the complete one hour recording of the wonderful world of nonclinical pharma careers at this link, nonclinicalphysicians.com/pharmajobs. That's all one word, nonclinicalphysicians.com/pharmajobs.

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The post Landing Your First Pharma Industry Job May Be Easier Than You Think – 311 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

PNC Podcast Blast from the Past Medical Communications Revisited – 207

John Jurica — Tue, 03 Aug 2021 10:00:42 +0000

Interview with Dr. Dana Carpenter

It is time to present a Blast from the Past Medical Communications Revisited. As I mentioned last week, I decided to bring back some of the classic episodes during this summer of 2021. Many are my most popular episodes. And they are as inspiring and informative today as they were when I first posted them (in my humble opinion).

Today I am revisiting my conversation with Dr. Dana Carpenter. She joined us originally in Episode #61.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country. It has over 700 graduates. And, the program only takes one year to complete.

Blast from the Past Medical Communications

It was an eye-opening interview introducing us to Medical Communications. Sometimes this term is used for any company that employs medical writers, such as a CME producer.

Be open to whatever comes your way and make the most of it. – Dr. Dana Carpenter

However, in this context, we’re talking about the firms that provide marketing and advertising services to pharmaceutical and medical device companies. They create ad copy for peer-reviewed medical journals and online publications, presentations for sales personnel, support for live events, and multimedia presentations for regional and national meetings.

Nonclinical Job With A Great Lifestyle

This job can be very attractive because it offers:

a great lifestyle,
infrequent travel demands,
opportunities for advancement, and
the possibility of working remotely from home.

There are hundreds of companies helping pharma companies with their marketing. And most of them employ medical directors in small teams dedicated to a particular drug or therapeutic class. And while most are located in large metro centers, working remotely is available at many of them.

Summary

Dr. Dana Carpenter provides excellent advice and insights in this blast from the past medical communications discussion. Since that interview three years ago, she has moved on to a new related job. But you can still connect with her on LinkedIn. And my plan is to bring Dana back for another visit to the podcast in the near future.

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode.

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Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton

Today's PNC Podcast Transcript

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Why Medical Communications Is the Best Nonclinical Career - 207

Interview with Dr. Dana Carpenter

August 3, 2021

John: Let's welcome Dana to the show. Good morning, Dana.

Dana: Hi, John. Thanks for having me.

John: I'm so glad you could be here, because I had heard about you as I was preparing to go to

the SEAK Conference, and then I was there, and I listened to your lecture, and it was so

informative. And I've never interviewed somebody about medical communication, so I

thought this would be perfect.

Dana: Oh, great. I'm excited to share my industry with folks that are either thinking about it, or

completely unaware. Kind of open their eyes to what we do.

John: Yeah. I think there's a lot we can possibly get into, but we'll try, and shoot for about 30

minutes or so, and answer at least the big questions, and we'll go from there.

Dana: Okay.

John: All right. Well, let's see. We'll jump right in. But, first, we can start maybe with you

giving whatever amount of background you'd like to give about yourself, and how you

transitioned. Because I know you were practicing full-time. How you made that

transition, and why you transitioned from your clinical career.

Dana: Sure. So, I guess I would start back when I was ... before I even became a doctor, I was

16, and I said to my mom, "You know, I think I want to be a doctor." Which came out of

the blue, there was really ... my dad was a scientist, but ... actually, an engineer. So, it

just rocked my mom a little bit. Anyway, when ... so, we pursued that path. And

followed it through, obviously. And it's funny, as I look back at that time in my life, I

actually wrote term papers in my English class about Toxic Shock Syndrome and it

seemed I was destined to go into medicine, specifically OBGYN, and of course that's the

career I needed up pursuing.

I took my undergrad in Champaign in Illinois and then I went to medical school at Rush

in Chicago, and when I got to my third-year rotation, I was over the moon excited to see

what OBGYNs really do because I had no idea. I'm not really not sure what convinced

me to say I wanted to be a doctor specifically an OBGYN.

I was so inspired by what they did, but at the same time I was a little bit frightened by it

because it seemed to really consume their life. I thought, "I'm going to do this." It's the

career path I chose, but I'm not going to do it my whole life. I didn't have a plan, though

how I was going to get out. Back then, no one prepared you to get out, so I went to

residency, then I went to practice, as you said I practiced for the better part of 10 years.

It was great. I was in an all-women?s practice. All my practitioners, my NP, we had an

intern at OBGYN, all were women. It was by women for women. It was really fantastic.

Probably the thing I loved the most about practice and we did the full complement of

course of medical and surgical OBGYN. The thing I loved most was patient relationships.

I was missing something and maybe it was creativity. I'm not sure what, but I knew

based on what I felt like I was missing and the fact that it was a very all-consuming

career. Once my loans were paid off, I was out of there.

At that point, I went to ... I guess I went into health communications inadvertently. I

started I guess a consulting company when I moved to Atlanta from Chicago called Dr.

Dana Health. I helped start up as chief medical office, an EHR start-up, helping them get

off the ground.

I did a lot of speaking engagements for different philanthropies. I guess I authored some

things. I actually have a website of my own and a podcast of my own, "a Minute for

Mom" was one of the podcasts that I would do and just talk for a minute about some

pregnancy related topic. I think that's how I got ?discovered? if you will in the health

communications arena. Because I made my way to CDM through a random recruiter

who found me through a little bit of health communications that I had out there on the

Internet.

Once I came to the health communications medical marketing arena, I just never looked

back. In that kind of appearance CDM where I did now for nine years, I guess. Actually,

nine years tomorrow.

John: Awesome, that's awesome. I'm doing these interviews, I'm talking to physicians about

career change and burnout comes up a lot, and other reasons you know. I think one of

the things that struck me when you were talking was that and I can relate to this, when I

went to med school in residency, I had no idea what it meant to even interact with a

patient. I have never touched a patient. I've never been in healthcare. I had no one in

healthcare with me, so you can imagine five, six, seven years later I didn't really know it

was going to be like this, you know?

It wasn't really burnout it was just like disillusionment, disenchantment. You had the

other external factors and they were nice, shiny things out there besides medicine. It's

very interesting. Okay, you made it to CDM. Was that like an eye-opener? Did you have

a pretty good idea what to expect? What was it that attracted you to that job?

Dana: Let's see, that's a good question. I'll tell you what, it felt like home the minute I got here.

I walked into a department of just MDs, PharmDs and PhDs. I remember the first day I

interviewed with all of them and they were all so in love with their careers. They oozed

energy and excitement about this, which you just don't see in medicine. When I told my

partner that was leaving practice, they basically said, "You're my hero" with a big sigh.

So sad.

Even when I came here everyone just had nothing but passion for what they did and you

couldn't help. It was just infectious, you just couldn't help to exude that yourself. I think

it's that. Look, I'm only been at CDM, so I want to say the culture here at CDM that

makes it so great, but because I don't know any other agencies from the inside it's hard

to speak to them. Certainly, the individuals that I know that have gone to other agencies

say the same thing.

It's the people that keeps them there. It's the work that's exciting beyond what we

would do in practice.

John: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Now, I know currently I think your official title is senior VP and

director of medical and scientific affairs, but I'm assuming you didn't step in as that.

What were they looking for? Someone is going to be listening and go, "Well, what am I

going to be doing if I go there? What would be the job I would actually be looking for if I

wanted to do what Dana has done?"

Dana: Absolutely. I came in as an associate medical director, a VP associate medical director.

When you come in that it's like the basement, entry-level position for a physician who

has practice experience. If you were to come straight out of either medical school or

residency, you might come in without the VP title because you may not have any kind of

practice, really tangible practice experience.

However, I had that and some communications experience, so I came in as a vice

president associate medical director, and I was really responsible for a couple of brands

in the anti-infective space and that was it. I was very much contained in my therapeutic

reach if you will. I was the medical expert on the team as a medical marketing and

advertising company. We run a kind of a Mad Men type agency, right? We've got

account people, copywriters, and art people, and medical people, and together we

make up a team.

We are the brain behind everything that we do here. We have to make sure it's

scientifically and medically accurate. That really was my job then, but as you can

imagine that was nine years ago. It was relatively basic. As time went on and titles grew,

I took on more brands. I expanded my therapeutic reach far beyond anti-infective. I

grew a women's health group here bringing in women's health business, which we

didn't have at the time. Took on direct reports, took on agency initiatives.

As you grow in this industry, you continue to do the same thing, right? You continue to

be the medical expert, but you do it for more and more brands in a much larger scale.

You begin to offer strategic direction to brands where initially you're just a medical

expert and then as you learn the business and understand the strategic thinking behind

the work we do, then you are able to help drive the direction that a brand is going to go.

John: Okay, so a couple more questions that are triggers. I take it like you said, the either

you're with or without the clinical experience after training basically that's all you need

is that, and a willingness to learn. You learn most of it on the job in terms of the other

side of that coin.

Dana: Absolutely. It's almost unfathomable to me how much I've learned here. So far beyond

medical school, residency, and even practice. Once you're in residency like you're just

focused on your specialty and here I have worked across so much different rare

diseases. A lot of brands that are primary care physicians like in the cardiovascular space

and the pulmonary space. The only thing I haven't touched is oncology I feel like

otherwise the breadth of my work has just really made me learn so much.

That's what so exciting about it. For example, when we have a new business pitch come

in, if it's for pulmonary arterial hypertension, and I'm the one's available to do the pitch I

have to learn to become that medical expert on pulmonary arterial hypertension even

though I'm an OBGYN. So, you do and it's so fun to learn, and then to share and teach.

Watch what we create out of that, but the growth is unbelievable.

John: Now, is there formal let?s say training when you come or is it more mentoring, or just

jumping in? How does that look?

Dana: It's a good question. There's all of that. At least the way we are set up and I hope other

agencies are set up where you have someone that's more senior to you that you meet

every week. They're responsible for helping make sure that you're understanding your

work and you're doing the work appropriately. Also, managing your career and

mentoring you, we have a formal Omni-Con health group university where we ... Oh my

gosh, we have so many classes that we can take, for example we can go to ... I'm trying

to remember what they call it.

It's like ad school, they call it. You can go for six weeks and learn just as yourself, and

outside of your medical role, and you can put on the hat of the account person or the

art person, and create an ad. Or you can go to your person presence class or a

PowerPoint specialty class. It's the amount of professional training that we have

available is great.

You do have to take advantage of it. It's easy to get sucked into the work and ignore that

sort of thing. Our managers try very hard to steer us in the right direction. It's so

valuable.

John: Yeah, I imagine you have to somehow weave that into the actual work that you're doing

day-to-day. You carve out the time. When you're talking about mentoring, when I was

working in hospital management, I learned a lot just from the person that was

supervising me. As you're reporting to the COO or CMO and it's like, "Okay, how do I do

this? You've done this before, I haven't." That works really well.

Dana: Absolutely.

John: I'm trying to get a sense of the size of CDM just for perspective. Are there other

physicians there, are there different teams, or is it one big team? How does that work?

Dana: Yeah, the way we're set up is, so our medical and scientific affairs department is MDs,

PharmDs, and PhDs. Right now, we only have two MDs. There was a time that we were

probably split more evenly, but we're down to two and then the rest are PhDs and

PharmDs at this point and time. We only have about 12 people right now, which is down

from when I came. That's just the way industry has gone because that was back in the

day of the blockbusters like the term "Viagra," which of course are now are off patents.

Brands are more from biotech companies with smaller budgets. We each do a little bit

more across different brands. We don't need quite as many medical directors, but again

we only two MDs right now. MDs bring an incredible value to the agency beyond what

PharmDs and PhDs can bring. Every specialty brings something really unique and their

perspective is super important, but MDs as you know the folks who have been in the

trenches and written the prescriptions, have seen the benefits for the patients or the

side effects.

We know how to talk to each other. We are the audience for whom we at CDM are

creating everything. It's so important to have MDs on staff. My department, like I said, is

about 12 people. We as a strategy group, our falls into a strategy group. There's a small

group of what we call "account planners." The medical and scientific affairs department,

we think of ourselves as the scientific storytellers if you will. Our job is to uncover

insights around what each VP and the opinion leaders think.

The account planners, they're more on the human insights as far as why do doctors do

what they do. Why do they prescribe what they prescribe and how can we change their

behavior? We have some digital strategists and together we are the strategy team. We

have a very large group of creative, which is made up of art and copy. Account, those

are the people who run the whole business.

Altogether right now, CDM is about 300 people I believe and that's just CDM New York.

That doesn't include all the CDMs around the world.

John: Okay, that helps put some perspective on it. One of the things that was a little bit fuzzy

for me before and I learned a little bit at the meeting, but what is the actual end

product? Because you had some slides that show here's what we're actually producing.

I'm thinking as a physician, "Well, you create some kind of advertisement or maybe a

handout for the MSLs to go out." Whatever, but it's sounded much broader than that.

Dana: It is. You're right. At CDM, at the most basic level, the ads that you see in the journals

are absolutely what we create. However, that's just the tip of the iceberg. While it's fun

to create an ad, everything that we can do based off of an ad, so the image that you see

in the ad is kind of our basic context we call it. From there, we create an entire iPad

presentation that the reps bring to you, right? They swipe through and if you pay

attention next time you will see that creative concept is pulled through everything that's

happened in that presentation.

The games that you play at the conferences where you try to get to the top of the

leaderboard. The virtual reality experiences that you run into at the conferences. Any of

the speaker programs that you go to. All the materials that you receive in the mail from

big pharma or small biotech. That's what we create everything that's communicated to

physicians comes from an agency like us, whether it's digitally communicated. Even the

website, we create website for the drugs, as well. The mechanism of action videos.

It used to be a very segmented, a very paper-driven creative output. We still of course

have ads, but it's not remotely the end of what we do for sure.

John: All right, I can tell that you're kind of passionate and you like your job. I was going to ask

you, so what is it exactly that you particularly like about either working for this company

or in general in medical communication, and marketing?

Dana: The people are great. They're all super smart. They're all really passionate. They all want

to learn. Even though we're the medical experts on the brand, the copywriters still have

to understand the literature, understand the data because they have to help craft

messages for it. The art people have to display that information graphically. Everyone

has to understand it.

You have people who are really interested in science, so that's really great. I think it's

the team environment, it's kind of like a practice where it's very energetic. There's a lot

of comings and goings as opposed to when I was doing healthcare consulting. It's kind of

just me. This environment is fun and energetic. It's just the opportunity to learn, learn,

learn is really great and keeps our minds active, and hopefully keeps us young.

John: Do you feel like that there's a certain type of person, a certain type of physician

personality type that would be most suited for this, or do you feel like there's a place for

different types? The very introverted versus the extrovert, what do you think?

Dana: That's a super great question. Yeah, here's what I would say. Marketing and advertising,

by and large, typically attracts more of the extrovert, right? Their reason for that is we

are in front of clients often. We go to conferences with clients. We do a lot of presenting

ourselves, either here at the agency or to clients. Typically, these are people who enjoy

interacting with others and talking about clients. Yeah, that's what I would say there.

Now, the other aspects of medical education from promo MedEd where it's still

promotional, you're still creating. Speaker programs and slides, in fact, I'm working with

campaign leaders all specifically for pharmaceutical companies that have bought specific

drugs. There's no advertising. You're just talking about the facts about a drug. There's

really nothing super creative about it that requires a great deal of writing. Perhaps less

presenting, so perhaps it's a nice place to start because there's little bit less client

interaction, and a lot more in office work that you do.

If you're a little bit timid about being out in front of clients right away promo MedEd is

kind of a nice hybrid. The place where I feel maybe the more introverted physicians

would be most comfortable is our publication planning. Publication planners typically,

again we still work with big pharma and small biotechs, but we work with them to write

abstracts, to write posters that we see at conferences like the Peer Reviewed Journal

articles was a ton of writing there.

The other interesting aspect of that is you also strategize with your team on what data

you're going to publish. Where are you going to publish is? Which journal? What other

data? Who's going to be your lead author? There's a whole line of thinking and

strategizing in writing. A lot less presenting in public and with clients. If you're really

introverted, publication planning might be a good place for you. It's quite a kind of nice

range, frankly.

John: Let's see, I just want to make sure that's crystal clear.

Dana: Okay.

John: You were talking about within the realm of medical communication. I guess the

advertising is one end and you talked in maybe the medical component. Then the one

you just mentioned was, what was it?

Dana: Publication planning.

John: Publication planning. Someone looking at this might find all three of those within an

agency and kind of sort out which would make most sense. Maybe?

Dana: They won't be the same in agency, believe it or not. There are agencies that focus on

advertising like ours.

John: Okay.

Dana: They're agencies that focus on public planning and agencies that focus on promo

MedEd.

John: Okay, got it, got it. It's all under the umbrella, but they're separate kind of specialties.

Dana: They are. I will tell you that the lines are starting to blur a little bit. We typically in a

marketing and advertising work with the marketing clients at pharmaceutical

companies. Promo MedEd agencies more interact with medical affairs and a little bit of

marketing. Publication planning is straight up medical affairs. The lines are starting to

blur a little bit in the industry, the pharmaceutical industry is looking for a little bit more

of the blended model like you said.

There are clients for whom we do some promotional, typical promotional MedEd work

that would normally fall into the advertising bucket. It's still something that we can do.

It's hasn't typically been in our purview. Writing, serving as a speaker for programs in

the evening, that sort of thing typically is a form of MedEd. We do that too and

sometimes they just ask for that. Sometimes you will find both within one agency.

John: Are there headhunters or recruiters out there that could help a physician sort through

this? I'm interested medical communication, but I'm more in this bucket versus another.

Dana: There are and shame on me for not figuring out how to find them before our call.

John: That's all right, as long as we know they're out there we can find them.

Dana: I'll tell you if you have anything on your LinkedIn that indicates in any way an interest in

health communications or any health communications experience, they will find you.

They're really helpful. I know they're industries where sometimes recruiter calls seem to

be overwhelming, but these recruiters are so specialized in what they do. They know

how to find the right people. Absolutely, I would go out there and look for the recruiters

in this industry, yes.

John: Now, can you talk a little bit ... That's helpful, thank you. Talk a little bit about the

lifestyle for your particular world there in advertising in terms of the time at work and

working from home, or not, and how much travels involved, things like that.

Dana: Sure. Working as a medical director, basically we're 9 to 5-ish I would say. What makes

us different is if you're working on a new business pitch. We're trying to win business

and there's like a two to four-week period where you're like really intense and in the

trenches, and really trying to knock out an amazing presentation in a very short amount

of time. You're going to probably work longer hours and perhaps over a weekend.

You might even travel. My first pitch, we traveled to Berlin, which is of course took extra

days over a weekend, but it was fun. The only other time you might work a lot of extra

hours is doing the drug launch. If a brand is coming to market and they get their FDA

approval, the day that they get their FDA approval is an exciting day here. It's something

we really celebrate, but then there is so much work to churn out within ... There's a very

specific timeline within X amount of hours and X amount of days, and X amount of

weeks. All of the things that have to be generated from places like that.

In that instance, you might work more, as well, but by and large, first of all there's no

call. There's no phone calls with agents. No answering service on the other line at 2:00

in the morning. Even all that aside, we really do work roughly 9 to 5, maybe 8 to 6.

There's a good work-life balance. I will tell you a fair number of people work remotely. I

have a handful of people who work from home a couple days a week. We have some

people who are always remote that live in Atlanta. We're in New York, they're in

Atlanta, or in LA. We make it work. It?s definitely a possibility to not have to come to an

office every day.

John: Sounds like there's at least a little flexibility. Maybe not the thing where mom wants to

stay at home and watch her two kids while she's working.

Dana: That would be hard.

John: That could be rough. For those who want a little flexibility and don't necessarily want to

commute an hour or two every single day, it sounds like it'll be very helpful. I guess

normally I ask two other questions, but I'm going to kind of lump them together. I'll just

say that if someone were interested in this aside from getting their name and some

keywords on their LinkedIn. Number one, what would be a couple of steps they should

take and on the flip side, what could be a really stupid thing they shouldn't do?

Dana: Good questions. I would say if you were not already communicating even if it's

something like tweeting, right? If your name is not out there, if you're not doing

podcasts, or vodcasts, don't have a YouTube channel you don't have to go that far, but if

you're not already communicating get out there and start communicating. Because

that's how people find you. Even if you're not great at it, you don't have to be polished,

but you just have to show that you have an interest in communicating, and your world

will open up. That's the first thing.

What wouldn't I do?

John: Or mistakes you think others make where they were trying to get with your company or

someone else, and it's like they shouldn't have done that, or said that.

Dana: That's a good question. I guess I would say it was just related to what I just said is don't

be off the grid. Because, again, people need to find you. The other thing is negative talk

in your head is so easy to let lend out, right? Because you're like, "I'm just a doctor. I

touch patients. I don't know what other skills I have." It's easy for that voice to take

over. I think the biggest mistake that we can make is to let that voice lend. We really

have to shut that down and translate our ability to talk to patients and to colleagues,

and to write into this industry.

There are ways to creatively translate what you might think is ordinary. For example,

maybe you wrote an article for your local newspaper about I don't know, diabetes.

However, that could be translated into authored and endocrinology article for ... I just I

think we have to give ourselves credit for the things that we think are just what we of

course do because we're doctors and not limit ourselves to just the things that we think

that's all we can do because we're doctors.

John: Okay, okay. I want to follow-up on that then. I want to think of other examples. Back to

the communications side and demonstrating. If somebody is writing articles even

because you can publish articles on LinkedIn. You can publish articles on Medium. You

can go publish with KevinMD or whatever. Anything like that showing that you're going

to address something and have some skill at writing that is going to be helpful is what

I'm hearing.

Dana: Absolutely. Honestly, that's how the recruiters are going to find you.

John: Okay. As far as a blog goes, I mean, it's so easy to start a blog. I mean, if somebody has

an interest and just a little bit extra time because it does take time to get started, and if

it's clinical, fantastic. I mean, it doesn't matter what it's going to be, not necessarily

creative per se.

Dana: No, absolutely. Right, our job what's interesting is you can be as creative as you want,

but we are in charge designing the ads. When the creative team puts together a

concept, we of course weigh on the concept. They want to know from a medical

perspective is it accurate and does it make sense, and how would it resonate with

physicians, but we don't have to create it. If you're super creative and want to be a part

of the creative process, rock on. You don't have to be.

John: Awesome, that's great. Well, that has answered a lot of my questions here. Any other

last bits of advice you'll give to anyone's who's thinking about transitioning that we

haven't touched on already?

Dana: No, I think that's it. I think I would leave it with what I said before, which is don't think

you only know how to be a doctor. Your skills are very translatable and to be really

open. It can me, I imagine, it could be very daunting to come into this very corporate

world from particularly if you were in a small private practice. Somehow, I didn't find it

daunting and I think because I just rolled with the changes. I was just open to whatever

came my way. I would encourage people just to be open to whatever comes their way

and make the most of it.

John: All right. Awesome. Those are good words of advice. I'm sure this is going to generate

some questions. Is there a way one of my listeners could follow-up with you without

overwhelming you on LinkedIn, or some other way they can contact you?

Dana: Sure, sure, sure. I don't honestly know how to communicate how to find me on

LinkedIn. I don't know what I'm supposed to say except that I'm on LinkedIn.

John: You're on LinkedIn because, yeah, I can find a link. I can just put it in the show notes.

Dana: Okay, fantastic.

John: Have the ability to contact you without calling your cellphone or something.

Dana: Sure yeah. They can reach me at my work email is the easiest, which is

dcarpenter@cdmny.com. I have a Gmail account that is of course linked to my LinkedIn,

but I don't check it as readily. If somebody wants to find me, find at the CDM is the

easiest way to do.

John: I guess before we go, I do want to ask another question that I forgot about. You had

provided a handout, it was called "the MM&Ms Agency Solar System," which I'll

probably put a link in there because it's just gives an idea of the number and the scope

of companies who are doing this.

Any comment you want to make about that handout? It's a little overwhelming in some

ways.

Dana: It's very overwhelming, but yeah, I would definitely encourage you to share it, and

definitely encourage people to look at it. As I recall, it does indicate which agencies are

patient or pub-planning. You really can learn a lot if you take some time, see which

agencies do what, and then Google them. That would encourage your listeners to start

Googling around to these agencies and start with the Holding Company and see what

agencies fall under them. And what those agencies do and what interests them, and

what doesn't.

Yeah, I think that page has over 150 agencies somehow. It is definitely overwhelming.

It's a great resource and I have to admit, I did find out one of the people who work for

found it. Hats off to them because it's a great handout. I'm glad you're going to share it.

The only downside to the handout and it doesn't give you locations. Your listeners might

want to know that. Largely, the agencies are located in the northeast. Where we are

now, right in New York, has an abundance of them.

Sometimes in New Jersey and California have the next highest concentration and that's

largely because the pharmaceutical companies are. That's where the agencies are.

There's a splattering, again, there's over 150 agencies in this country and they are across

the nation. Much more concentrated in the Midwest go out in between California and

the Midwest. Again, like we talked about earlier, working remotely is a possibility. If you

happen to live in Colorado, I wouldn't rule out the possibility.

John: Okay, okay. I would think just looking these up, seeing what they do, start to look for

some keywords, what are they looking for? It's part of the research if you're really

thinking of changing a career.

Dana: Absolutely.

John: That is very useful. I was so glad that you had that for us at the talk at the SEAK meeting.

Dana: Yeah good.

John: All right, Dana. A lot of content, a lot of fantastic information, and obviously your

passion is coming through. There's very few ... When I interview people there's a few

careers that people are really happy and almost never leave. This sounds like this could

be potentially one of them. I want to put that on the top of my list.

All right, I guess with that I have no other questions. I guess I'll sign off now and say

goodbye.

Dana: Thanks for having me on, John. I really enjoyed it.

John: It's been my pleasure. Take care.

Dana: Thanks, you too.

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How to Shine as a Technical Medical Writer – 155

John Jurica — Tue, 11 Aug 2020 10:30:23 +0000

Interview with Dr. Kaci Durbin

In this week's PNC Podcast episode, Dr. Kaci Durbin describes her journey from obstetrical hospitalist to technical medical writer.

Kaci received her medical degree from the University of Illinois College of Medicine. She completed her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Louisville Hospital. She later completed an MBA while in practice, at Southern Illinois University.

In addition to board certification in obstetrics and gynecology, she holds a certification from the American Medical Writers Association.

She was employed at a private practice for 5 years and then transitioned into OB hospitalist work. During her time as a hospitalist, she began part-time freelance medical writing, creating a variety of materials including CME materials, needs assessments, manuscripts, and presentations.

She then worked as an independent contractor for a CRO. This Contract Research Organization later offered her a full-time position as a technical medical writer.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country, with over 650 graduates. And, unlike other programs, which typically run 1 – 1/2 to 2 years, this program only takes a year to complete. Recently, Economist Magazine ranked the business school #1 in the world for the Most Relevant Executive MBA.

While in the program, you'll participate in a company project, thereby contributing to your organization. As a result, the University of Tennessee PEMBA students bring exceptional value to their organizations.

Graduates have taken leadership positions at major healthcare organizations. And they've become entrepreneurs and business owners.

By joining the University of Tennessee physician executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills needed to find a career that you really love. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office by calling (865) 974-6526 or go to nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.

How To Transition to Technical Medical Writer

Kaci became dissatisfied early in her clinical career. She tried out several nonclinical side jobs while working clinically. And she discovered that medical writing was a popular option for other physicians. So, she decided to pursue a career as a freelance medical writer.

She joined the AMWA and became certified. To help create her freelance business, she took Emma Hitt Nichol’s medical writing course.

After the course, Kaci started contacting CME companies and landed several freelance jobs. Then she stumbled across technical writing and worked for a CRO as a technical medical writer. That led to a full-time job with the CRO.

I think, once I got a couple clients and I started writing for them, it snowballed from there. Then they would refer me to someone else. Another job would come up.

Now she mainly writes clinical trial protocols and clinical study reports. Kaci enjoys helping to design clinical trials. And she continues to do part-time freelance medical writing through her company, KD Medical Communications.

Resources for Medical Writers

Kaci mentioned important steps for aspiring medical writers to follow:

Add a profile on AMWA
Including “medical writer” and related terms in your LinkedIn profile
Create a web site with examples of your writing
Join and engage in pertinent Facebook groups
Search job listings on the Look for Zebras website
Search for jobs on the Virtual Vocations website

SUMMARY

Kaci determined early in her clinical career that she didn't enjoy that work. She began exploring other part-time jobs. She obtained an MBA, thinking that she wanted to go into hospital leadership. But her early experiences did not support that idea.

She discovered medical writing and really loved it. Then, she pivoted from CME writer to technical medical writer and found her niche. She graciously shared the story of her journey and provided inspiration and advice that listeners will find encouraging.

Links for Today's Episode

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There is an automatic Free Trial. So, this is a no-risk opportunity to connect with experts and begin your career transition today.

To check it out, head to the Clinicians Career Cooperative.

Imagine what it will be like 6 to 12 months from now to start a fulfilling career, and leave behind the headaches, long hours, and constant threat of a lawsuit. Joining the Cooperative is the first step on that journey!

So head over to the Clinicians Career Cooperative.

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And to make it even easier, listeners to this podcast can get a one-month Trial for only $1.00, using the Coupon Code TRIAL at nonclinicalphysicians.com/joinnca.

Thanks to our sponsor…

Thanks to the UT Physician Executive MBA program for sponsoring the show. It’s an outstanding, highly rated, MBA program designed for working physicians. It is just what you need to prepare for that fulfilling, well-paying career. You can find out more at nonclinicalphysicians.com/physicianmba.

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Many of the links that I refer you to, and that you’ll find in the show notes, are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so has no effect on the price you are charged. And I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you, that I have personally used or am very familiar with.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. It should not be construed as medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counselor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career.

The post How to Shine as a Technical Medical Writer – 155 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

Should I Work for a Contract Research Organization? – 124

John Jurica — Wed, 08 Jan 2020 13:00:00 +0000

Interview with Dr. Michelle Bailey

This week, I bring you my conversation with a former academic pediatrician who now works as senior medical director for a contract research organization, or CRO.

Dr. Michelle Bailey knew she wanted to be a pediatrician since she was 12 years old. She received her medical degree from State University of New York (SUNY) Downstate Health Sciences University and completed her pediatrics residency at Duke University Medical Center. She trained in the Integrative Medicine Fellowship through the University of Arizona, and served on the faculty of Duke University School of Medicine for 18 years.

Michelle worked in a demanding academic setting for many years. Then a medical scare helped her realize she needed a change. Now, she works full time as a medical director for a contract research organization, and part time as a career development coach for physicians.

Our Sponsor

We're proud to have the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program, offered by the Haslam College of Business, as the sponsor of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest-running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country, with over 650 graduates. Unlike other programs, which typically run 1 – 1/2 to 2 years, this program only takes a year to complete. And Economist Magazine recently ranked the business school #1 in the world for the Most Relevant Executive MBA.

University of Tennessee PEMBA students bring exceptional value to their organizations. While in the program, you'll participate in a company project, thereby contributing to your organization.

Graduates have taken leadership positions at major healthcare organizations. And they've become entrepreneurs and business owners.

By joining the University of Tennessee physician executive MBA, you will develop the business and management skills you need to advance your career. To find out more, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office by calling (865) 974-6526 or go to vitalpe.net/physicianmba.

What Do You Want?

Michelle worked as an academic pediatrician for over 20 years, when she began to experience symptoms of burnout. One day she developed chest pain and sought medical care at the insistence of a colleague.

She had not suffered a cardiac event. But she took the episode as an indication that she needed to make a change in her career. She needed more balance and less stress.

She realized that she had reached a point where she was neglecting her health for the sake of her career. So, she began asking herself questions to determine what she wanted for herself at that stage of her life.

A friend of hers had recently transitioned from clinical practice to a pharma job at a contract research organization. Michelle knew nothing about the CRO world. But she was willing to learn. When the opportunity presented itself, it turned out to be a perfect fit.

When we enter a job, sometimes it works for us based on that stage of life we're in. But then as life continues there's marriage, and children, and other things that are happening… taking care of aging parents. Sometimes what we need can shift based on that next stage of life.
Dr. Michelle Bailey

Working for a CRO

CROs are companies that pharmaceutical, biotech and device companies hire to run their clinical trials. As a medical director, Dr. Bailey collaborates with a multidisciplinary team to bring new drugs to market.

She presents at bid defense meetings. These are similar to sales meetings where she shares her expertise to try to win contracts for her company. She also reviews safety narratives developed by pharmacovigilance teams to ensure they make sense.

Michelle enjoys her role at the contract research organization. Many CRO medical directors have training in internal medicine or family medicine. But Michelle says not to rule yourself out based on your specialty. She has been quite successful with her pediatric background.

According to Michelle, physicians have advantages in this industry simply based on their experience working with patients and families. However, there are other skills that can be valuable if you want to work for a CRO:

leadership skills,
teaching experience,
research background,
understanding the clinical drug development process, or
experience working on an investigational review board (IRB) or ethics committee.

There are several roles for physicians at a contract research organization. If not qualified as a medical director, a physician could also pursue:

a medical monitoring role,
work as a safety physician within a pharmacovigilance department, or
a clinical research associate job providing onsite monitoring.

Work-Life Balance at a Contract Research Organization

Michelle’s role has given her the flexibility she was looking for at this stage in her career. She works full-time from home, travels relatively infrequently for short business trips, and maintains regular work hours with weekends and holidays off.

The career change has offered her a more balanced lifestyle. And with the newly acquired free time, she started coaching physicians in career development.

Looking back, Michelle is very happy with her career working for a contract research organization. And she believes that every physician can find the job that's right for them, many of which may be in the pharmaceutical industry.

Michelle is also an excellent career coach. And she has made THIS GUIDE TO EARNING INCOME OUTSIDE YOUR MEDICAL PRACTICE available to you. Just follow the link.

Links for today's episode:

DrMichelleBailey.com
Dr. Bailey on LinkedIn
Dr. Michelle Bailey's Free Guide to Earning Income Outside Your Practice
Email Dr. Bailey at michelle@drmichellebailey.com

Thanks to our sponsor…

Thanks to the UT Physician Executive MBA program for sponsoring the show. It’s an outstanding, highly rated, MBA program designed for working physicians. It might be just what you need to prepare for that joyful, well-paying career. You can find out more at vitalpe.net/physicianmba.

I hope to see you next time on the PNC Podcast.

If you enjoyed today’s episode about this business coach and consultant , share it on Twitter and Facebook, and leave a review on iTunes.

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton.

Disclaimers:

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. It should not be construed as medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counsellor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career.

Right click here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

Here are the easiest ways to listen:

vitalpe.net/itunes or vitalpe.net/stitcher

The post Should I Work for a Contract Research Organization? – 124 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

CRO Archives - NonClinical Physicians

Embrace Stage 2 of the 12 Month Roadmap to a New Career – 312

Months 2 Through 4

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Navigating Your Nonclinical Career Path: A 12-Month Roadmap

Navigating Stage Two: Building Networks and Enhancing Credentials

Join a Professional Organization

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Summary

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Landing Your First Pharma Industry Job May Be Easier Than You Think – 311

What I've Learned from My Guests

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Compelling Advantages of Nonclinical Pharma Careers

Exploring Opportunities and Roles in Pharma Companies

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PNC Podcast Blast from the Past Medical Communications Revisited – 207

Interview with Dr. Dana Carpenter

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Blast from the Past Medical Communications

Nonclinical Job With A Great Lifestyle

Summary

NOTE: Look below for a transcript of today's episode.

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How to Shine as a Technical Medical Writer – 155

Interview with Dr. Kaci Durbin

Our Sponsor

How To Transition to Technical Medical Writer

Resources for Medical Writers

SUMMARY

Links for Today's Episode

Download This Episode:

The Clinicians Career Cooperative Is Live

The Nonclinical Career Academy Membership Program recently added a new MasterClass!

Thanks to our sponsor…

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton

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Should I Work for a Contract Research Organization? – 124

Interview with Dr. Michelle Bailey

Our Sponsor

What Do You Want?

Working for a CRO

Work-Life Balance at a Contract Research Organization

Links for today's episode:

Thanks to our sponsor…

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