Career Development in the Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Industry
You're a busy woman. You have work, family, friends, and hobbies all vying for your attention. How do you find the time for all of them without being overwhelmed? Perhaps, you know someone who constantly says yes to extra projects at work, overcommits socially, or takes on too many extracurricular activities for her kids. How do you know when it's time to say no? I want to share a handy tool that I’ve created to help you decide whether extra activities are worth your time.
Women often have higher-pitched voices. Due to unconscious or implicit biases, we might think that higher-pitched voices make women sound less threatening. However, women with higher-pitched voices can also sound less credible. They may be criticized that they don't project confidence. As a result, such perceptions can have a significant impact on women in the pharmaceutical workplace.
Advice directed at women often includes voice coaching to deepen their voices. By contrast, rather than changing the pitch of their voices, we suggest that women can project confidence in other important ways. All women's voices, no matter their pitch, should be heard and normalized so that society no longer considers anything inherently negative or wrong with a higher-pitched voice.
Recently, I was listening to an episode of Adam Grant's WorkLife podcast on psychological safety. Psychological safety is the ability to feel that it is acceptable to speak out at work without fear of retribution. Workplaces that create a feeling of fear for speaking up or letting known an unpopular opinion compromise their ability to put the best products or services forward. Lack of psychological safety also creates an ineffective work environment in which employees do not feel that their opinions matter. The podcast episode made me think about the impact and importance of creating psychological safety in working environments in the pharmaceutical industry.
Working with an executive or career coach can help you design the changes you need to propel your career in the direction you desire. I had the pleasure of interviewing Joanne Yawitz who has over 30 years of experience as an executive recruiter, executive coach, and career coach. In this interview, we explored everything you need to know about working with a coach for your career growth.
Here, we feature a guest post by Sandra Torres. She shows us how to leverage a company's annual report to set performance goals.
