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Working in a pharmaceutical or biotechnology company often means interacting in a cross-matrix environment. Project teams are made up of people with different responsibilities. They represent different functions, and they all come together to work on a project. Team members may have conflicting priorities and motivations, and even the team leaders are not their direct managers. Therefore, learning to “influence without authority,”  that is, to influence others without directly managing them, is a useful skill for succeeding in this work environment 

Woman needs to influence without authority in virtual team meeting on her laptop
Influencing without authority is even more challenging in today's virtual work environment. Image by Jagrit Parajuli
...continue reading "Proven Strategies to Influence Without Authority on Cross-Functional Teams"

Hisani Madison and I met as trainees in the NCI Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program. She recently transitioned from working at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to AstraZeneca. Of course, I was really intrigued about her transition from the FDA to working in pharma. I also thought that maybe our blog readers might be interested in this too! So I asked her to answer some questions for this blog post. Thank you to Hisani for being so generous in sharing her experiences with us!

Hisani Madison, tansitioning from FDA to working in pharma
Photo courtesy of Hisani Madison
...continue reading "Transitioning From the FDA to Working in Pharma"

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Am I doing what is right for me, or should I change direction?

Navigating through one’s career might seem daunting for some healthcare research & development (R&D) professionals. Defining objectives and tangible milestones can help deconvolute the process.

Michelle Chen, Technical Sales Consultant at Lucideon, shares her best learnings on how to actively take strides towards staying professionally fit for her future. She walks us through the journey of making her leap as an accomplished R&D scientist at Johnson & Johnson to a commercial business-driven role at Lucideon.

Woman looking at two different paths to choose from
A career path is full of choices. Photo by Burst
...continue reading "Guest Post: Why I Left a Fortune 500 Company For a Company With Less Than 500 People…"

Editorial note: Pharma often features prominently in the U.S. political news, from Trump blaming pharma for the impeachment probe to lowering drug pricing. Medicines and health technologies play an integral role in health systems around the world. Thus, it's really important that we, professional women in pharma, play a role in advocacy. We can make an impact as experts on relevant topics as well as constituents affected by policies. But as busy professionals, how do we get involved with the causes we care about? I recently met Dr. JoEllen McBride, Advocacy Director of a local women in science group; I asked her to write this guest post to help women in pharma get started in advocacy.

...continue reading "Time for Advocacy: Getting started with advocacy for high impact – Guest post"