Monday, December 9, 2013

Getting a job in the medical device industry PART 1

If I'm qualified to speak on anything, it's how to get a job in industry.  I've had more success in finding industry work than anything I've ever done, and I've been invited to 12 separate talks at universities and conferences to disseminate this information in two years.  For the record, I applied for 12 positions, got 10 interviews, and 9 offers.  These were all senior level positions as either an engineer, scientist, or engineering scientist, and all with medical device companies, large and small. This is my experience, and I'm sure some HR people might not agree. This worked for me though, and I was sure to talk this over with HR people.  But each company, recruiter, and hiring manager will be a little different.  The job hunt process is a long process, so I'll split this up into a couple posts.

First up, find jobs.  Look at your favorite companies and peruse the postings, and look for consolidated sites.  I used indeed.com.  It's pretty solid, but I'm sure there are others out there.  Do the search for what kind of position you want, and bookmark the jobs that YOU FIT.  Some people say to take a shotgun approach and apply for positions that they're definitely unqualified for, however, you're wasting everyone's time - including your's.  So find the jobs that you think you're a good fit for and begin taking notes on what's important and what's not important.  Try and get a feel for exactly what they're looking for.

Next up, spend at least 80 hours of your life on your resume. Give it to at least 10 people in different roles in the industry you want to enter. Or cycle it amongst students, faculty, and staff. The ideal resume is at max, two pages, is written in a combination of functional and chronological, and has a flow with distinctive sections. The key here is to have a resume that will woo a computer. 

Why a computer, you ask? Each posting has key words and phrases that the hiring manager most cares about. And without someone on the inside to bypass the computer for you, your resume needs to have these keywords to get to the recruiter. Now, there's two aspects to tuning your resume: direct and hidden key phrases. 

Direct ones are directly from the posting. For example, "utilize direct knowledge of cardiovascular principles to design new medical devices and evaluate devices with statistical principles."  In this case, your resume needs to have that you know a) the CV system, b) device design, and c) statistics (or sadistics, as a friend calls it).  The resume will most likely run through an automated search routine looking for these terms before a human even looks at it. Before I continue, a little rant:

What the fuck are we paying recruiters to do?  From what I've seen, some program does all the hard work for them. A candidate uploads her resume to the company's career site, then an automated program decides whether the recruiter sees it. Now the recruiter has a significantly reduced pile that he just has to skim to determine if the recruit is called. The recruiter calls the candidates with decent looking resumes (decent looking being the symmetry, distinct sections, fonts, flow, some content) then passes on those that talk semi-competently on the phone to the hiring manager. The hiring manager does the rest of the interviewing with the recruiter only stepping in to place offers and schedule on-site interviews. Can't all the recruiters be replaced with a travel agent and the hiring manager just take care after the computer? I understand there are some legal issues. But recruiters need to start actually looking at resumes again. Get off your asses, and out the software creators out of business!  Your missing great scientists that can't necessarily play the recruiting game!

But I digress. 

Hidden phrases and words are the key phrases that you think they're looking for. Recruiters know exactly what the hiring manager is hunting for, and having hidden phrases prevents tailoring the resume based on the posting since everyone worthwhile will be tailoring based on the direct words in the posting. The key here is to read the posting a couple times, look at the company and direction, and try to figure out exactly what they're looking for. There are key phrases in the search algorithm or recruiter's head that they don't post online. This makes filtering applications even easier for recruiters since those that are not truly fit for the work will not have the hidden words. Now, you might have these hidden phrases embedded in your resume already since you have the proper experience, however, chances are that you don't. You will get through the filter if you can figure this out. For example, the posting is a generic scientist posting in a medical device company that does GI. You cover the things that are listed up-front in the posting, but you don't have GI experience. You need to look at the company direction, say they're working on new proton-pump inhibitors, or you saw recent patents or conference abstracts on a new stomach stapling procedure.  You also need to figure out if this is a position where you will be in the lab, clinic, working on a computer or on animal models, etc. You can gleam this from words like "hands-on" "hospital", etc.  But you have to figure out what you think they're looking for to insert these key words and phrases in the resume. Or, if you have an insider, have them find out.

For example, one offer I got with a mid-sized major medical device company was pretty generic: drug-delivery scientist. From the posting they wanted a generic scientist: polymer experience, simulation experience, material science, etc. I went deep into the company online and made a conclusion that they're shifting company focus to loading drugs onto existing devices since none of their current products have drug-elution. I also noticed the use of a particular drug, paclitaxel, in one of their European studies. Simple detective work. So I tailored my resume to say less of the stuff they wouldn't find useful, and put in more of the polymer, drug delivery, and paclitaxel language. I got a call in two days. The offer didn't come until a couple months later (I'll talk about timeline in a little).

Work on that resume! I'll post part two later on. 

5 comments:

  1. Thanks for this. How far should one go back in the resume, and how much space should be dedicated to each section? I am trying to move from academia to industry, and I do not know where to start.

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    1. I wouldn't go more than a decade back unless you have so few positions that they won't take up too much space. I would dedicate as much space to qualifications as your chronology. What's more important is to have the proper details related to the position and a good flow to the resume. Best of luck!

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  2. Thank you, this is really helpful! I am trying to leave academia as well. Your advice is great!

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  3. Your approach to this topic is unique and informative. I am writing an article for our school paper and this post has helped me. Thanks.

    TOSHIBA PVM-375AT

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