It was May 2013 and I found myself in a small meeting room on the seventh floor in an office building in Euston, London. It was a clear and bring spring day. A few spots of cloud covered the sky.
I sat there in my suit and tie patiently waiting for my interviewers to come in and grill me. As I glazed over the London skyline, I could see the Shard, the Walkie Talkie building and I remember thinking to myself, “It would be a dream to work here!”.
I had graduated as a Pharmacist and finished my clinical training the previous year. I had also just returned back to London after spending 5 weeks back at the University of Nottingham starting a PhD in Biophysics…and then quitting it.
Being in that room is a vivid memory for me. As I sit here nearly 10 years on, little did I know that was the start of a career in the field of Pricing and Market Access. In the last 9 and a half years, I’ve worked with a range of consultancy companies as well as directly with pharma and biotech.
I have been employed for four and half years and spent five years as a freelance P&MA consultant. In that time, I had also Founded another business called Thriving Scholar. Our mission is to create effective and powerful impact-driven leaders. Via my work at Thriving Scholar I’ve coached a number of working professionals, executives, teams, and organisations to become better and transform the way they operate and lead.
In this article, I share 5 career lessons I would share with my younger self. So, whether you have an ambition to start your career in the pharmaceutical field, or whether you’re confused, or maybe you’re already a few years into your role – these lessons could transform the way you see your career and who you are being in it.
We’ve all been educated in a very rigid education system and like me, you’ve probably been brought up being asked “what do you want to do when you get older.” Making a career decision and sticking to it for the rest of your life is what people did in the industrial revolution. But we live in a completely different world today.
I started my career in the P&MA field thinking this was going to be it for the rest of my life. I looked at how people senior to me got to where they got to and thought I needed to follow the exact same path because that was the only way to get there.
This kind of thinking caused feelings of being trapped. It dampened my creativity. There was no room for exploration. No room for creation. No room for expanding myself beyond what I’ve seen others do. Luckily, I dropped this kind of thinking that allowed me to create my own path. Most people in the field don’t freelance after 4 and half years of experience.
What would I tell my younger self: there is no set career path. There is a typical career path but you can be creative and create your own, if you choose to.
I’ve worked on projects I really didn’t enjoy at stuck in the office at 11pm and I’ve worked on projects I found fun, fulfilling, and that allowed me to travel to different countries. I’ve worked with people I get along with really well and others who aren’t my kind of vibe.
Early in my career, I was naïve and slightly “entitled”. I only wanted to work on projects and in teams that I enjoyed only. I spent a lot of energy trying to fight against projects I didn’t want to be on. But I’m glad life didn’t work like that because there would be no room for growth, challenges, and learnings!
I learned the importance of having a mindset of scientist. A scientist experiments every day. They are not expecting things to be so perfect. They are failing their way to findings. They are gaining clarity.
Just like a scientist has an experimenter’s mindset, I would tell my younger self to embrace experimenting. Get involved with projects and teams. If you don’t like it, take it as a good thing that you’re finding clarity. The more you experiment the greater the clarity. The greater the clarity, to more likely you are to navigate and find the area you love working in. Sometimes, we need to know what we don’t want and what we don’t like to then understand what we do want.
What would I tell my younger self: Embrace working on different projects with different people. Even if it isn’t initially attractive. The more experiments you conduct the greater likelihood of finding your breakthrough.
I was brought up in an Indian family. Stereotypically, that means education over everything! Apparently, a good degree under your belt and your life is sorted. I couldn’t express how incorrect that is in my experience.
You don’t get paid for the degree you’ve got. No one cares if you went to Cambridge and did the most amazing PhD. What they care about is the value you are bringing into the marketplace. A PhD at Cambridge could help with bringing your value, but I’ve worked with people who are highly academic but in the world of business, they can’t communicate and don’t have what it takes to lead projects.
It’s important to also note that you don’t get paid for being passionate. Passion helps and it a bonus, but ultimately, you get paid in the marketplace for the value you provide. So, focus on becoming valuable to your teams and clients. Always be asking the question, how can I become more valuable? What does my team/employer define as value? Make sure you know that.
What would I tell my younger self: Make sure you are clear on how your seniors, your team, and your clients define as value and focus on becoming a person of value.
Your career is in your hands. Most people follow the herd and the general trend. There’s nothing wrong with that if doing so consciously. But most people follow the path and then complain about their career. There were times I had complained in my career about not being promoted, about the companies I worked in or whatever, and doing so I was out of my creative power.
Complaining about something doesn’t make it any better. Actually, the more we focus on complaining the bigger it gets. I would tell me younger self to take more responsibility. Take ownership. If you’re not getting the job you want, stop blaming the marketplace. You have no control over that. You have control over how you respond. The conversations you have, the way you speak, the value you bring etc.
When you take responsibility, you are now in your power. You can create. You can focus on what you can control and act from there.
What would I tell my younger self: Take 100% responsibility of your career. When you catch yourself complaining, ask yourself the question “what would 100% responsibility look like?”
Finally, all too often it’s easy to forget work can be fun. You’re allowed to make it fun. For most of you reading this, your work isn’t life and death. Taking things too seriously can dampen performance in your role. Prioritising fun in our careers helps out best selves into our roles.
There are times I’ve made mistakes in projects and messed up presentations and felt like my life was over. Its ok! It’s not that serious. Work doesn’t define who you are, more so it can be an expression of who you are if you allow it to be. Bring your uniqueness and your energy into the role – it’s what makes you unique.
Over time, people got to know me as the P&MA consultant who also coaches people. It’s my own unique style and when P&MA teams hire me to projects, they get the best of both worlds.
For you that might be being the hockey player or the person who loves running. Whatever it may be, bring it all to the table.
What would I tell my younger self: Stop taking it so seriously having fun could get you out of your own way!
I hope these lessons are of value to you and inspire you to flourish in your career!
Jaineel Mistry is a freelance P&MA consultant and a Founder of Thriving Scholar. He also hosts the Lead From Within Podcast. He has coached a number of individuals to flourish in their careers. He also trains teams to become effective and high performing.
You can listen to the Lead From Within Podcast here on Apple or Spotify.
Apple:
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/lead-from-within-podcast/id1630132435
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2mcMwFFsMBOUUOKKuHY8Dw?si=04a63bdb6e5341ec
You can contact him via email: [email protected] or LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaineelmistry/