Our 4th Career Paths for Postdocs Seminar (CaPS) was on “Jobs in Industry” which was high in demand by our audience. As the industry field is extremely broad, we will cover other industry jobs in future events. For the October seminar, we invited Maria Genua, a Biotechnology Sales and Tech Transfer manager at GAIKER Technology Centre in Spain.
Maria started her presentation with a quick overview of her career path. Later in her talk, she shared with us some intriguing questions from when she was doing her first postdoc. She asked herself for example, if she liked the research topic, how staying in academia was going to affect her personal life and shared her thoughts about her future perspectives.
After giving everything careful thoughts, Maria took a leap of faith and jumped ship. She moved to Germany and started looking for opportunities in industry. She prepared her CV by using industry appropriate wording that highlighted her PhD and Postdoc skills such as communication, time and project management, and social interactions. After 3 months waiting time and sending her CV to several companies, she finally heard back from one place and got the job after two phases interview at Botiss Biomaterials. There, she worked as “scientific and market advisor” and later as “international sales and marketing manager” for almost 3 years. Weighing her personal and professional options, she decided to move to Gaiker Technology Center, where she is currently working as “sales and technology transfer manager”. Later in her talk, she shared her daily routine from her present job.
Maria’s take-home message was not to get discouraged with “no response” from hiring managers. So, keep applying guys!
After her insightful and witty presentation, we have had a great response from our audience. They have further discussed how it feels like to be working in industry and asked her for advice on what to expect in this sector. It was really encouraging to see the engaging discussion and interest from our audience. Thanks to all our attendees.
We want to thank Maria again for her time, advice, and sharing her career journey with us. For those who missed it: a recording of the seminar can be accessed here until November 14th, 2021. Please use it just for yourself and don’t publish it elsewhere.
A reminder about our 1st leadership work, which will be held at the end of November 2021. Do not forget to apply.
Report by: Fouzia Bano
Edited by: Miriam Becker & Kerstin Seier
Event organizers: Career Development Team @UPS
For questions: careerdev@umeapostdocsociety.se
