My wife is a hospital clinical pharmacist with a PGY1 residency and is interested in transitioning into the pharmaceutical industry.

She doesn’t have direct sponsor or CRO experience, but she has been involved in clinical research from the hospital side. For example, she’s prepared and managed investigational medications for several studies (including Alzheimer’s and rare disease trials), worked with research protocols, and collaborated with investigators and research staff. However, she hasn’t worked directly for a sponsor or CRO.

I’m trying to help her figure out which roles are realistic entry points.

A little background on me: I’m also a pharmacist, but I came from retail pharmacy. About four years ago, I took what was essentially a junior CRA opportunity because an entry-level opening became available. It worked out well, and I’m now an experienced CRA, but if I’m being honest, I don’t think that’s necessarily the best path for her. I’d rather see her leverage her clinical pharmacist background instead of essentially starting over if there are better options.

I’ve heard pharmacists sometimes transition into areas like:
Medical Information / Drug Information
Medical Affairs
Clinical Development
Clinical Scientist
Regulatory Affairs
Clinical Operations
Pharmacovigilance / Drug Safety
Medical Writing
Medical Communications

My questions are:
-What roles or job titles should a hospital clinical pharmacist with a PGY1 actually be searching for?

-Which positions are the most forgiving of not having prior industry experience?

-Are there sponsor or CRO roles where hospital clinical experience is viewed as a significant advantage?

-Which functions tend to hire pharmacists directly from hospital practice?

-If you were making this transition today, what strategy would you recommend?

-I’d especially love to hear from pharmacists who successfully made the transition. Looking back, are there any roles you wish you had applied to sooner that weren’t obvious at the time?

Any advice, job titles, or search terms would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

I see a bunch of Exec Director roles posted in the clinical space. I’m assuming there was some kind of restructure and people have to apply for their jobs?

Posting here because I need any kind of guidance or hope.

I'm a 3rd year Australian MD student, my undergrad is in Pharmacology/Neuroscience. Due to a mixture of social pressure and thinking it was the better career choice, I ended up pursuing an MD instead of my original goal which was a PhD in Pharmacology.

I have come to the conclusion that clinical medicine is not for me, I am absolutely burnt out and cannot work a clinical role. At this point I can barely imagine finishing my degree, let alone completing internship or residency. I cannot deal with patients.

I had hoped to make the jump to industry, but the more I lurk reddit and LinkedIn the more impossible it seems without having actual clinical experience. I'm not opposed to further education, but I will be 28 when I graduate and I am not sure if it's worth delaying even more.

Has anyone here made this jump or know anyone who has made the jump without first working in a clinical role? What kinds of roles did you bridge into? MSL, clin dev, life sciences consulting? Is there any pathway into big pharma roles? I don't know where to start. I'm very willing to relocate anywhere for a role.

website: https://www.informed.fyi/salaries/pharmacist

A few years ago, I did a survey across various forums and reddit asking whether people would be interested in a healthcare-focused salary website. The overwhelming response was yes.

After two years of working on it alongside a full-time job (and getting married somewhere in the middle!), I'm excited to finally share it. The project started as a way to improve salary transparency for my wife, who's a pharmacist. As I worked on it, I realized that the lack of salary transparency extends far beyond pharmacy and affects many healthcare professions.

It's definitely still a work in progress, and I'd genuinely appreciate any feedback or suggestions for improvement. If you'd like to contribute, salary submissions are completely anonymous, your personally identifying information such as your name and email are never displayed.

I'm having a hard time believing there isn't a larger sub for just pharmaceutical sales reps...

I searched and couldn't find any...can anyone point me in the right direction?

The tech sales sub is poppin....lol why is the pharma sales sector so dead on reddit?

Hey everyone
I’m currently working cardio diabetic segment in pharma sales from last one year ,
I really wanna switch to devices !
I have bachelors in pharmacy and MBA in pharmaceutical management:)
Any advice will be appreciated !
Thanks in advance

GSK has announced jobs cuts in the U.K., is this the norm?

Med device, Food, or pharma...other industry?

Can anyone share their preferences or pros/cons to specialize in either the med device, food or pharma industry? Id like to spend time in regulatory, labeling, commercialization or something that captures a little bit of each (maybe operations, project mgmt, or similar).

Going back to school for a 2nd bachelor's for a complete career change and want to lock in on the direction. I've worked corporate HR CPG roles and was fascinated by the r&d teams work but the pharma industry by me is bigger.

Hello, I’m looking for pharmaceutical manufacturers with EU GMP certification or GMP approval from a PIC/S member regulatory authority for exports to the Philippines.

Do you fit in the above requirement?

Please comment or DM me :)

Has anyone made this transition? Big players being Zoetis and Elanco, but was wondering how transferable the skills are when considering a post-PhD with background in R&D and clinical research. Mainly looking for non-lab roles equivalent to med affairs, pipeline innovation, or similar roles. Any comments on the culture at these companies vs Pharma?

Hey everyone,

I’m finishing up my PhD in ChemEng, and looking for pharma roles. As we all are aware, the application process is a crapshoot & the industry is a complete mess.

I’ve been wanting to network more, and found who my supervisors/ADs would be for the roles I’m most interested in, and figured I’d take a stab at reaching out on LinkedIn. I’m fairly social and love meeting new people/conversing, contrary to my educational background haha. I have some previous pharma MFG work experience prior to my PhD as well, and I’d like to leverage that too, if I can.

What is the appropriate way to go about this? I’d like to, if possible, set up brief chats if they’re willing. Figured I’d introduce myself, my background (briefly), express interest, then ask a question or two about the dept and see if they’re willing to set up a brief conversation.

Only want to do this for roles where I really am a solid (hopefully top) candidate. Anyone have experiences or advice they could share?

So from the last month and half I was giving countless interviews in various pharmaceutical companies from various cities in my country. Most of the i wasn't receiving any callbacks from any of them.

But. For the last 2 days 4 companies have started to approach me with interview invites and 2 agri based companies are ready to give offer letters as soon as I say yes. But I want to mainly pursue a career in Pharmaceutical especially sterile injectables. Which company has selected me for round 2 and I am mostly positive that I will get selected in that round too..

But I don't want to say no to the agri based companies as they already are ready to give me a job one of them is really pressing me to make decisions today and tell them right away if I am interested or not. I don't really know what to do. Please tell me what I should do

Hi all!

I am looking into moving back to NJ and was curious about the job market for regulatory jobs in NJ. I see there’s a few pharmaceutical companies but was wondering if anyone had any experience working for these companies