Working in the pharmaceutical sector: the positions required
In spite of the economic recession that has struck Europe and global markets, the pharmaceutical industry is still a stable and promising sector, and therefore working in pharmaceuticals remains many people’s desire.
In recent years, this field underwent significant transformations, with an increase in quality and pharmacovigilance responsibilities, leading to the appearance of new professional roles and required expertise.
Traditional and Emerging Professionals Roles
Pharmaceutical industry is characterised by its wide requirements in professional expertise, traditional as well as emerging. Figures like biologists, biotechnologists, chemists, pharmacists and pharmacologists represent the sector’s scientific core, and are essential for research, development and manufacturing of innovative drugs.
These professionals contribute to each phase of a drug’s life cycle, from development to clinical trials, up to market distribution.
Engineers, especially those with biomedical, chemical or managing engineering expertise, are essential to optimize manufacturing processes and ensure that the technologies used comply with the highest quality and safety standards.
These figures are also crucial when adopting new technologies, such as automation and digitalisation, that are transforming the way drugs are developed and manufactured.
In addition, the continuous update and extension of national and European regulations requires the generation of more professional roles, sometimes even with inter-disciplinary profiles.
Legal experts specialised in pharmaceutical regulations play a key role in ensuring regulatory compliance, managing marketing authorisation and monitoring product safety. In the same way, managers and financial consultants contribute to the strategic management of corporate resources, planning investments and optimizing production and distribution costs.
This variety of expertise reflects the growing importance of interdisciplinarity in the pharmaceutical sector. Every professional figure, from researchers to legal specialists, plays an integrated role assuring safety, efficacy and accessibility of pharmaceutical products.
Emerging Professions: Medical Science Liaison and Medical Advisor
In recent years, pharmaceutical industry saw a growing demand of new professional figures, able to respond to the needs of an increasingly complex and competitive market. These include the Medical Liaison and the Medical Advisor , key roles that are acquiring a strategic importance in this sector.
Medical Science Liaison
The Medical Science Liaison is a professional figure linking pharmaceutical companies with the main stakeholders of the healthcare sector, such as doctors, researchers and institutions.
This figure is not limited to representing the company, it also plays a crucial role in the identification of new opportunities of development, analysing the market, examining competitors and understanding unmet clinical needs.
This profession requires a steady scientific training as well as excellent communication, analyses and negotiation skills.
Medical Advisor
On the other hand, the Medical Advisor acts as in-house scientific contact person for the company. Their responsibilities range from the management of clinical trials to the preparation of the documents required to obtain authorisations for new drugs, up to the training of Pharmaceutical Sales Reps (ISF).
This professional figure has also an active role in the scientific dissemination, taking part to workshops, conferences and events, to present the company latest discoveries or new products. The Medical Advisor is essential to ensure that corporate strategies are always in line with scientific evidence and market needs.
Market Access Specialist and Compliance Manager
Along with these figures, the pharmaceutical sector is increasingly looking for interdisciplinary experts. These include market access specialists, that analyse regulatory and socio-economic contexts to ensure that drugs reach the final user via the healthcare system, according to negotiated prices.
Although in the pharmaceutical industry compliance is usually related to Quality, in order to pursue a regulation-aligned policy extending to all the company department, the role of the Compliance Manager is emerging, responsible for the compliance of all company operations with the continuously evolving regulations, locally as well as internationally.
New Expertise for Personalised Medicine
With the progress in personalised medicine and advanced technologies, the pharmaceutical industry has seen the rise of an increasing demand for expertise in the field of big data. Big data analysis experts are today the most wanted professionals, as pharmaceutical companies have to face huge amounts of data generated throughout the whole life cycle of a product: from preclinical research up to post-market pharmacovigilance.
The Big Data Analyst is an essential figure to collect, organise and interpret big volumes of information from miscellaneous sources, such as clinical trials, genetic databases, electronic health registers (EHR), and real-world data collected by wearable devices or health monitoring apps. This data, when appropriately analysed, can provide crucial insights to improve decision-making and optimise corporate strategies.
Big Data and Development
For instance, in the sphere of research and development (R&D), the Big Data Analyst can identify patterns and correlations inside complex datasets, speeding up the discovery of new therapeutic targets and reducing the time and costs associated with new drugs’ development.
These tools allow a more precise forecast of the clinical trials’ outcome, improving the patient selection for trials and increasing the probabilities of success for therapies.
In personalised medicines, Big Data Analysts play a key role in the interpretation of genomic information and in correlating the patients’ genetic characteristics and their response to treatment. This approach allows the development of targeted therapies and the forecast of any side effects, significantly improving clinical results and therapy efficiency.
Moreover, in the pharmacovigilance area, the real-world data analysis helps monitoring the efficacy and safety of drugs once they are marketed. By continuously monitoring adverse event reports and analysing the feedback from patients and health professionals, companies can promptly react to any problem, reducing any risk for patients and preserving the trademark reputation.
Data at the service of marketing
Marketing and market access strategies also benefit from big data analysis. Big Data Analysts can study patients’ behaviour and needs, identifying unexplored market segments or optimizing promotional campaigns. Besides, analysing socio-economic and health data from different regions, it is possible to develop targeted strategies to ensure that drugs reach the patients that needs them more.
Finally, in a corporate context increasingly oriented to sustainability and cost reduction, the work of the Big Data Analyst contributes to optimise in-house processes. From the identification of inefficiencies in the supply chain to forecasting drug demands, these analyses allow pharmaceutical companies to improve their operations, staying competitive in a rapidly evolving global market.
In brief, Big Data Analysts represent a strategic resource for pharmaceutical industry, capable to turn raw data into added value, supporting innovation, efficiency and quality in every aspect of the corporate activity.
Conclusions
An Evolving Sector Working in the pharmaceutical sector offers a wide range of professional opportunities under continuous evolution, and requires increasingly specialised and interdisciplinary expertise to face the challenges of a sector steadily growing.
