Work Placement in 3rd year (Pharmaceutical Industry)

ticklemylemon

Hey guys , im doing Biopharmaceutical Chemistry and i have work placement in 3rd year. Quite looking forward to it .. In september we'll be sending out our cv's and stuff... so i have a few questions :pac:

1. I'm just wondering what are they looking for in the cv. What could make a good cv into an excellent one? (i heard that its hard to even get an interview :eek: )
2. Any good pharm industries??? i heard good stuff about eli lilly and phizer... anyone worked there.. what's it like????

If anyone has tips or suggestions how to prepare for placement please share :)

yer man!

I'm doing chemistry in NUIG, I'm going into 3rd year and doing a voluntary paid placement for the summer in Roche. For me, the interview was what got me the job, I'm not the best in my class but I have worked in medical devices before this and that used a lot of the same procedures as pharmaceuticals so that really helped me. In pharmaceutical manufacturing there's several different sections to the plant, there's QC which is the labs, operations which is the management of batch sheets and procedure (my section), engineering (you wouldn't be put here, depending on the plant there may be some minor R&D. There's very little of that done here in pharmaceutical companies but there is some. One thing I was not expecting is the vast vast amount of paperwork, the job is about 90% paperwork 10% chemistry..... From my experience there so far anyway it's pretty obvious, you NEED a phd to get into any R&D, that's the really interesting stuff. If you can get into QC, I would go that route for the placement, you'll be getting great experience on machines and procedures, it'll pay off for the final year project.

ticklemylemon

Wooo im in NUIG too .. are u working in Clarecastle by any chance???


The thing is i've never even had a part time job or anything (apart from volunteering).. so.. i think it would be hard to even get an interview. My grades are good but i heard what they want is a bit of experience

Also, what kind of questions do they ask during an interview?? :pac:
oh and i almost forgot.. whats an R&D??

Woodward

I did that course and I worked in QC for my placement . Amgen,Covidien,Teagasc are great places to work. There is very little you can do to your CV to help get an interview as you all have pretty much the same experience. The only thing you can do really is stress your interest in chemistry,hard work and cGMP. If you are a member of the RSC or have done a SPUR internship it will help but apart from that its all luck of the draw until you get the interview

ticklemylemon

hi woodward, i haven't even heard of places like Amgen,Covidien,Teagasc :eek:
im just curious.. what are you doing now? working in an industry or post grad???

Woodward

ticklemylemon wrote: »

hi woodward, i haven't even heard of places like Amgen,Covidien,Teagasc :eek:
im just curious.. what are you doing now? working in an industry or post grad???

Doing a PhD now but the placement is good at setting you up for a career in industry.Covidien announced that they are going to sell off their pharma division so I dont know if they will take on students next year. Amgen is in Dun Laoighre and used to be Pfizer so they might not be taking on students either. Teagasc is a agricultural research body that does a lot of government research in Cork

yer man!

ticklemylemon wrote: »

Wooo im in NUIG too .. are u working in Clarecastle by any chance???


The thing is i've never even had a part time job or anything (apart from volunteering).. so.. i think it would be hard to even get an interview. My grades are good but i heard what they want is a bit of experience

Also, what kind of questions do they ask during an interview?? :pac:
oh and i almost forgot.. whats an R&D??

Yup in Clarecastle indeed. The questions they asked in the interview were to do with the lecture material you would have done in college, talk a little bit about some of the really big reactions and some of the equipment you use and stuff about labs, once they found out I had some experience in a related industry they got more interested. I found that if you keep on talking about all the different aspects of your course and what you like and what you plan on getting out of a placement and ultimately what type of job do you see yourself in. They really want you to want the job.

R&D - Research & Development. Pfizer stopped taking students from NUIG this year, they are really cutting back in their Cork plant right now. GSK took a student and Roche did take another person in my class. Abbott held interviews for the Biopharm class (their placement is mandatory) they didn't get it as Abbott have very high standards when it comes to grades.

ticklemylemon

WOODWARD
hmm.. i was thinking... if there is like 10 ppl in my course and they will all be applying to places like Roche, Eli Lilly etc through college.... so that would mean there would be more competition between us... but what if i applied for the placement in aug/sept on my own ( not through college)?? is that even possible, like would i be even allowed to do that?

masteroftherealm

Woodward wrote: »

Amgen is in Dun Laoighre and used to be Pfizer so they might not be taking on students either.

Nope we still take on Students if they are good enough.

ticklemylemon wrote: »

Hey guys , im doing Biopharmaceutical Chemistry and i have work placement in 3rd year. Quite looking forward to it .. In september we'll be sending out our cv's and stuff... so i have a few questions :pac:

1. I'm just wondering what are they looking for in the cv. What could make a good cv into an excellent one? (i heard that its hard to even get an interview :eek: )
2. Any good pharm industries??? i heard good stuff about eli lilly and phizer... anyone worked there.. what's it like????

If anyone has tips or suggestions how to prepare for placement please share :)

Drop me a PM and I'll give you an email address to send your CV to for Amgen.

Woodward

ticklemylemon wrote: »

WOODWARD
hmm.. i was thinking... if there is like 10 ppl in my course and they will all be applying to places like Roche, Eli Lilly etc through college.... so that would mean there would be more competition between us... but what if i applied for the placement in aug/sept on my own ( not through college)?? is that even possible, like would i be even allowed to do that?

Yea there is a bit of competition. You are allowed apply for positions yourself although the department would frown upon you applying for companies which the uni sends CV's out to before they do. I know from my own experience that some companies will only talk to the uni when you are applying for a student placement but it cant hurt for you to try

ticklemylemon

ye.. i was thinking of applying to different companies.. not the ones that department sorts out for us.
so i would apply through department AND on my own.. so there would be a greater chance for me to get an interview.. fingers crossed :pac:

ticklemylemon

dcugrad wrote: »

Hi,

Please send your CV to career@zhidaice.com, as they have work placement opportunities in China, and a few internship position in the Pharma sector are also available. Good Luck!

cool, thanks very much...

is there a website that i could read a bit about them?

AbbieB

When I was looking for my third year work placement, I applied to places by myself but your lecturers will have contacts in the industry for placing students, so no one wont get a placement.

Woodward

AbbieB wrote: »

When I was looking for my third year work placement, I applied to places by myself but your lecturers will have contacts in the industry for placing students, so no one wont get a placement.

Not true. We were very lucky to get all my class placed and our class was much smaller. They were even sending the CV's to plants in England