By: Claire Wilson. Last Updated: April 2022

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If you’re looking to make a mid career change into pharmaceutical manufacturing then you’re in the right place.

And the best news is – almost anyone can do it!

The courses we offer will allow you to utilize the skills you have from previous employment in other industries and give you the knowledge you need to work in these highly regulated environments.

Making A Career Change Into Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

There are 3 key factors you have to consider when making a career change into pharma:

  1. The transferable skills you have that pharma employers want
  2. The essential technical knowledge needed to work in this highly regulated environment
  3. Your job hunting abilities

The Transferable Skills You Have That Pharma Employers Want

If you’re coming to pharma from another industry, the first thing you have to get to grips with are the skills that you already have to offer.

We can guarantee that it doesn’t matter what industry your previous employment was in, you already have skills that employers in pharma are looking for. You just have to figure out what they are, and how to explain them in a way that’s easy and quick to understand.

But that’s not always something that people find easy, so we wrote a whole blog post on Selling your Employment History when Changing Industry.

And while it’s always best to tailor your discussion of skills to a given advert, we analysed hundreds of job adverts for some of pharma’s most specialist areas to give you an idea of the types of skills that are necessary. So check out:

The Essential Technical Knowledge

Next up is the specific technical knowledge you’d need. The pharma industry is highly regulated and employers are generally looking for candidates that can demonstrate a solid grounding and understanding of this.

Click on your background from the options below to see what technical info you’d need to supplement your current experience:

With any other background, your first step would be to aim for entry level manufacturing roles.

To achieve this, you’ll need to learn about the rules and regulations of the pharma industry and how these are implemented in the manufacturing environment.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and land your first pharma job.

Your specific course recommendation is: Conversion Course into Pharma.

With a background in engineering, you just need some additional training about the rules and regulations of the pharma industry and how these are implemented in the manufacturing environment.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and land your first pharma engineering job.

Your specific course recommendation is: Conversion Course into Engineering Roles in Pharma.

With a background in automation – you’ve got great prospects in pharma. The most important training you can take is to familiarise yourself with the specific rules and regulations of using computer systems within the pharma industry.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and expand your role into Computer Systems Validation. Roles here pay well and professionals with this training are in high demand.

Your specific course recommendation is: Computer Systems Validation Course.

With a background in chemical or biological science – you’ve got great prospects in pharma. There are a range of job opportunities at almost all stages of the product lifecycle.

Some roles (like Research) you’ll be able to apply as you are. For roles in Development, Manufacturing Support, Quality Assurance, or Quality Control – you can give your CV a huge boost and jump ahead of the competition by learning about the rules and regulations of the pharma industry and how these are implemented in the manufacturing environment.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and land your first pharma science job.

Your specific course recommendation is: Conversion Course into Pharma for Scientists.

With experience as a plumber, pipe fitter or in commissioning in any industry – you’re well suited to move into the specialist area of validation in pharma.

To make this change, you need to know about validation protocols, and the processes involved with validating pharmaceutical systems.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and land your first role within a validation team. Roles here pay well and professionals with this training are in high demand.

Your specific course recommendation is: Validation Training Course for Starter Validation Roles

With a background in quality from another industry, you just need some additional training about the rules and regulations of pharma and how these are implemented in the manufacturing environment.

This level of technical understanding will be enough to get you confidently talking to pharma employers and land your first pharma quality job.

Your specific course recommendation is: Conversion Course into Quality Roles in Pharma.

Your Job Hunting Abilities

The final consideration is your job hunting skills.

Many people boldly assume that an updated version of the CV they’ve used for the last decade, sent in response to a few job adverts will be enough. It likely won’t.

Once you’ve got the basic technical information from one of the routes above, it becomes more about how you present yourself and your skills, to employers.

We’re so sure that job hunting skills are the vital missing piece, that we developed our own Advanced Career Coaching course for the Pharma industry. Some of our programmes include this course as standard, but you can add it on to any course to learn the essential tools for a modern day job hunt in the pharma industry.

If you take our advice, you can get a job in pharma – even with no previous experience.

But don’t just take our word for it, hear from the people who’ve already done it:

Next Steps

This article is only designed to give you an idea of the minimum requirements for a move into the pharma industry. Each and every application to one of our courses is considered on its own merits. We don’t use any arbitrary rules and your unique situation will always be considered.

For this reason, if you’re interested in one of our courses, we’d always recommend getting in touch with us directly and speaking to an admissions advisor.

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About the Author

Image with Claire Wilison from GetReskilled Team

Claire Wilson

Content Marketing and Career Coaching

Claire runs GetReskilled’s Advanced Career Coaching Programme – our specially devised job hunting course that helps our trainees take that final step into employment by leading them through the job hunting process. She is extremely enthusiastic about helping people reach their final goal of employment in their new career path.

Claire has a BSc (Hons) in Medical Biology from Edinburgh University and spent 7 years working in the pharmaceutical and medical device industries.