Career Advice

[kemzero]

quite a few youngsters have been asking for my advice re -pursuing a Pharmacy degree......but I honestly don't know what to tell them .....there are now 18 schools of pharmacy in the UK, back in my day there were only 9,( I qualified in 91). My son isn't interested in pharmacy at the moment;he wants to be a GP/Dentist.....all things being equal......although he has said he might consider pharmacy but not optometry....I'm not too sure...with the imminent changes proposed by the new Health Bill, I don't thing pharmacists will be in demand.
Coz no one wants to spend thousands of pounds on a decent education just to end up on the dole queue or in a low paid job,its awfully important that one gets it right the first time .Anybody got a take on it ??

[Pharmanaut]

Re: Career Advice

quite a few youngsters have been asking for my advice re -pursuing a Pharmacy degree......but I honestly don't know what to tell them .....there are now 18 schools of pharmacy in the UK, back in my day there were only 9,( I qualified in 91). My son isn't interested in pharmacy at the moment;he wants to be a GP/Dentist.....all things being equal......although he has said he might consider pharmacy but not optometry....I'm not too sure...with the imminent changes proposed by the new Health Bill, I don't thing pharmacists will be in demand.
Coz no one wants to spend thousands of pounds on a decent education just to end up on the dole queue or in a low paid job,its awfully important that one gets it right the first time .Anybody got a take on it ??

GP or Dentist.
Teacher - physics.

[Jeff]

Re: Career Advice

Coz no one wants to spend thousands of pounds on a decent education just to end up on the dole queue or in a low paid job,its awfully important that one gets it right the first time .Anybody got a take on it ??

Game design - eldest son has game in development and a place at Teeside.

He already has publishers asking how much he needs to get the game to market.
He said 2.6 million and a publisher asked to take him to dinner for further discussion.

Jeff

[Pharmanaut]

Re: Career Advice

Game design - eldest son has game in development and a place at Teeside.

He already has publishers asking how much he needs to get the game to market.
He said 2.6 million and a publisher asked to take him to dinner for further discussion.

Jeff

Sounds promising.

[mr_colt]

Re: Career Advice

With universities closing their Physics labs and dropping pure Science degrees and HND's/HNC's in favour of fads like Forensic Science and Psychology; it is only a matter of time before there is a big recession in the industry.

So you are going to end up with hundreds of Forensic Sci and Psychology degree holders forming the dole queue while; the industry screams out for people for Chemistry, Physics, Biology and Pharmacy positions.

A demand that will be difficult to meet due to the HE framework to train new graduates in the above no longer existing. On the HND for example; only 3 Universities nationwide are offering "Chemistry" for the 2008 entry.

I don't think it will lead to better pay for those with the quals, just more work to share between fewer people.

mr_colt.

[johnep]

Re: Career Advice

and the flight of industry and R&D abroad. China and India have plenty of science graduates.
johnep

[Pharmanaut]

Re: Career Advice

and the flight of industry and R&D abroad. China and India have plenty of science graduates.
johnep

We'll need all the forensic scientists to help prove that the criminals didn't do it and the psychologists to study response of society to increasing crime and violence.
Every cloud has a silver lining.

[azz]

Re: Career Advice

i think some1s been watching too much csi-crime science investigation series...lol..... but its wicked though.....

[Pharmanaut]

Re: Career Advice

i think some1s been watching too much csi-crime science investigation series...lol..... but its wicked though.....

Its sad, both of my children dropped sciences as soon as they could because its 'boring'.

[Tony Schofield]

Re: Career Advice

Thankfully everyone now is expected to change career at some point. When I left school (1970) jobs were for life and if you had to resit exams you were losing a)pay b)promotion prospects and c) Pension contributions. If you picked the wrong career or course it could take forever to rectify it.

Now people are encouraged to become mature students and some organisations discriminate against people who don't change career frequently as they don't exhibit the required willingness to change.

It's got to be good I believe.

[ymdawd]

Re: Career Advice

Quite simple really

(1) Get a career where you are as far away from dealing face to face with the general public as is humanly possible.

(2) Find something that you actually enjoy doing ( remember 30-40 years is a long time to be doing something you dislike)

[admin]

Re: Career Advice

Now people are encouraged to become mature students and some organisations discriminate against people who don't change career frequently as they don't exhibit the required willingness to change.

It's got to be good I believe.

Tony

How can you frequently change career when it takes 4 or 5 years just to qualify for any professional job? How can we be expected to start in a new career if aged over say 35 to 40?

If I decided to go to college and start again, I'd have to probably sell my house, start at the bottom of a new career and after going through all that I'd have around 10 years of my working life left.

How could it be worth it, never mind "good" ?

[Tony Schofield]

Re: Career Advice

As a pharmacist alone you could change career frequently working in for example Hospital, Primary care, community, industry, sales, marketing, licensing, management etc. You could then move from management positions into different industries.

I am not suggesting that anyone works in a profession then completely re-trains to meet the requirements of a new profession every few years.

My best friend is a very successful pharmacist who started life as a civil engineer.

Looking at my contemparies from 30 years ago two went into R&D from college. One is a clinical director of a mega drug company and he has spent no more than 3 years in any job in the pharmaceutical industry and with share options etc he has earned more than most of my "era". Current residence is Manhattan although he has a nice place in Galway and another in Geneva. The other has been into many different industries culminating this year with the sale of a biotechnology company he helped found 7 years earlier which has made his family Croesus rich! One other individual has a really interesting media career which he got into by accident when helping a BBC researcher. They started life as pharmacists. They have made serious money but have had a very interesting and varied career in getting there and it's not over yet.

In general though, the great mass of the population who may have degrees but not a professional qualification cannot expect a job for life and do expect to change career frequently. As pharmacists the world doesn't owe us a living but we don't have to spend all our lives counting tablets and being ordered around by technicians if we don't want to. I am a pharmacist and no technician has ordered me around since my pre-reg year. To read some of the whinges on this and other sites, I seem to be luckier than a lot of pharmacists.

[the old merlin]

Re: Career Advice

As a pharmacist alone you could change career frequently working in for example Hospital, Primary care, community, industry, sales, marketing, licensing, management etc. You could then move from management positions into different industries.

I To read some of the whinges on this and other sites, I seem to be luckier than a lot of pharmacists.

No Tony you're not "luckier". Who was it said the harder I practice the luckier I get?

I'm a bit older than you; started out in community as a relief pharmacist, became an "owner-driver" then in a small family-run company then LPC Secretary/locum/consultant. Then in my fifties a hospital job came up which was right for my experience so went for it, and ended up a prescribing advisor with a side interest in Care Home work. And I know I missed several other opportunities along the way! At one stage looked like I was going into full-time journalism.

And, like you I know people who've had varied careers in and out of pharmacy.

It's there if you lift your head and look for it!

[johnep]

Re: Career Advice

Old Merlin,

You sound like another poster in another forum from Essex.
I'm afraid I rather drifted from retail into industry as a rep, then marketing manager - export manager- community after being made redundant when export transferred to Switzerland, then a rep again until retired and now a locum for 8 years.

I have had some very good times and seen a great deal of the world in the process.

By the way Tony, I like to stir things up sometimes, I 100% support your contention that contractors deal with govnmt on financial contract matters and employees/locums should have representation on professional matters.

I would be happy for the PDA to take on this role.
johnep