Welcome to the MSL Mastery Blog
Job Search, Career Development, and Professional & Personal Fulfillment Resources for Medical Science Liaisons
Join Our NewsletterBy Patrina Pellett, PhD (Follow me on LinkedIn)
You are looking to land your first MSL position and send your resume to 100s of job listings. Then you never hear back and start to feel really discouraged. The job market is tough and the MSL job market is super competitive. There is a...
What is the most dreaded word for every job searcher, PhD, MD, PharmD, and just humans in general?
Networking.
You know you need to network but it is so awful! It's hard. It's awkward. What if you get rejected. You'll have to talk to strangers, and then probably get...
By Patrina Pellett, PhD & Tom Caravela
When you get Medical Affairs Interviews, you don't want to miss anything. These jobs are extremely competitive and you want to be prepared to shine. Tom Caravela and I prepared this quick Medical Affairs Interviewing Checklist to help you crush...
"There is no need to have her move forward with a presentation. Would you please be able to cancel tomorrow?"
This is feedback that Tom Caravela received from a hiring manager after an interview with an MSL candidate went terribly wrong. So what happened? This...
You have a Medical Affairs interview! Congrats! Or maybe you are interviewing with multiple companies at the same time. High five!
If all goes well, you will be invited to interviews with HR people, the hiring manager, the hiring manager's manager, the team, and...
By Patrina Pellett, PhD & Tom Caravela
You have some big goals you are going after or high-impact work that will increase your visibility at your company. But you find yourself getting easily distracted and just cannot seem to focus. How can you get back on track and not let the...
By Patrina Pellett, PhD & Tom Caravela
Have you recently done a scan of your territory and noticed that some of your KOLs have fallen through the cracks? Or perhaps you are breaking into a new territory and working your tail off to build relationships?
Getting access to KOLs and...
By Patrina Pellett, PhD (Follow me on LinkedIn)
I help a lot of PhDs, post-docs, professors, aspiring MSLs, MSLs, and Medical Affairs leaders with their job search or transition. I get a lot of calls like this, "Hey, I am thinking about taking this role. What do you think?" I always give...
MSLs travel a lot. Work travel is so fun, especially in the beginning. You feel fancy and get to eat a lot of good food.
Eventually you are dodging polar vortexes and frantically running to be on time to your next presentation. It gets tiring. Here are work travel...
The MSL job market is extra crazy right now. There are so many new PhDs, MD, PharmDs looking to transition into the role. On top of that COVID has resulted in many practicing clinicians getting burned out and they are also looking to move to MSL positions.
With...
By Patrina Pellett, PhD
Goal setting for medical science liaisons is critical to being a high performer. It's essential to avoid being reactionary in your activities. MSLs are super busy with a lot on their plates. It's easy to get caught up in the minutia and not focus on moving the...
Are you applying for jobs and not hearing anything back? Maybe it’s time to revamp your resume. When an academic decides to switch to the dark side (industry), figuring out how to get a real job is hard. Especially the resume part. And yet so important. Your...
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