Working in Pharma/Healthcare consulting

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Speaker: Pierbruno Ricci, PhD in Molecular Biology, Consultant Pharma & Healthcare, CEPTON Strategies (  / pierbruno-ricci-phd  .

▶️ How to do a transition from academia to consulting?
▶️ What do strategy consultants do during the week?
▶️ Do PhDs have a real advantage in Life Sciences consulting?

The full version of the talk is available at Paris Biotech https://parisbiotech.fr/past-events/p...

What is strategic consulting?
- Most of the companies need external expertise for certain tasks where they lack expertise. Strategic consults help companies to manage these specific problems and guide them through the process. Consulting aimed at improving the efficiency of companies and optimizes existing processes.

How did you choose the career path in strategic consulting?
- I was inspired by a book about strategic consulting and found several reasons for myself to become one. First, what I liked is that strategic consulting is a very dynamic environment. Second, in a short period of time you can learn how different types of companies work, what kind of problems they face and how these problems can be solved. Third, you have a lot of human interaction which I missed in academic research.

What are the main requirements from candidates at interview in strategic consulting companies?
- The main goal of interview is to understand wheatear the candidate will be good at it. Doing consulting requires not the particular knowledge about problems, but rather an ability to reason in a structured way, being able to approach problems efficiently and find the best solution.

What is the best way to prepare for an interview?
- You should learn how to become great at case studies. You can learn how to solve cases from books like Victor Cheng’s - Case Interview Secrets. Together with the knowledge of the Life Sciences field will help you to become a great consultant. For Life Science consulting in particular, you would need to know well the clinical trials process.

What kind of background usually people working in Life Science consulting have?
- We are about 25 people at CEPTON, and about a half of my colleagues have background (PhD or MSc+Business school) in biology or other fields. Everyone is unique and has an interesting combination of knowledge.

What are the usual exit options from LS consulting?
- Usually after working in consulting firm you can go to work to one of your clients. Some people join some other companies, or venture capitalist firms. Other people leave to found startups.

Why do you think it is so important to have a good knowledge in economics? Would it be possible to be consultant “only” in more specific subjects?
- Yes, you can do consulting specialist, but you won’t be able to do it as a strategic consultant. Knowing business is important because most of clients have business related problems even in Life Sciences field.

What types of client do you have?
- It is around 50% of Big Pharma clients, 35% small companies (startups and biotech companies) and 15% investing funds.
Do you get to choose the company to work with?
- Yes, you can. In a small consulting firm, however, it is a nontrivial task to make sure that all 25 people are always on a mission and everything is optimized. Usually the consulting company takes all the projects and finds people to do it.

Do you prefer working in a big consulting firm or a small one?
- I did both and I prefer the smaller one. Big consulting companies often recruit generalist consultants rather than specialists and orient their focus to the most profitable industary. Smaller boutiques hire more of specialists are get specialized and in certain industries. In smaller companies you also know all your colleagues, their expertise and you can establish better professional connections. In big companies the advantage is that you have colleagues all around the world and you can always contact them to answer some questions. In a smaller company you do everything yourself.