Flexi Working

As a small company with fairly relaxed owners, we are allowed to work entirely from home. Flexible working is allowed, but there is an expectation that you should be able to respond to messages/emails from 9am-4pm. Some projects can be intense and require longer hours of work, but this is managed carefully by the senior partners.

How is Work Assigned?

Work is assigned to me directly from the two senior partners who co-own the business: at any time, I will normally be managing or actively working on 3-4 projects (a mix of rapid turnaround projects and large slow-moving projects). The senior partners are normally responsible for winning the projects from clients, but I will help in that process (e.g. writing our project proposal). I will be assigned a project team of several analysts (plus one of the partners as the ‘senior lead’), and given responsibility to run the project from there, with the senior lead providing oversight.

Client Focussed Work

Work is mostly client-focused, with a project typically involving working with one or two people (the clients) from a pharmaceutical company. The client is normally our day-to-day contact from the company, who we will meet with on a regular basis to progress the project. Obviously, with more experience/expertise, you will have more interaction with clients, whether this is discussing the project in catch-up meetings, presenting deliverables or answering questions etc. We are normally encouraging of analysts to present the work they themselves have produced, but this can vary client to client.

Commission / Bonus

My role is not commission-based, although a bonus is awarded based on personal performance and overall company performance. Personal performance is based usually against pre-agreed, annual ‘SMART’ targets. Hitting these targets consistently over a number of years usually leads to promotions, if your work is particularly high quality.

Professional Exams / Qualifications

There are no professional exams to complete. The area of pharmaceutical consulting I work is in fairly niche, so we are flexible in hiring people with any type of business/analysis/scientific background who are interested in the commercial side of science. Progression typically moves from analyst/senior analyst up to consultants/senior consultants/directors (usually reflecting a move away from doing the research, to project management and high-level strategic thinking). The senior partners are encouraging in funding additional training courses, if they see there is a clear benefit to personal/skill progression.