ERIBA Career Day 2019

On Wednesday 24 April 2019, the second edition of the ERIBA Career Day took place, introducing PhD students and Postdocs to career opportunities outside of academia.

A variety of enthusiastic guest speakers shed light on their motives to leave a traditional academic career behind, letting personal talents and interests lead them to Science Communication and Publishing (Máté Pálfy, The Company of Biologists in Cambridge) and Science Outreach and Education (Eva Teuling, University of Groningen). Other speakers told their stories of working in pharmaceutical companies (Seong-Joo Koo, Janssen Pharma, Antwerpen), or of starting their own company (Maxime Willems, Proef, Gent). Furthermore, the audience learnt about working in Sales and Marketing (Marnix Wieffer, Elsevier), running an research institute as Manager (Paula van Tijn, AMOLF, Amsterdam) and being a Consultant on funding opportunities (Annemieke van der Goot, Vindsubsidies).

The speakers’ stories were aimed to remind young scientists that an academic background provides them with a set of skills that can be used in many different types of careers. The Career Day concluded with a Meet the Speaker Mixer, giving the PhDs and Postdocs a chance to network and engage in informal discussions with the speakers.

The ERIBA Career Day 2019 was organized by members of the ERIBA outreach team: Anita Pras, Alejandra Hernández Segura, Katya Dvorianinova, Megha Pandey-Upadhyay, Sylvia Hoks and Judith Paridaen.