Attending the European Women in Technology Conference as a Project Analyst in the pharmaceutical industry

Grayce Analyst, Melanie Hardiman shares a day in the life working at a global pharmaceutical company

I joined with Grayce three and a half months ago and have been fortunate that I got a global pharmaceutical client as my first client position. At the end of November, I was lucky enough to attend the European Women in Technology conference in Amsterdam with 35 other employees of my client.

I had an amazing time at the European Women in Technology conference! I was honoured to be present along with over 4,000 other attendees. I spent the two days ‘Womaning’ our stand with the Talent Acquisition Team and speaking to loads of amazing women from all around Europe about how my client are using IT to help change lives.

The highlight was when I attended a talk by my client's VP of R&D IT. She informed us that out of 64,600 employees, 45% of senior leadership roles here are held by women! I think that is an astronomical achievement given that both IT and the pharmaceutical industry would be largely considered as male dominated areas. As a young woman just starting her career this was a hugely encouraging statistic to hear!

My client's new branding includes the phrase 'IT that changes lives', which is very much true. Their focus is constantly to help improve the lives of the patients. Currently they’re using exciting new analytics tools to help improve the production cycle of medicines by reducing the amount of waste products produced, as well as to help improve the maintenance of the production equipment and reduce downtime. There are also trials of new technologies in the labortories to help improve efficiency for scientists who work in sterile environments. All of these projects are focused around improving and developing the best medicines for patients.

I feel that the reassurance and encouragement I have received from Grayce so far is what motivated me to pursue the opportunity to attend the event. I spoke with several students at the event who I felt I really connected with, given I have just graduated myself. I could empathise with them how daunting it can be to try and decide what you want to do after university. By chance I found Grayce, which has opened up these amazing opportunities for me.

Since joining my client, I feel I have been able to bring fresh knowledge and a new perspective to my team. Although having just graduated, I feel that I have definitely added value to my team as I'm hardworking, motivated to learn and contribute to as many things as possible. I have been able to help out in multiple areas and gain experience in a wide range of activities such as process modelling, reporting and metrics gathering.