Let’s recap what transferrable skills are; they are competencies that you
develop in one job and carry over to another. That still leaves the
question, ‘Why are employers fixated on transferrable skills?’
A recent survey revealed that
87% of companies
are either experiencing a skills gap or expect to in the near future. In
the face of a skills crisis, employers begin to look outside of their
industry, for candidates that might not have direct experience but have a
skill set that they can carry over to this industry.
Simply having these skills is not always enough to land a job. Employers
need you to illustrate how they will help you in the role you’re applying
for. With that in mind, here are five skills that you’ll learn in a biotech
setting and how you can apply them within a medical sales role.
Customer service
No sales skills? No problem. Having
top-notch sales skills
might seem like the most valuable asset to a medical sales rep, but
actually, client-facing skills are far more important.
At some point in your biotech career, you'll have interacted with
customers. No matter whether this was a small part of your role, you can
still explain how you handled the situation and relate that to the medical
sales job you're applying for. Just remember, the employer isn't looking
for someone who comes perfectly trained, they're searching for that
candidate who has potential and the drive to become successful.
Time management
There's an unending stream of technical skills that you'll have honed in
your biotech job, including PCR, western blot and molecular cloning. While
these specialist abilities might not help you secure a medical sales rep
job in their own right, you can highlight how your exemplary time
management skills enabled you to complete your technical tasks on schedule
and how this will serve you in a sales role.
Data analytics
You've heard that
data analytics helps sales reps win more deals, right? And with each passing year, the list of ways that data can be
applied within medical sales grows. Just as in biotech, where data
analytics would help you to quickly identify the source of error, big data
can offer invaluable insight for medical sales reps.
Consumer data, in particular, will give you a broader picture of patient
needs, and therefore the medicine and devices they need to live a better
life. If you can demonstrate to the employer that data is like a second
language to you, they'll be confident knowing that you'll use your data
analytics skills to help improve patients' lives. And since a Deloitte
survey found that
75% of people
believe that customised treatments are the most impactful, this
personalised approach matter more than ever.
Adaptability
Ask any professional in the industry, and they'll tell you that meeting
sales targets is one of the
top challenges that medical sales reps face. But this can be countered with one soft skill - adaptability. Throughout
your biotech career, you might have been asked to make lateral moves and
try on new hats every so often. The changing trends that have impacted the
industry have created new functional roles, and it's the adaptable
professionals who have been ready to seize any opportunity that came their
way.
It's no different in medical sales. Take the ongoing pandemic as an
example. Almost overnight medical sales reps were no longer able to visit
hospitals and physicians' offices in person. They had to rethink how they
would move prospects through the pipeline without relying on their
carefully honed in-person communication style. That's adaptability!
Take your next career leap with IQVIA
There are no two ways about it,
medical sales is a rewarding career, and it's one of the reasons why many people choose to make the jump from
biotech. And now that you know that you've got the right skills to build a
successful medical sales career, all that's left to do is find your next
role.
Browse the latest
medical sales rep vacancies
or explore our other roles to see what opportunities you can find with
IQVIA.
