Case study - Senior Scientific Director

I am somewhat of a veteran of medical communication, having started in the industry way back in the last millennium (1998 to be precise), fresh from a Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular Biology. My first role was as a Trainee Medical Writer (now more frequently known as Associate Medical Writer), and I have steadily progressed through the ranks to arrive at a Senior Scientific Director role during the 5 years I spent at my previous agency. I joined Aspire Scientific in the same role of SSD in 2022.

At Aspire, I have a number of different responsibilities. Most of my time each day is devoted to the needs of a large medical affairs account in oncology, which covers multiple different products at various stages of the lifecycle. My time is divided between content creation and reviewing work for more junior members of the team and client-facing tasks such as initial briefing calls, status meetings, and responding to emails. A noticeable, and enjoyable, difference in the role at Aspire is that a good proportion of my tasks relate to project and financial management both on an individual project basis and across the account as a whole.

I also have a large number of internally focused responsibilities. Some of these relate to the account I work on, such as team resourcing, workload calls and revenue forecasting. I also have direct line management responsibilities for writers on my team, ensuring that they are adequately supported to achieve their career progression goals. Outside of the account, I am a part of the management team for one of the business units at Aspire, where we focus on financial targets, resourcing and recruitment needs and team welfare. I am also involved in internal workstreams, including one focused on ensuring that Aspire remains on the cutting edge with regard to identifying, adopting and sharing innovative ways of working.