Interview Practice with Blue-chip firm? And you get paid
March 31, 2009
We are looking for some and young post-grads who might like to practice their interviewing skills—we will give you feedback on your strengths and weaknesses as an interviewee—whilst making £25 plus travel expenses for one hour of your time. The venue is in London near tube and train stations. The company is a global one with an excellent reputation. Their staff are learning new interviewing skills and need to practice them.
The interviews will take place in the morning and early afternoon of 22 and 29 April and during the afternoon of 23 and 30 April. We are also looking for 4 people willing to be ‘back-ups’—that is, be available to be interviewed on site if somebody else does not show up. That would entail your being there for just over 2 hours. For these 4, we can pay £50 plus expenses.
Please contact Dr. Sheila Rossan at Sheila@rossan.co.uk for further information or to register for the practice.
The City Course
March 27, 2009
14 – 18 September 2009
Application deadline: 5pm, Thursday 11 June 2009 http://www.careers.lon.ac.uk/city
For an entire week, top financial firms will open their doors to you.
Through a series of in-house workshops, case studies, presentations and discussions, you’ll get an up-close-and-personal insight on working life in London’s financial centre. You’ll start early, work hard, and come away with a detailed understanding of how the City works. The programme covers investment banking, management consultancy, accountancy, commercial law, risk management, and more. Organisations involved this year include:
* PricewaterhouseCoopers
* Accenture * Bloomberg
* Financial Services Authority
* Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales
* Kaplan Financial
* Nomura
* Slaughter and May
Attendees last year (including a couple of King’s PhD students said:
“I was searching for a real overview into City life and this course gave me exactly that.”
“Fantastic course!”
“…Great week, great insight.”
If you can handle the early starts and late finishes, apply now! The deadline is 5pm on Thursday 11 June 2009. Please note this event is exclusive to current students within The Careers Group, University of London Consortium and members of GradClub. Join us on Facebook where you’ll receive updates, can take part in discussions, ask us your questions and share the event with your friends and anyone who you think will be interested in applying to this course: www.careers.lon.ac.uk/facebook/city
Skills Needs for Biomedical Research
March 26, 2009
This is Laura Mackenzies’s useful summary of this report
Findings from the ABPI report:
Skills Needs for Biomedical Research: Creating the Pools of Talent to Win the Innovation Race’, November 2008, based on a survey of 30 life science organisations within the UK:
|
Translational & Biomedical Science Disciplines |
Priority at graduate level* |
Priority at PhD/postdoc level |
|
|
|
|
|
Clinical Pharmacology/translational medicine |
|
High |
|
Molecular & translational toxicology |
|
High |
|
Biomedical Imaging / Physics |
|
Medium |
|
“Omics” |
Medium |
High |
|
Drug metabolism & ADME |
Medium |
High |
|
Biochemistry |
Medium |
Medium |
|
Bioscience & molecular biology |
Low |
Low |
|
In vitro pharmacology |
Medium |
Medium |
|
Pharmacy |
Medium |
Medium/High |
|
Medicine |
Medium |
Medium |
|
Biotechnology & Biopharmaceuticals |
High |
Medium |
|
In vivo physiology |
High |
High |
|
In vivo pharmacology |
High |
High |
|
Toxicology |
High |
High |
|
Pathology |
Medium |
High |
|
|
|
|
*Columns left blank indicate that little or no recruitment takes place at this level.
Skills & competencies expected of new recruits
Examples of the skills and capabilities that are expected of new recruits, based on a survey of 30 life science organisations within the UK:
§ Understanding of basic experimental design, observation, recording, and
§ testing hypotheses.
§ Ability to plan and conduct a scientific experiment with appropriate controls
§ and analysis of data
§ Demonstration of good, safe laboratory practice, including an understanding of Good Laboratory Practice, standard operating procedures and the impact of health and safety in the laboratory environment (and environmental issues).
§ Basic practical laboratory procedures (setting up equipment, use of pipettes, serial dilutions, basic chromatography and basic chemistry skills)
§ Exposure to molecular biology procedures (such as tissue culture and collection, aseptic techniques)
§ Experience of the handling of live organisms and dissection of organs.
§ Ability to accurately observe and record data (including understanding of the importance of accuracy over speed)
§ Recognition of the integrity of data gathered.
§ Ability to bring aspects of an experiment together
§ Understanding of how errors arise (including use of error bars).
§ Critical analysis of their results
§ Independent and confident interpretation and assessment of scientific experiments
§ Problem solving skills, for example independently solving difficulties encountered in the lab.
§ Application of scientific and mathematical knowledge in designing experiments and interpreting results
§ Critical thinking skills and being able to dispute scientific procedures, data sets and other people’s work
§ Basic report writing and accurate record keeping
§ Ability to develop a project plan and be able to use it as a communication tool
§ Know how and when to use IT; including Word, Excel (use of spreadsheets for computer modelling), data capture devices, search engines (to effectively research scientific literature).
§ Communication and interpersonal skills
§ Team working, collaboration and problem solving
§ Independent working
§ Data and text mining skills
Taken from ABPI report ‘Skills Needs for Biomedical Research: Creating the Pools of Talent to Win the Innovation Race’, November 2008: http://www.abpi.org.uk/Details.asp?ProductID=338
Getting into Medical Writing
March 25, 2009
Interested in exploring the possibilities of a career in medical communications? The guide, downloadable from
http://www.medcommsnetworking.co.uk/startingout
is intended for PhDs and post-docs, and signposts more information and, importantly, useful contact details for agencies who are genuinely interested in recruiting trainee writers.
Get LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/in/networkpharma
: http://www.networkpharma.com
From PhD to the FCO
March 24, 2009
On Friday morning, Dr Peter Hayes will talk about his work as a High Commissioner for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Dr Hayes did his PhD in physics here at King’s.
This will be a valuable session for anyone considering a career in Public and Foreign policy.
Friday 27th March
10 -11am
Strand Campus K2.31
If you intend to come -just drop an e-mail to
NatCen Learning has some places available on the popular Cognitive Interviewing Skills course. This two day course (22-23 April 2009, central London) provides participants with a thorough grounding in cognitive question testing methods and practical experience in cognitive interviewing skills. The course also covers the analysis and reporting of cognitive interview data. It is ideal for researchers involved in designing and developing questionnaires and survey instruments giving you with a comprehensive understanding of the value cognitive approaches can bring to your survey design.
For booking form see our websiote at: www.natcen.ac.uk/natcenlearning/ or contact Susan Mackenzie on 0207 549 8577.
This 9-week scheme* is aimed at those who have already graduated who still aren’t sure whether Consulting is right for them. It will give you a real taste of what the life of a Consultant is like before you commit to a permanent role. You’ll start in September, and the induction training you receive in your first week will provide you with grounding in business and technology consultancy techniques, plus several core business skills. During your induction, you will also receive technical training before you learn about the project you’ll be involved in. The project could be in any industry area, anywhere in the UK. Expect to become a fully signed-up member of the team – and take on real responsibility for software testing, research, report writing, data analysis or even designing client websites. Application Deadline: 27th March 2009 Although you may not already be an IT expert, you are keen to learn about technology. www.accenture.com/ukschemes
Management Training – Psychiatric Care
March 18, 2009
There are some vacancies for a management trianing programme for Cygnet Healthcare – a provider of acute psychiatric care to tthe NHS.
Closing date is the 25th March.
This is a business managment role but in a clinical setting.
Details form the Cygnet website or email
Graduate School Careers Seminar
Mathys and Squire Intellectual Property
On Tuesday 24th March
At 5pm -6.30pm
Waterloo Bridge Wing
Graduate School Training Room 4.14
We will be welcoming 2 patent attorneys both with PhD’s and with postdoc experience. They will talk about their jobs and about making the switch from lab-based research to IP.
For PhD’s at any stage and postdocs who are exploring alternative opportunities for their skills and knowledge. Mathys and Squire have Engineering, IT, Life Science and Environmental Technology practices.
If you wish to attend, let me know on
Phd-careers@kcl.ac.uk
Admin Job at Cancer Research
March 17, 2009
Not really an obvious move for a PhD – but the Institute of Cancer Research is looking for a couple of trainees in their registry
Details from www.icr.ac.uk/jobs/index.shtml
