What is a recruiter and how do I find one?

Help me find a biotech recruiter

• Recent Ph.D. grad would like to work with a recruiter/headhunter to find an industry job. Can you help me find a recruiter in the Boston area, or give me pointers/tips on working with one? I just graduated with a Ph.D. and I am wondering if one or more recruiters (headhunters) can help match me with an industry job in my field. How can I work with a recruiter? Does anyone know of good ones in particular? I am located in the Boston area, and I would like to consider job options around here as there's a great biotech industry. Though, I'm also interested in looking for jobs -- and working with recruiters -- based in other cities or even in Europe. Thanks!

• Answer:

  If you're looking for jobs, then a useful resource would be to know where the biotech clusters are [http://www.us.am.joneslanglasalle.com/ResearchLevel1/Life%20Sciences%20Cluster%20Report_Global_2012.pdf], because there are a lot of them. Even within the US, San Francisco, San Diego and Raleigh/Durham are not that far behind the Boston area. San Diego is actually ahead of Boston on life sciences employment. Raleigh-Durham has more establishments. San Francisco gets more VC funding. The US attracts roughly double the investment in life sciences of the next most important country, China so even second or third tier US cities are still pretty attractive in the great scheme of things. Another thing to consider - there are lots and lots of consulting firms that support the biotech industry that hire PhD grads who can make sense of the science but also put things in a commercial context. I.e. if you don't want to work on the R&D side, these firms are a good entry point into the commercial side of the business. The big consulting firms like Bain, McKinsey, Booz as well as Accenture and Deloitte all have Boston offices. Decision Resources is based in Burlington. There are countless other consulting firms dealing with every aspect of the commercial process - licensing, lifecycle management etc. On top of that, larger institutions have tech transfer offices - another point of entry into the wider area. I don't work directly in the area so don't know any recruiters, but look at the online trade press and job boards, look for the kind of jobs you're interested in and you'll see certain recruitment firm names crop up repeatedly. If you're new to the job market you're probably not looking for a headhunter (i.e. who is given a brief with the task of reaching out to a pool of candidates) unless you bring something unique right now. You're looking for a recruitment firm (i.e. who typically cast the net a bit wider and are a typically less bespoke, and used for less bespoke appointments).