Careers-perspective Interview

Abstract

I did. When I first left graduate school, I was the first employee at an e-commerce software start-up that my friends had founded. I was the vice-president of marketing, but I was incredibly bored. I really missed science and health. My colleagues and mentors were less supportive of this move than my subsequent choices; it just didn't make a lot of sense to them. In retrospect, they were probably right.After that, I spent a year and a half as a management consultant specializing in the pharmaceutical industry at a firm called Plan A. I enjoyed that position because I got to learn about different diseases and, again, keep up on the literature to some degree. It was very intellectually stimulating. I really only left that job because an editorial job fell into my lap and I couldn't refuse the opportunity.The writing I did while still in graduate school definitely made me a better candidate for all my subsequent positions. I would encourage anyone thinking of leaving the bench – whether they want to be a writer, or consultant, or lawyer, or whatever – to start writing and to brush up on their communication skills.