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Moving from Lab-coats to Business Suits

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Everyone has a different reason for leaving the university. In my case, having been in the university all my life and risen to the tenured position of a full professorship, I was primarily bored. The way I found my present position was quite idiosyncratic, but I believe that is often the case when moving from science to business. My husband is on the staff at Mayo, so when I decided to look for a new career, Mayo was at the top of my list. My husband and I had a commuting relationship for 7 years, and that aspect of my personal life was getting pretty old! Also, I was familiar with the institution, having collaborated with several individuals while on sabbatical leave and as a visiting scientist.

Now, however, I was approaching a scientific institution looking not for a technical position, but rather for one in administration. How should I present myself? Using my research training, I headed first for the library-this time, to find books on business resume writing. I learned that the business resume fits on one page. I was flabbergasted. How could I possibly condense my professional curriculum vitae, whose value is directly proportional to its length, into one page? This was a tremendous challenge and a very difficult exercise, extrapolating the real-life skill that I had developed over many years in academia "abstracting and evaluating" scientific literature.

Finally, with my one-page resume in hand, I went to talk with all the administrators I knew (and some I did not) at Mayo. Without exception, they all pointed me toward Mayo Medical Ventures, which includes the office of technology transfer. At that time, by chance, the OTT was considering expanding its staff and hiring its first card-carrying professional scientist, who they thought might have some advantages over business people when interacting with the Mayo staff. My familiarity with the Mayo culture was an advantage, and I was hired.



Job openings in technology transfer are advertised through AUTM and LES, and they frequently show up on Techno-L on the Internet. Additionally, executive placement agencies may know of tech transfer opportunities in industry. One good source of job-hunting information is the chapter on "Recruiters Specializing in Biotechnology" in 1997 Genetic Engineering News Guides to Biotechnology Companies (Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. Publishers; ISBN: 0-913113-79-4).

One aspect of the transition to business that I found difficult was moving from a position in which I was completely in charge and basically "knew everything," to a position in which I was an integral part of a working group, with people both junior and senior to me, and a position in which I basically had to learn from the ground up. It can be very frightening and frustrating to go from a field in which you have worked very hard to learn the material and feel that you are in control, to a position in which you are basically at sea. In the university, if you don't know the answer to a question, the one thing you do know is how to go out and find that answer.

I very clearly remember starting my new job in technology transfer and sitting in with my boss during a contract negotiation. I was astounded! How do you learn how to negotiate a business deal? So, I went to look for a book on negotiation strategy. Yes, there are books on negotiation out there; you will find when you read them that they are basically common sense, but notably short on specific "how-to" advice. This was a tremendous shock to me-not to have a source of black and white answers to questions. Rather, I found that much of business and negotiating is common sense, and the only way that it can be learned is through practice and being exposed to the various situations that can arise.

The transition from the lab to the business office can be challenging, exciting, frustrating, and sometimes just plain irritating. In the lab, you are generally your own boss-you wear what you want; you carry out your experiments when you want; you frequently speak as you wish with minimal online censorship; and you usually have some basic understanding of the politics and the pecking order.

In the business world, you wear "dress up clothes" every day; you are a bit more formal in your interactions with your co-workers and associates; you are expected to be at work regular hours, usually 8 A.M. to 5 P.M.; and you are set down in the middle of a notably different hierarchy. The hierarchy of people, positions, and personalities can be intimidating. In the university, most interactions are direct between the effector and the affected. One's department chair or mentor rarely intervenes.

In the business of technology transfer, other layers of interactions may become interwoven between the technology transfer officer and the inventor, especially if the inventor is unhappy. Some institutional and many office policies are best addressed by my boss, whereas other institutional policies are best addressed by my boss's boss. And with both very happy or unhappy inventors, there is the need to pass the message upstairs, so that the senior administrator is not blind-sided by a situation that should not have been news! Perhaps the business hierarchy is more accurately described as a web-most folks, like small insects, must be aware of all the threads they activate.

The Biggest Changes

When asked what has been the biggest change for me in moving into technology transfer from the research laboratory and lecture podium, I have always answered that I have increased my short-term memory. That is not a joke!

In the laboratory you know what you are going to do when you arrive each morning; you move through the stages of an experiment in a sequential, logical fashion; and you usually do only one thing at a time. In technology transfer, you have to be able not only to juggle several tasks simultaneously but also to prioritize the existing tasks, sometimes with those priorities changing several times during the day. You may have a plan for the day when you come in, but the telephone rings, a Federal Express package arrives, the fax machine is smoking, your e-mail inbox is full, and you have three meetings scheduled back to back to back.

What was particularly difficult for me was to find a method to keep track of all the ongoing projects-basically a living, breathing to-do list that functions effectively and efficiently, and is something with which I can live. When I first started in this job, I would make a series of telephone calls, I would end up getting a series of answering machines, I would leave messages, and then I would be completely befuddled when the people called me back and I couldn't remember who they were. Hence, the need to improve that short-term memory!

Another significant difference between technology transfer and living in the university is the loss of control of the speed at which, and the direction in which, your projects move. Interacting with the commercial world can be very, very frustrating. A company that seems very interested in a technology and presses you to supply them with additional information may suddenly appear totally to lose interest, not calling for 6 months. Then, as the end-of-the-year budget dollars become available, they may be back on the phone to you, insisting that the deal be closed in the next 2 weeks or they won't be able to work with you.

Business trends, as exemplified by the daily changes in the stock market, fluctuate tremendously and your success at being able to commercialize your technologies must ride the crest of those fluctuations. The frustrations, however, are often balanced by the successes and the completed deals. I had a string of several weeks when every Friday, sometime after 3 P.M., when you would think everyone was getting ready to go home and make plans for the weekend; the telephone rang with good news from a company regarding moving a deal forward or completing a negotiation. Go figure.
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