5 tough questions about a career in pharma you should answer before sending your CV
Maryna Toporenko is an HR Business Partner at Sona Group with more than eight years of experience in Big Pharma. Today, she focuses on developing HR processes and corporate culture, helping the business scale and build strong teams across multiple countries.
In this conversation, she shares her perspective on what a career in pharma really demands, what kind of talent the industry is looking for today, and why a strong candidate is defined by far more than the facts listed on a resume.
1. Why is pharma more than just a “stable industry”? What makes it a distinct kind of career?
Many people are drawn to pharma because of its reputation for stability. But I would argue that its defining quality is not stability at all. It is responsibility.
This is an industry where daily work is directly tied to people’s health and quality of life. That is why precision, ethics, attention to detail, respect for process, compliance, and personal maturity are valued so highly. In many sectors, mistakes cost time or money. In pharma, the cost is often much greater.
Pharma is not a comfortable career for those simply looking for predictability. It requires you to become part of a system built on the trust of doctors, partners, patients, and public institutions. For people who are genuinely aligned with that level of responsibility, it can become one of the strongest professional paths available.
2. What kind of people is pharma really looking for today, beyond those who already have relevant industry experience?
The strongest candidates in pharma are not always the ones who have simply “worked in the industry before.” What matters much more is how a person thinks, learns, and operates.
The first thing the industry values is structured thinking. Pharma is a complex environment made up of interconnected functions: medical affairs, regulatory work, marketing, market access, compliance, distribution, and engagement with healthcare professionals. It is essential to see the system as a whole, rather than focusing only on your individual area.
The second is the ability to learn faster than the market changes. Strong candidates are not intimidated by new information, complexity, or high standards.
The third is personal maturity. That means being able to take responsibility, remain composed under pressure, keep your word, and respect professional boundaries.
And finally, there is motivation. If someone comes to pharma primarily for a well-known brand or a stable salary, that tends to show very quickly. But when a person genuinely understands why this industry matters to them, the quality of the conversation changes entirely.
3. Why do even strong candidates often fail to make it through a pharma hiring process?
Because today the market evaluates not only experience, but also the quality of a person’s professional self-awareness.
Many candidates are, in reality, much stronger than they sound in an interview. The problem is that they describe themselves in overly general terms. They say, “I led a team,” “I worked in marketing,” or “I was responsible for sales,” but they cannot clearly explain the scale, the context, the complexity of the challenge, or, most importantly, the logic behind their decisions.
In pharma, that is not enough. It is not enough to list responsibilities. What matters is whether you can demonstrate your professional lens: how you analyse situations, how you make decisions, how you work through uncertainty, and how you uphold standards.
Another common issue is weak preparation. If a candidate does not understand how the business works, which markets the company operates in, which therapeutic areas it focuses on, or the logic behind the role they are applying for, they come across as random.
And once again, there is the absence of an honest answer to one very simple question: why pharma? Without that answer, even a strong profile often fails to inspire trust.
4. What should candidates look at when choosing a pharma employer, beyond brand and compensation?
I would always advise candidates to look beyond the company name and the compensation package. For a long-term career, those factors alone are not enough.
First, look at the quality of leadership. In pharma, people learn a great deal not from formal training, but from the leaders they work with. It matters whether a company has strong professionals who do not just manage, but actively help others grow.
Second, look at the culture of responsibility. How consistent is the company in its standards? Are the rules clear? Is there genuine respect for process, expertise, and reputation? In pharma, trust is the core currency, and company culture directly shapes the quality of your professional environment.
Third, look at the opportunity for meaningful growth. A strong pharma company offers more than a new title. It gives people broader scope, a higher level of responsibility, more complex markets, and deeper professional development.
And fourth, look at values. People often build long careers in this industry. That means the style of interaction, the way people are treated, attitudes toward development, and the quality of teamwork matter enormously. Together, these things define the quality of your professional life.
5. Is it realistic to move into pharma from another industry, and what does it take besides motivation?
Yes, it is absolutely realistic, and in many cases it can be a very promising move. But entering pharma requires more than a simple desire to try something new. It demands serious internal preparation.
The first step is to rethink your existing experience in the right way. Many skills transfer well into pharma: strategic thinking, project management, analytics, marketing, process management, supply chain, digital, finance, and HR. The real question is not whether you have worked in pharma before. It is whether you can explain how your background creates value in this industry.
The next step is to quickly build industry context. You need to understand how the market works, what market access means, what engagement with the medical community looks like, why compliance matters so much, how regulation functions, and how the hospital segment differs from retail.
And of course, you need mature motivation. If someone is drawn to pharma simply because it looks good on a CV, that is almost never enough. But when a person sees in this industry a combination of intellectual complexity, high standards, and real impact, their potential looks entirely different.
