Black MBA - Winter 2007/2008 - (Page 76) CAREER Market Forecast which industry you choose, regardless of which job choice you make – the network and relationships you build, in large part, will determine how your career goes and how fulfilling it is. The third piece of advice is really a perspective about the right opportunity. As I mentor individuals inside Cardinal Health, they come and talk to me about a promotional opportunity they’re considering. My take is that whether or not to pursue a specific promotional opportunity is very individually specific. As someone looks at an opportunity – regardless of the title of the position, regardless of the pay that is associated with the position or the level of the position – if it provides you additional portable skill sets in the direction of what you feel your ultimate purpose is, then it’s a promotion. If it doesn’t, then it’s not. For some individuals coming out of school, that first offer sounds like a lot of money to you. The tendency is they want to go with the job that just has the highest dollars associated with it right out of the gate, instead of picking the assignment that has the best promotion – in terms of providing those valuable portable skill sets – for them. When it comes to analyzing job opportunities, I always recommend that individuals take time to consider whether or not it will help them fulfill their ultimate career purpose; and whether it will help them develop portable skills sets that will help them achieve that purpose. What makes being an MBA at Lilly different from other companies? care industry by leveraging a financial background. On the con side: it is a very dynamic, quickly changing industry. If you’re not comfortable with that, this isn’t the place for you. As large as it has become, it is still a pretty heavily relationship-based industry. If an individual is not comfortable with that, this is not an area where you want to be. This industry has a level of urgency about it that’s different than others I’ve experienced. What advice would you give MBAs coming into the workforce? Try and understand what you feel your purpose is and what you really can get passionate about as early in your career as you possibly can and that will serve you well. I had the good fortune of meeting Warren Buffett a couple years ago. He’s a trustee at my alma mater, Morehouse College, and I met him when I was there on campus. A similar question was posed to him. I paraphrased it, but that’s kind of the answer he gave. He figured out what he wanted to do early in life and he had longer to work at it than most folks. That’s a good piece of advice. Be introspective and figure out what you really want to do, as early as possible – then commit yourself to being the best at doing it. The second thing is that relationships are gold. The network and relationships you build – regardless of Answers. We impact lives by delivering answers to some of the world’s toughest health care questions. And, with over a century of experience behind our name, there is no one better prepared than Eli Lilly and Company to tackle these questions and the challenges of our changing industry. Working in the Pharmaceutical Industry Q&A With Marisa Pratt Director, Finance, Eli Lilly After completing her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering, Marisa Pratt took her engineering skills to work in the automotive industry before deciding to pursue an MBA. While working on her degree at Indiana University, an internship at Eli Lilly helped solidify her decision to go into finance, and though she’s not using the technical skills learned in engineering every day, Pratt said her engineering background has paid off. “As an engineer, you learn a way of thinking and that method of thinking you learn in engineering school, you never lose that. A lot of it applies in MBA school,” she said. “I think that’s why you see many people with MBAs also having a background in engineering, and maybe many of them even pursue more analytical MBA paths like finance because it is a very methodical thought process. So I do find myself using that.” www.lilly.com/careers 76 BlackMBA 349042_lilly.indd 1• Winter 2007/2008 • www.nbmbaa.org PM 12/7/07 5:05:46 http://www.lilly.com http://www.nbmbaa.org
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