Lafayette Campus News (www.lafayette.edu), February 19, 2008 — Jennifer Ricciardi ’08 (East Hanover, N.J.) is majoring in neuroscience. During the interim session, she spent three days with Kathleen Wyckoff ’01, manager of manufacturing change control at Bristol-Myers Squibb & Company, as a part of Career Services’ externship program. The following is a first-hand account of Ricciardi’s experiences with the externship.
When looking at the brochure with numerous different types of externships in the science field, I came upon one that caught my eye. Kathleen Wyckoff, an alumna and former chemistry major, was hosting an externship at Bristol-Myers Squibb. I had always thought about a job in the pharmaceutical industry and I thought this may be my last chance as a current student at Lafayette to see the daily operations at such a company.
After looking at what position Ms. Wyckoff held at Bristol-Myers (manufacturing manager of change control), I was unclear as to what she did for a living. It made me wonder even more what the pharmaceutical industry had to offer, besides research and sales positions. I figured that I would give this externship a chance and see if it would be something I could see myself doing in the future.
After meeting Ms. Wyckoff and hearing more about what she does for Bristol-Myers, I became very interested in the field. She told me that she was going to try to expose me to different aspects of the pharmaceutical industry to show me that there is indeed more than just the obvious positions in research, sales, and marketing.
We first sat down in a conference room to get an overview of worldwide quality and compliance, a phrase which I had never heard. We then sat down with her team of employees, the Global Change Control Group. They talked to me about the roles and responsibilities they had within the group, as well as what their experiences were before coming to Bristol-Myers. I noticed that they came from a wide range of backgrounds and educations. Each member of the group was very open and also talked to me about what my options were in the pharmaceutical industry after college.
Ms. Wyckoff then arranged for me to meet another Lafayette alumna, Holly Shackman ’00, who works in the Research and Development field. I was able to gain insight into the responsibilities of a research scientist.
During this externship, I also toured the clinical supply manufacturing site and the biologics clinical supply manufacturing site, learned the purpose of global auditing, learned about regulatory compliance, and spoke to human resources about future employment at Bristol-Myers. On the last day of the externship, I was able to have a teleconference with neuroscientists from the company’s site in Wallingford, Conn., to learn more about career paths and job opportunities in my major, neuroscience.
I must say everyone in each department was extremely willing to talk to me about their jobs and my ideas for future positions. Each part of this externship was enlightening and helped me decide that Bristol-Myers Squibb is a place that I could see myself working in the future.
