It’s Not About the Title

Welcome to your worthy career, a podcast for women in Pharma and Leadership Coach with me, Melissa Lawrence. I am a certified career and leadership coach with a master’s in organizational psychology who has worked in talent and learning development in biotech to large pharma, from nonclinical to commercial. I help women in pharma and biotech create a career worthy of them with Whether you want to get clear on what you want, get a new job, get promoted, or be effective as a leader at any level, this is the place for you. Every week, you will get practical career strategies and mindset shifts to help you overcome the problems you experience at work so you can reach your goals feeling better than ever. Your up level begins now. Hello and welcome to this week’s episode of the podcast. Now, a lot has happened since I I just recorded an episode, which was just a few days ago. My book, Your Worth Career: A Science-Beckt Method to Build a Meaningful Career in Pharma and Biotech, was just released. And it was a whirlwind of joy and excitement as you were officially able to get this resource into your hands. 

Now, if you already have your copy, I cannot wait to hear your thoughts on it, how it helps, how it changes your perspective on yourself, your career, and what is possible. You can always send me a message on LinkedIn or Instagram. And how you can really help is to leave a review on Amazon. If you’re like me, when you go to make a purchase, you look to see if there are any positive reviews first. So taking a few minutes just to share what you liked about the book helps other women in the industry who could use support, get the help that they need to. And if you haven’t gotten the book yet, my gosh, go to Amazon right now and grab it. It is the method I have developed working working with clients the last several years that leads to not just job offers and promotions, but more importantly, meaningful and fulfilling careers where you feel like you belong. Now, today, we’re actually going to be talking about titles. So So when I wrote my book, I didn’t write it to be a best seller. My why for writing the book was to create a resource that could help more people than I can reasonably help directly.

It was to help women feel seen in a way that the way that they feel about their careers and to know that they’re not alone and there actually is a way that you can feel in control of your career, know what you want and achieve it really in any job market. So it’s the book that I wish that I had coming into industry and what I would want every woman in this industry to have, to show you the things that we aren’t told when we come into this industry and what you can only learn if you went through it, if you have my experience and expertise, and that I gleaned from years of coaching women in this space. It truly is an insider’s guide to the neuroscience and behavioral psychology of work, but also the unspoken rules of advancement in our specific industry. Because scripts and generic templates and generic books and even the best trainings are not nuanced enough, right? So I wanted this to help you even if we never spoke. So this was my why. And I literally asked myself, how How can I help people when I’m no longer on Earth or if I lose my brain and I’m not as sharp as I used to be? 

And this was my answer. It doesn’t involve complicated tech or any maintenance. I can write it and make it available and believe that it will stay on the test of time. Now, why am I sharing this with you and how does it relate to today’s episode? Because the why of your goal is really important. And you might be like, Yeah, I know. But I want to talk about this deeper because I think the way I’m going to talk about it today might land differently for you. I am in awe, really, and so proud to say that my book was released two days ago at the time that I’m recording this right now, and it already hit number one best seller in career advancement and professional development, and number one new release in that category in pharmaceutical and biotechnology and motivation management and leadership. I honestly hoped that I would rank in the top 10 of maybe one of those categories. And even though that was a hope, it was just icing on the cake. It was gravy. It wasn’t the goal. Because I want to share, though, that these categories, they’re symbolic. Some of the biggest authors related to my work are in these categories like Brené Brown and Adam Grant. 

The pharma biotech category is obviously so aligned with my niche and the work that I do, but is so symbolic because when I joined this industry in the beginning of I felt like a fish out of water. I didn’t feel like I belonged. I didn’t have a science degree. I had an expertise in learning and development. When I was interviewing for my very first industry job, going through all of the hoops and the presentations, the panels, all of the things, the learning and development department that I was being hired into, they wanted to hire me. They knew that I had the skills and the experience. The resistance to actually giving me the offer came came from the technical folks in quality assurance that I would be supporting. Why? Because I didn’t have that science degree. So they were asking, How in the world would I be able to help train their auditors in non-clinical toxicology studies without my own science degree when it is a basic requirement for anyone that they would hire into that department? And it was a reasonable question. And in the end, I got the job. And I actually tell that story in my book.

I proved to them that I could train auditors better than any technical expert did. And they saw the data. Faster training with higher quality work and less deviations. But even when I proved myself early on, as I went through my pharma career, I was consistently exposed to brilliant people with scientific expertise far beyond my comprehension. My clients are the most brilliant women that I’ve ever met. It’s one of the reasons that I love this industry. I love being around people whose brains work differently than and I love the challenge of helping them see things differently and learn things differently. It’s like we can create this really powerful partnership. So it’s no wonder I do what I do now, right? So earning number one new release and bestseller status in pharma and biotech books with my book next to other big books in the space, it feels like I’ve come full circle. From not feeling accepted in the scientific circle to creating a scientific method for career advancement, specifically for this same population. And just like that first job proving that the method that I use works. I was walking Brooklyn yesterday, my puppy, and well, she’s three, so she’s not really a puppy, but I call her my puppy.

And I was reflecting on this and why I created this. And I started thinking about how I got here because I was thinking, how did I become a best seller? It was a year ago that I had just decided to write this book. So writing this book wasn’t easy. And throughout the year, I wondered how and if it was going to come together. I honestly wondered if I was going to have to delay things. And it started with a decision that I was going to do it after putting it off for years. And that commitment sparks change, just like with your goals, whether it’s a new job or a promotion or to start running or whatever it is, it all starts with commitment. So I had been saying for years I’ll try to fit writing in a book this year. I might write a book. When I have time, I’ll write the book. I’ll write the book by September. I had meetings with publishing houses and editors over the years and said, Yeah, I’ll think about it. At the end of each call, I was like, Yeah, maybe I’ll go with them. I’ll think about it. 

And then I didn’t make a decision. And all of that thinking, all of that maybe I’ll do it, didn’t lead to a commitment. I had the desire and the want to write the book, but not the commitment. It’s the same when I start working with my clients. Before, they might have tried a lot of different things. Maybe they didn’t try that much on their own. But investing your time and money into a solution, it takes a different type of commitment. You’re deciding, I’m putting my money, I’m putting my time into something, I’m going to get a different result. It’s forcing your hand to do the uncomfortable things. So a little over a year ago, I didn’t overanalyze or do a lot of research. I decided I had been thinking about writing this book for a while. I’m just going to decide, and then I’ll figure it out later. So I found an editor I liked. I hired her. I found someone who could help navigate the publishing process. I hired them. Now I had my why and I had my commitment. And when it got hard, I had to keep going. When I wasn’t sure of my scope, if I was saying too little or too much on a topic, when I felt I didn’t have enough time, I made the time. 

I figured it out. There’s times that we went to visit family and I brought my laptop. And that’s all part of the story now of me sitting at the kitchen table while my family is watching a game on TV and ordering takeout, and I’m sitting there editing my words and printing out copies and reviewing the illustrations in the book and writing out new sections. And now they’re all part of that story, too. A colleague of mine told me that she remembered when I told her over this past year during different parts. At one point, I told her I hadn’t started yet. And then I told her that I wasn’t sure if I was going to create something good enough. And now here I am with this best selling book. How inspiring she said it was for her because she saw the outcome, but she most importantly saw the messy middle. And so she can reflect now, too. And she’s like, Wow, you earned this. But I saw you push through and work through the ups and downs of this all year long. And it wasn’t all a struggle, right? Anything, there was excitement and wins along the way, too. 

When I formulated new ideas or I came up with a better way to talk about something that I’ve been talking about for years. Or when I decided to hire my graphic designer to elevate Clarity Path, who you’ll meet in the book, so I could create visuals to illustrate ideas to help you learn them more effectively. That was so exciting. Or when I decided to add exercises and I could see just how useful this was going to be and my vision was becoming a reality, it was so fun. And I celebrated my first draft and my final manuscript. But here’s what I really want you to take away from this story. Everything you want to achieve, you can. It just might not look like a highlight reel or amazing or easy. And I think you know that. I think we all know that on some until we’re in it. And then somehow our struggles seem harder or the mountain feels harder to climb or things just seem more impossible or they’re never going to work out. It’s why some of my clients will say that they can believe these things for other people, but they can’t believe it for themselves. 

And it’s because they’re not in the messy middle. But you are in control of your dreams. This was part of my reflection, too. As I found myself saying over and over to you that this is a dream come true, whether it was on Instagram or LinkedIn or emails, I just kept saying, This is a dream come true. This is a dream come true. And after seeing it a hundred times, it must have been. It felt like it dawned on me that I made this dream come true. This didn’t happen to me. I decided to do it and I stuck with it. I figured out how to write a book. I went through the cover design process. I figured out how to promote a book. I had never done that before either. So my dream came true because I I had the dream and I decided to create it. And this is the same with your career. If you ever were happy in your job or reached a big achievement and you reflect on that now, that didn’t just happen. You created it. So if you’re in that messy middle now or maybe even feeling lost or things just aren’t going to work out, know that you can work through this and you can get to the other side. 

I heard someone say that when something isn’t going well or they experience a big loss, they cry themselves a river and then they build themselves a bridge to get over it. So maybe you just need to make yourself a bridge. All right. So we talked about the why and the commitment. I want to connect this in a really tangible way to you around title. For me today, we’re talking about the best-selling author, and in other times, it might have been me getting a promotion or a new job offer. And when women come to me and say that they they want a promotion to a specific title, one of the first things I ask them is why. And oftentimes, it’s because I feel I earned it, because I work hard, because I’ve been with the company for a long time, because other people are getting promoted. And if deep down that is their why, then they often aren’t successful in getting that promotion because it’s not as meaningful. It’s more vanity, right? They haven’t gotten deep enough yet to know why it’s so important to them. With many of the women that I talk to, when I dig deeper with them, a few things come to the surface, and any one of these could be true. 

I’m going to give you three things. One, they aren’t feeling like they’re growing or challenged enough. So that promotion represents growth for them. Two, they are unhappy in their job and they don’t know what they want, so they chase the promotion in order to see some change or progress in their career. Three, they feel entitled based on what they’ve contributed. Now, here’s what happens when these are the reasons and you don’t address the root cause of these, to really get into the why. With the first one, from a business perspective, if you’re not feeling challenged, a promotion isn’t the answer. Promotions don’t always lead to a challenge anyway, right? And also some companies, even with very supportive bosses, aren’t going to your desire to be challenged as a reason to pay you more money. So first we need to know what exactly you want to be challenged in, what are the problems that you want to solve, and how can your company benefit from that? Then we can make an effective business case. Now, the second one is being unhappy. When we’re unhappy in one area, it’s really common to run away rather than know what we actually want to run toward. 

If the promotion is just about the title, it isn’t persuasive to your leadership, and it will also feel hollow after you get it. It is something to keep your brain focused on, believing you will achieve it, and if you do, you’ll feel differently. But chances are, if you get the promotion, you’ll still be unhappy because it isn’t addressing the root cause of your unhappiness and what you actually want. And with the entitlement, listen, I get it. And I think overall, we really need to name and neutralize this feeling of entitlement because there’s a lot of negative connotation, but it really is a natural human emotion. When we work hard, we want to be rewarded. We expect it. When we were in school, we worked hard. We got rewarded with A’s. When you get A’s, you often get gifts. Some people’s parents would pay them for their A’s. Or right now, Krispy Kreme gives you free donuts, a free donut for every A that you have. My daughter loves that. So whenever she gets her report card, you know we’re going so she can get her free donuts. Or when I was a kid, we had the book reading thing with Pizza Hut, right? 

You read books and you got pizza. So of course, we work hard. We want to get rewarded. The problem is that when the reward doesn’t come, we can get resentful because we believe we earned it. It changes how we think about work, how we think about others. And it also can start to erode the trust and the confidence that we have in ourselves. So For my clients, this can look like continuing to push for the promotion and feeling frustrated when they can’t force it to happen, or putting together detailed development plans and getting frustrated when they do their part and it still doesn’t come. What they’re doing is they’re still relying on pushing and they’re still relying on performance when those are not the makings of a promotion. Promotions aren’t granted because you can do the job or because you asked. They’re more nuanced. It requires understanding the business perspective, having the right relationships, and being visible. You do this more effectively when you have your clarity, which starts with your why. My book, for example, didn’t become a best seller because I know how to write a book or because I’m an expert in what I’m talking about. 

It was all of the things. It was the relationships I have. It was the visibility. It was how I had proven and tested this. It was so many different things, so many new skills I had to learn. So many things went into that. So whether it’s a best seller title, a promotion, a new job offer, You’re making a pivot. Remember, these are just titles, they’re outcomes. But there’s a lot that goes into that. And when you focus on why, those things come more easily because you work through the messy middle. You try new things. You gain new perspectives. You build new skills. That why fuels you to do those things when it’s hard. When you get into that valley of despair, your why is what keeps you moving forward. The title is never just a title. It comes from some deeper place. So find your deeper root cause, and the outcome you want will come. All right. Have an amazing week. I’ll talk to you soon. I have something special for you. The episode is over, but that doesn’t mean your development ends here. If you enjoyed the podcast episode today, head to my website, yourworthycareer.

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