Interviewing for a VP role in big pharma-- 5 rounds and I still dont have clarity in the role or the hiring mgr--

[Anonymous]

Is it a red flag if a company seems to be unable to commit to a hiring mgr/ clear responsibilities. I get that adaptability is important but after 5 rounds, is that still par for course?

[Anonymous]

Yes.

Pharma is a mess right now, and there are a lot of things up in the air. Many VP positions open but perhaps on ice/you are being led on while they read the tea leaves.

[Anonymous]

Pretty rough time to join big pharma. It’s a slow-moving, stodgy, highly regulated industry in the best of times.

[Anonymous]

DH works in biotech, for VP that is sort of odd, to have 5 rounds -- he is an AGC, so not as high as VP, the process is slow, but clear.

[Anonymous]

Totally unrelated to this industry, but in my experience, anything weird I picked up on an interview ended up being absolutely a sign of directly related weird things when I started. Like, the guy who interviewed me and asked about my marital status and whether i had kids in the interview..... a f-ing weirdo in the job. And the guy who was super chill but gave me a great vibe in the interview, but had me connect with his underling, and the underling gave me a very bad vibe during the interview.... she was horrible for years, like I was going to eventually leave solely because of her and then she left and everything instantly got great. But yeah, any red flags during the interview will in fact relate to things that will definitely be issues during your job. What you need to do is try and suss out how bad it's going to be and if it's something that you can manage in the job.

[Anonymous]

The weird thing IMO is that they are interviewing outside people for a VP role. At my pharma, all VP job openings have a person already picked out for them. The job posting is just to pretend we are fair

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The weird thing IMO is that they are interviewing outside people for a VP role. At my pharma, all VP job openings have a person already picked out for them. The job posting is just to pretend we are fair

Also, this. The high level posts typically are filled internally. The GC for my husbands division was an external hire from a peer company. It worked out. Otherwise, most exec level positions don’t work out in his experience.