Biomedical Career Horizon on Cloudy Side For 1993

While salaries are on the upswing, the number of job opportunities is predicted to decline The coming of a new year, the establishment of a new presidential administration, and some encouraging signs of an economic upturn may yield professional gain for some in the science community. Nevertheless, research directors and human resource managers at United States biomedical research institutions say their approach to the hiring of scientists will remain cautious in 1993. Many add, however, that though the number of job opportunities in the biomedical field is likely to remain low--as it has been for the past two years--salaries should continue on an upward course. In addition, they point out that scientists in a few specialties- -particularly those combining biology and mathematics--are commanding significantly higher-than-average pay. "The field as a whole seems relatively flat in terms of hiring and opportunity," says Ames Putnam, vice chairman of the department of education and research at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. "Funding is tight. For our part, we're concentrating sole-ly on particular areas of need." The biomedical research field includes any life science-related research applicable to understanding human biology or the cause and treatment of disease. As Roger Hewitt, a molecular genetics professor at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, writes, this includes "more medically oriented disciplines," such as physiology, toxicology, neurobiology, and virology, as well as "more basic, biomedical science" fields, such as biochemistry, molecular biology, biophysics, and biomathematics (Peterson's Guide to Graduate Programs in the Biological and Agricultural Sciences 1992, Princeton, N.J., Peterson's Guides). Hewitt adds, however, that "research in any of these disciplines is rarely conducted in isolation.... The interdisciplinary nature of most biomedical research has made its assignment to disciplinary categories very difficult, if not meaningless in some cases.... The area of biomedical science has evolved an identity as a field that transcends the disciplines it subsumes." As a basis for this article, The Scientist interviewed research directors and human resource managers at more than 30 biomedical research institutions across the U.S. Included in the informal survey were officials at public and private universities, private and state- or federal-government-supported research centers, public and private research and teaching hospitals, and industry laboratories. No purely biotechnology-based companies were included in the industry group. New Hires At many of the institutions contacted, managers report that already-established departments and research groups are increasing in size only slightly or not at all, with the bulk of new hires in most areas replacing scientists who have retired or moved to other positions. Some facilities report no new hiring at all in some traditional disciplines, such as physiology. Others, however, relate that they have recently initiated or are about to initiate programs in some new research areas, and are hiring staff for the new programs. Fields in which programs are being set up include immunology, neuroscience, and molecular genetics, as well as some interdisciplinary areas involving the application of physics, chemistry, and computer science to the study of biological molecules. At institutions that are beefing up already-established departments, scientists who combine molecular and cell biology techniques with some other area of expertise seem to be most in demand, with some facilities also making special efforts to hire more clinical researchers than basic researchers. "We're placing a premium on those whose discipline is preceded by the word `molecular,' " says James Karr, chief scientific administrator of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute, operated by the New York State Department of Health in Buffalo. Many administrators characterize the current outlook for biomedical investigators as essentially a hirers' market, with enough good scientists available to give employers their choice. Researchers at the postdoctoral level are the single exception to this rule, officials say. Many would like to fill postdoctoral positions with top-notch young candidates from the United States, but claim that there are not enough to go around. Resistance To Change Probably because of a slow economy, caution in making changes is the rule among both employers and investigators, many of the administrators interviewed say. They note that it's become an especially tough task to entice scientists to change their current positions for jobs in another part of the U.S. or in another kind of institution. Meanwhile, employers from all biomedical sectors report another possible hiring trend, which indicates their own caution: hiring more staffers with somewhat more experience (at the associate professor level in a university, for example) and fewer of the very youngest, most inexperienced scientists. "There's a bit of an assumption at the moment that you may get a greater dividend by recruiting scientists who've already demonstrated the skills to go beyond the competitive renewal of their first award," Karr says. Salaries Rising While most of the administrators surveyed say that biomedical research salaries can vary widely among disciplines and from position to position, they say the general trend has been slowly upward. That's been the case, even in the recent sluggish economy, many say, because institutions of all kinds have been competing for the best candidates in a few currently booming fields of study. In general, these administrators say, industry labs offer the highest salaries--at all levels of experience--with private universities and research institutions second, and government- sponsored research institutions last. Although there are more postdoc positions than top-flight candidates to fill them, postdoctoral stipends have remained relatively flat, administrators say. According to salary figures cited by the officials interviewed for this article, the range of those stipends is wide, from the low $20,000s to the mid- $30,000s. Some administrators say that postdoctoral pay may have increased most at very specialized institutions that must compete nationally for a narrower pool of candidates. Scientists without job experience face an even wider range of salaries, from the low $30,000s to $70,000, depending on the type of institution and the scientist's specialty. In some public universities, beginning assistant professors' salaries still linger in the low $30,000s, particularly in nonmolecular disciplines. However, most of the universities surveyed as well as other research institutions report beginning salaries ranging from the $40,000 level through the low $50,000s in the biomedical disciplines in which they are now hiring. Several administrators contacted by The Scientist in connection with this article note that mathematically oriented biomedical specialists, including biostatisticians, biometricians, and epidemiologists, are in especially short supply. These shortages, they say, have created an employees' market in these areas, with young scientists routinely commanding salaries ranging from $50,000 to $60,000. "In biomathematics disciplines, we're finding that offers in the $40,000-$50,000 range don't bring candidates back for a second interview," says one official at a government-funded research center. In industry labs, beginning scientists with molecular biology specialties can expect to be offered around $50,000, some industry managers say. Beginning clinical researchers in private research hospitals command salaries of around $70,000. Many administrators point out that average starting salaries, in particular, have risen by as much as $10,000 or even $20,000 over the past two to three years. Clinicians' salaries, especially, seem to be on the rise. Bench scientists with experience who do not hold top management jobs are currently receiving salaries ranging from the high $40,000s to the mid-$90,000s, research officials say. Surprisingly, private universities, hospitals, and research centers contacted by The Scientist cited slightly higher average salaries for this large group of scientists than did industry labs. Many administrators contacted said that while salaries for this mid-level group of scientists have risen recently, they have risen less than beginning salaries. At this level, too, several managers report that biostatisticians and other biomedical scientists with mathematical specialties are in short supply and seem to be able to command higher salaries. A salary range of $90,000 to $110,000 seems to be available to investigators who are also top managers at many institutions, while highly experienced clinical researchers can receive salaries of well over $100,000. Evolving Employment Picture Economic factors make the hiring picture different at different kinds of institutions, research managers say. Currently, officials at privately owned universities, hospitals, and research centers--as opposed to government-backed facilities--say they have opened or are opening new research departments or programs in 1992 and 1993. That reflects the current economy, in which publicly funded institutions are at the mercy of salary caps, hiring freezes, and other state and federal government cutbacks, scientists say. However, administrators at private institutions say that despite the renewed activity in their facilities, there's no real guarantee that this situation will last. Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C., is expanding its research facilities and substantially beefing up programs in neuroscience and molecular and cell biology, according to university officials. Says Kenneth Dretchen, the medical center's associate dean for research, "We're doing pretty well because we're not under salary caps and don't have a state budget to deal with. There are definitely times when it's better to be private, and this is one of them. But the pendulum will probably swing back to favoring publicly funded institutions sooner or later." University and government investigators say that industrial research laboratories are probably the fastest-growing market for biomedical scientists, but some industry mangers disagree. They contend that the big push for industry expansion into biotechnology and other biomedical studies came during the late 1980s. Now, they say, biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and chemical companies are starting only a few new research groups, primarily in the same areas being pursued by universities and other institutions. John Bussen, manager of human resources for Monsanto Corporate Research (a division of St. Louis-based Monsanto Co.), echoes other industry managers when he says, "We had a significant growth for five to six years as we developed a biotech focus. Since then, however, we've slowed our growth. Currently, we're slightly increasing our hiring in some new areas of major focus, such as immunology and natural products chemistry. Otherwise, we're mainly hiring to replace normal attrition in the molecular and cell biology areas." Other Considerations Besides salary, scientists should consider the differences in institutional styles and structures and how those fit with their own career goals and personal styles as they conduct job searches, administrators say. Officials at government-sponsored research centers, for example, urge potential employees to consider that government scientists are less dependent on obtaining their own grants and can usually count on continued funding for equipment and for staff. Managers of privately run research centers stress the ability of their scientists to undertake more risky and more controversial areas of research, while managers of hospital-connected research institutions point out that their investigators have easy access to materials such as human tumor cells, for which scientists in other types of institutions must often beg. Administrators in industry labs point to the variety of career tracks in their firms as an important factor for potential hires to consider. That variety, they say, means industry jobs offer scientists more options for specializing in bench science or management or combining the two as their careers progress. But while managers in all biomedical arenas urge potential employees to consider factors other than salary when deciding what job to take, it's money that makes some of them nervous about the future. Many administrators, especially those in private universities and research centers, say they fear that insufficient grant funds to carry out increasingly expensive biomedical research protocols may ultimately shrink the pool of young scientists available to them. "Right now there are lots of outstanding junior faculty," says Allan Granoff, director of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn. "But many of us worry that the future supply may be greatly affected by the necessity to compete fiercely for insufficient extramural funding. If pursuing the funding an independent research career requires becomes too difficult, people may say, `Why should I go to all that trouble?' " Marcia Clemmitt is a freelance science writer based in Washington, D.C.

Biomedical Career Horizon on Cloudy Side For 1993

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