CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Coalition of State Bioscience Institutes (CSBI) and Booz & Company have issued a report, entitled “Demand for Talent: Current & Projected Workforce Trends in the Life Science Industry,” which provides a snapshot of the most current and projected workforce needs within the United States’ life science industry and calls for broader industry participation in an ongoing analysis of talent demand.
Two of the most pressing questions for the life science industry today are “where are the jobs?” and “where are the jobs going to be?” This first-of-its-kind national analysis provides insights into these questions, drawing from thousands of current job postings and interviews with strategic industry leaders across the country about their projected talent needs.
“The life science industry continues to be an engine for job creation, necessitating adequate talent development at all levels of education and across multiple disciplines, with particular need for entry level technicians as well as managers with advanced experience, especially in regulatory and compliance functions,” said Lori Lindburg, CSBI Chair and Executive Director, BayBio Institute.
The report identifies the life science industry's current demand for skilled, cross-functional and flexible knowledge workers, and suggests that increased industry/academia collaboration and an effort to create national industry certifications could begin to address gaps in the US talent pipeline. This need for a highly trained workforce shows up in four distinct ways:
- Substantial need for employees with baccalaureate and advanced degrees
- Relatively low need for high school-only graduates
- Advanced /specialization degrees, such as bioinformatics, biostatistics and computational biology, as well as engineers with the ability to manage complex biological process scale-up, are in exceptional demand
- Industry and experience-specific job skills in disciplines such as Regulatory and Quality Systems continue to be in short supply