Andi Atteberry is the Business Development Manager for Tom Ruff Company. Andi is our guest blogger today and she will share her insight into her job, who’s hiring and who’s not within the medical device and pharmaceutical sales arena, trends she has observed within the healthcare sector and her networking advice for breaking into medical and pharmaceutical sales.

TR:  Andi, please tell us about what you do for Tom Ruff Company and what your position entails:

AA:  I am the Business Development Manager for Tom Ruff Company.  Simply put, I network and dig to find the decision makers at the most up and coming medical device and pharmaceutical companies.  I market our recruiting services until they agree to give us a shot at finding them sales talent.  Our recruiters then take over the searches and do the rest.  

TR:  What do you like most about your job?  

AA:  I like digging for leads and the feeling I get when I am able to get us on board with a great company that our candidates will be excited about.  It’s all about the ‘chase’ for me.   

TR:  From your perspective, what is the current state of the medical sales industry vs. pharmaceutical sales industry?  

AA:  Almost all of my progress made so far in my position has been on the medical side of the industry.  I am finding there is much more opportunity for agencies like TRC to present talent for medical sales opportunities.  Competition is fierce to get into the best companies.  I regularly hear that I am one out of 20-30 recruiters marketing their services to HR departments and hiring managers each day.    TR:  Are companies still hiring within medical and pharmaceutical sales?  AA:  Our medical and biotech clients are hiring, but lately opportunities at big pharma have dwindled dramatically.  Fortunately, for our pharmaceutical candidates, our smaller pharma clients like Forest Pharmaceuticals and Santarus are still hiring pretty regularly.             

TR:  What is the hottest niche or sector within the medical device arena?  

AA:  Our candidates seem to be very interested in positions selling cardiovascular products, as well as exploring opportunities with the smaller, start-up medical device companies.  I spend a lot of my time researching and marketing to up and coming companies that are marked for long term growth and committed to developing new, cutting edge technology. Three new companies we are really excited about right now are Cardiac Science, Synergetics USA and Cryolife.  

TR:  Any advice you would offer to someone that is just starting their job search and is researching the best healthcare companies to work for?  

AA:  I am a huge advocate of jumping on social networking sites like LinkedIn.com, and reaching out to industry professionals who have posted their profiles.  If they weren’t interested in networking, they wouldn’t have posted their information.  It’s amazing what kind of help you can get if you just ask for it!  

If you have any questions for Andi, please feel free to post a comment below and she will be responding to questions all week.