r/clinicalresearch

I’m interviewing with Merck, Thermo Fisher/PPD, and a smaller CRO. No offers yet, but the salary discussed for Merck is around $129k, and I believe the other two are around $130k–$135k. The Merck role would be in cardiovascular monitoring.
My biggest priorities are higher pay, manageable travel, and job stability. How are the travel expectations?
I was told the Thermo role doesn’t have a days-on-site metric, although I know that doesn’t necessarily mean less travel. I’ve also heard good things about working directly for a sponsor.
For anyone with recent experience at Merck or Thermo/PPD:
What does travel actually look like in terms of overnight stays per month?
How manageable are the site loads, workload, and metrics?
How do the benefits, bonuses, retirement plans, and PTO compare?
What happens when a study ends—are CRAs reassigned?
Has moving from a CRO to a sponsor improved your work-life balance?
Would you take $129k at a sponsor over $130k–$135k at a CRO if travel were similar? What would you clarify before accepting?

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for some insight from anyone who currently works at Thermo Fisher Scientific/PPD or has recently applied for an ACRA/CRA position there. I was in the recruitment process for the ACRA position at Thermo Fisher Scientific (Northeast & Southeast US). After my initial recruiter screening interview, I received an email from the recruiter stating that hiring for their CRA opportunities has been temporarily paused until further notice and that they are not moving forward with interviews at the moment. The recruiter was kind enough to say that she believes I could be a strong candidate for future opportunities and would like to reconnect when hiring resumes. I'm wondering if anyone else has received a similar update, particularly for ACRA or entry-level CRA positions. Does anyone have insight into whether this is a broader hiring pause, a team-specific decision, or something affecting particular regions or projects? I understand that nobody may know the exact details, but I would appreciate hearing about others' recent experiences or any insight into the current hiring situation. Thanks in advance!

I’m a new CRC with about 6 months of experience, and during these past months I’ve made mistakes on several different occasions. It’s mostly been small errors that were easily resolved, or errors that resulted in minor PDs. But recently I made a quite major mistake that’s not very good at all. I just want to hear other CRCs experience and the mistakes they’ve made, so I can gauge just how “dumb” I am haha 😬

So, what mistake did you make as a CRC that caused the biggest issue or was so bad, it got you fired?

Update: thank you all for the suggestions. I think I’m going to get a work phone. My current phone is already low on storage so I would love to delete my current work apps to get more space. Plus I have a tendency to check my work emails after hours since it’s on my personal phone. Hopefully getting a work phone will help me keep that work life balance.

I have the option to be supplied a phone or I can use my own and be given a monthly stipend. Which would you choose? I currently have everything on my own phone (teams,outlook) but with my new role I have an option to be supplied a cell phone. Which would you choose? Is it a hassle to always have two phone when traveling or if they supply me a different brand phone then I have I would have to bring two different charges. Which did you choose as?

Currently unemployed, but I have 2 years of experience as a CRA and I’ve been trying to get into CDM for 2-3 years now and all I ever get are just rejection emails. I’ve tried tailoring my resume to each application, reaching out to people on LinkedIn, and I’ve applied to over 200 jobs now but nothing ever works. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong and I’m just so frustrated cos I really need a job rn. I’ve also done a CDM course from BCRI (Bangalore Clinical Research Institute) a few years back but that didn’t help either.

Does anyone have any advice on what I can do to at least get an interview?

Just want y’all’s opinions.

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