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EMPLOYMENT OUTLOOK
gestion of friends and opened American
Research & Testing, which provides services
including product development, custom
chemical analysis, materials testing, and
contract research. “We consider ourselves
consultants with a laboratory,” she says.
Elizabeth A. Armour, founder and president
of the 15-year-old specialty chemical
consulting firm Armour Associates, also
started working in the chemical industry
at a time when women’s opportunities in
industry were even more limited than they
are today. Having earned bachelor’s and
master’s degrees in biology and an M.B.A. in
marketing and finance, Armour entered the
workforce in the early 1980s and observed
that “few women were being targeted for
upper management roles,” she says.
Although Armour particularly loved her
eight-year stint working in Europe, which
included being part of Rhône-Poulenc’s
specialty chemicals strategic planning
team, “in the back of my mind, I knew that
I would probably not continue in this largecompany
mentality forever,” she says.
Forming Armour Associates, an international
consulting firm with offices in
Hendersonville, N.C., and Paris, allowed
her to make that shift. “I always knew that I
would find something that would allow me
to better use my creativity and networking
skills. I had a strong desire for more flexibility
and to determine my own way.”
Finding a new career path was a necessity
for Sharon V. Vercellotti, who was forced
to leave a university research laboratory
position when “the dean thought my presence
in the same department as my husband
might be problematic.” Vercellotti,
who had already earned a master’s degree
in chemistry, enrolled in business classes
and began to ponder starting her own business,
she says. Shortly thereafter, in 1979,
she and her husband founded V-Labs, a
Covington, La.-based company that continues
to provide consulting, custom manufacturing,
and analytical services focused
on carbohydrates and
polysaccharides. In
addition to carving
out a new career, she
also gained control
over her schedule,
which included her
two small children,
ages 10 and four at
the time of V-Lab’s
inception.
FRESH APPROACH
Gleason (back row,
second from left)
cofounded GVD
Corp., which now
boasts a reactor
that is used for
small-volume
manufacture of
commercial parts.
Balancing work and family responsibilities
was the primary impetus behind Jinling
Chen’s move to start Pharm Expedia, a
pharmaceutical technology development
and consulting firm, in August 2007 in
Houston. After working for major drug
companies including AstraZeneca and
Bristol-Myers Squibb for 15 years in positions
she found both “interesting and enjoyable,”
she opted to follow her husband’s
GVD CORP.
job transfer from New Jersey to Texas. She
then worked for a smaller pharmaceutical
company, Encysive Pharmaceuticals, for
five years, during which time she rose to the
role of senior director of pharmaceutical
sciences.
When Encysive closed its R&D facility
as part of its acquisition by Pfizer, Chen
was without a job. Instead of splitting her
family and uprooting her 15- and 10-year
old sons in a move to the East Coast where
pharma jobs are plentiful, she decided to
start Pharm Expedia.
With a Ph.D. in physical chemistry and
broad project management experience, she
says she has been able to address the challenging
drug development needs of clients.
She has also developed and patented innovative
enabling technologies to enhance
drug delivery and to improve the palatability
of certain medicines, she says. Forming
Pharm Expedia “has been a great way to
take care of my career and take care of my
family at the same time.”
WORK-LIFE FLEXIBILITY is especially
important to many women. Dukor, who
has two children, says she has benefited
from the ability to set her own schedule.
“Even with all my travels, I think I have not
missed anything critical in my children’s
lives. I volunteer for my children’s schools.
I have done science demonstrations. I can
even take time during the day to watch my
son’s high school tennis matches.”
As head of her own company, Boggs was
free to care for her parents before they died
in the early 1990s, she says. “Shortly after
that, I developed breast cancer. Fortunately,
because I had the business and the help
of Barbara Belmont (now the firm’s president)
I was able to manage all of this.”
Despite the benefits, entrepreneurship
brings many challenges. Some entrepreneurs
report that they must wear many
hats—from janitor to salesperson—and
log extensive hours to meet customer
needs. And there’s a huge learning curve,
says Chen, who had to figure out how to
apply for grants and handle tax issues,
for example.
Would-be entrepreneurs must be mentally
prepared to take on the many risks
that accompany this kind of work, Chen
says. In smaller firms, in particular, the uncertainty
of income can be a drawback. As a
consultant or a contractor, “you may have
good contracts for several months or even
several years and then you may have nothing
for a while.”
WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG 52 NOVEMBER 3, 2008