My mother greatly influenced my career as she was a successful electronic engineer in China. I also had a great manager when I first started out working in R&D who always encouraged me to think outside the box and trusted me to work directly with customers and vendors. This really helped me to build up my confidence.

I start my day with a good strong coffee! I work in the RCI department in BD Dun Laoghaire and most of my projects involve working with colleagues overseas. In the morning, I start with my project action items, this could vary from R&D support work to liaising with external vendors. Then the afternoon usually comprises of meetings with my overseas colleague to discuss the progress of our project.

I am responsible for supporting R&D work in the Diabetes Care business unit within BD, and engaging with different functional groups across the company. This requires strong communication skills and dynamic thinking.

While working on a new product idea could be very exciting, it may take years to implement and prove out the final product as the medical device industry is so heavily regulated. However, this is necessary and important in order to deliver the highest quality and safest products to our patients.

Knowing that what I do every day is seeking innovative solutions which strive to improve healthcare products.

BEng in Biomedical Engineering from University of Limerick

My experience working on group projects has been very useful for my job today as I work with various different functional groups within BD. And the skills I have learnt such as problem solving and CAD design have been very practical too.

Yes, definitely. The flexible working hours in BD allow me to start my job early and finish early. This is really valuable to me as it allows me to spend more time in the evening with my 14-month-old child. In BD, we are always encouraged to continue learning new skills which is very important for the R&D medical device industry.

Don’t be afraid to speak up, be yourself and always learn from each other.

Any college internship or work experience in the medical device, biotech or pharmaceutical industry would be extremely valuable, as this will demonstrate to them what the real work environment is like and what area they may be interested in working in after graduating. It will also give them the opportunity to network with different people within the industry.

Product Engineer

Product Engineer