How I Ended Up in Pharma
How did I end up in pharma? Honestly, I did not plan it.
I spent my early twenties in hospitality: first at a hotel and congress center in Zug, then running the restaurant Almodóbar.
One of my regular guests was Themistoklis Moustakas, CEO and President of HealthWatch Swiss AG. Somewhere between serving him and talking across the table, he offered me an opportunity as an Administrative Assistant at his niche generics company.
I said yes because it was an opportunity, not because I had a five-year plan.
That one decision became a 15-year career: Executive Assistant, International Business Coordinator, Operations Manager and Deputy Qualified Person, and Regional Sales Manager at HealthWatch Swiss. Then came proving I could compete in the corporate world at Takeda, first as Team Assistant and Project Coordinator, and eventually as Brand and Customer Manager for Rare Metabolic Disease and Business Analyst and Planner for the entire Business Unit.
Themistoklis did not just give me a title, he taught me the industry from the ground up. He reviewed and corrected the emails I sent to customers before they went out, spent long nights walking me through marketing and medical terminology I had never come across before, and invested his own time patiently so I could actually grow into the job he trusted me with.
It started because one person saw potential before I had the experience to prove it.