Biomedical Engineering and its job Opportunities!

I would like to share a few of my experience from the time I joined at Placement Cell at Govt. Model Engineering College,Kochi and from the experience of managing Biomedical Job Portal, which I started in 2017. Fortunately, I had an opportunity to interact with many officials from medical industry from the time of doing engineering itself being a placement cell representative of the college.

I have received many feedback's from Biomedical students as well as job seekers that the opportunity for Biomedical engineers are very less in the industry. I would like to start with a comment by one of the senior person from Philips Healthcare, who told me we are not getting quality candidates nowadays at the time of recruitment drive in our college. Many Biomedical openings in the industry are filled up with electronics/ instrumentation candidates, it’s mainly happening because of the lack of a quality pool of Biomedical graduates.

If you are looking for a job in Medical Device Industry, I would like to categorize it into 3.

1. Biomedical Jobs in Hospitals/ medium level companies

2. Biomedical jobs in MNC’s/ International Hospitals

3. Biomedical Jobs in Research field

It’s not to analyze where you stand, People are always open to good job opportunities which is better than the current job. As all of us know, Having a Biomedical background itself is not enough to get into a good job, which needs good knowledge and skill sets. Getting a job and a good job is having a huge difference in my opinion. If you look at the salary range of Biomedical Engineers, you will understand the importance of getting into a good Hospital/ Company.

Getting a job in hospitals or small companies is not difficult as getting a job in MNC’s or an International Hospital, may be abroad. So what’s the difference here? It's simple, the criteria will be much more precise based on the challenge of the job. The expectations of the candidate will be high for a good organization. Let it be your communication skill, Leadership qualities, Knowledge about the industry, Your perspective on the job role, Your passion, Qualification, etc. Organizations are looking for multi-talented people who can bring changes. Having a good mark in the course certificate may not help you to get into a good job in the industry, everything is equally important nowadays.

Communication skill (Fluency in English) and networking plays a major role; if you are not able to communicate properly in English, you have to improve on it as it’s an unavoidable part of any organization. Many people don’t realize how important networking is in the job industry, if you are well connected with people from the medical device industry, you may not be required to waste time on searching jobs in classifieds or any job sites. Most of the jobs in good organizations are filled by referrals, which even not coming to know by many people, there is the importance of networking and keep in touch with people from the industry.

If you are a student, I urge you to give importance to your extra-curricular activities, your communication skills, attending Biomedical conference and workshops, enhancing your network in Biomedical industry, those will be the best thing you can do to prepare yourself for the future.

One of the concerns of many aspiring Biomedical Engineers are the lack of opportunities in the research field; India imports nearly 80% of its medical devices, hence more opportunities in the service and sales field. India is giving much more importance to the medical device industry and it’s manufacturing nowadays, Andhra Pradesh MedTech Zone (AMTZ) is one of the good examples. Many multinational companies are starting their plants in India, which also creating more opportunities in the research and development field. Another interesting fact is the exponential increase of healthcare startups in the industry, investment in the healthcare industry is increasing year by year. It’s a clear indicator that the opportunities for Biomedical engineers will also increase.

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