Tearing Up the Paper Ceiling

“Don’t waste talent” – Jim DeKloe

Sometimes it’s hard to describe a phenomenon until someone invents a term for it.?Today I heard the term “Paper Ceiling,” which perfectly describes a phenomenon that I’ve observed for decades; and I’ve witnessed several very recent examples.?The paper ceiling is defined as “the invisible barrier that comes at every turn for workers without a bachelors degree.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4ybJ28v2Hs

From their webpage www.tearthepaperceiling.org :?See also:?no alumni network, biased algorithms, degree screens, stereotypes, and misconceptions.?

????????Although this applies to a variety of fields, I’ll focus on what I’ve been working on for several decades:?training technicians to work in biotech.?And I’ll give some paper ceiling examples – both older and very recent.

???????????Before I started working with Genentech in the 1990s, they said, “our technicians have Bachelors degrees.?Period.”?And this was pretty common in the biotech industry.?After helping us develop the curriculum and the equipment list for our community college biomanufacturing program, they were willing to consider giving candidates with lesser paper credentials a chance - but insisted on specific training as a substitute for the degree.?Since the pioneers from our program worked out so well, the job description changed to “Bachelors degree or specific biotechnology training.”?

???????????The Bachelors degree-only policy was in place during my sabbatical at Genentech in 1996 – you absolutely needed a Bachelors degree to be a technician.?You needed a Bachelors degree in something – anything.?The woman who ran new employee training had a Bachelors of Arts in History – and that counted.?There was a technician with a BA in English and one with a BA in Art on the floor.?But most common was a biology or biochem major from UC Davis or UC Berkeley whose ink was drying on their Bachelors degree.?They were looking for a job in the gap year or two where they would be applying to a professional school.?They came in thinking that “biotech” meant working in a research lab and were surprised to encounter a manufacturing environment.?They stayed for a year or two and then left for their real career.?

???????????This turn-over was killing us.?It’s assumed that it takes six months of experience for a technician to become self-sufficient and useful.?If that investment only yields an additional six months, the training time and effort represents a bit of a waste.?At one point we had a 40% per year turn-over.?I made a point to introduce myself to the technicians on every shift (I typically worked swing shift); when I went on the manufacturing floor a year later and it was difficult to find a familiar face.?

???????????The head of manufacturing performed a study a few years later.?He said, “if we claim to be data driven, let’s collect the data.”?He compared the turn-over rate of technicians without a bachelors degree with those with a bachelors degree – their tenure was twice the length of the technicians with a bachelors.?He compared the turn-over rate with the number of mistakes made – the scatter plot showed a positive linear relationship.?And he could place a dollar figure equivalent to every percentage of turnover rate.?Later Genentech, and some other companies, dropped the Bachelors degree requirement and started aggressively recruiting students from community college biomanufacturing programs.

???????????But these lessons weren’t universal and are never permanent.?When there is turn-over in management, or turn-over in Human Relations, the the loss of institutional knowledge often meant reverting to the old philosophy.?New managers would re-impose a strict “you need a bachelors degree” requirement on particular departments.?They would reimpose the paper ceiling.?

???????????You still encounter this often.?I vividly remember that I attended a meeting arranged by NIIMBL (the National Institute for Innovation in Biologics Manufacture) meeting October 2018 ??arranged meeting at Merck in the suburbs of Philadelphia.?A guy from Celgene said, “we require our technicians to have Bachelors degrees.”?It was a group of people who didn’t know each other very well, so someone pushed back gently, “why?”?He said, “HR put in that requirement – it was an easy criterion to add.” ?I thought, “we all have to go through process this every time.”

???????????A few miles away a CEO was bringing in high school students on the weekends to teach them cell culture and told me, “They are good at this and I think that they would do fine in this job.”?

Earlier this year, I was on a national workforce committee with the CEO of a local biotech company.?

“I can’t find anyone who knows fermentation and I can’t diversify my workforce,” he said.?

“Do you require a bachelors degree?” asked the faculty member from a community college a few miles away from that company.?This community college specialized in teaching fermentation and has one of the most diverse student populations in the United States.??

“Yes.”

“Why do you require a Bachelors degree?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never worked anywhere where they didn’t require a Bachelors degree.”

“I think that I’ve solved your problem.”

“I’m going to have to push back on that.”?

The academic tradition of favoring degrees over skills and knowledge still dominates the biotech industry.? This exchange made me wonder how much of the workforce shortage is self-inflicted.?

? In October 2022 the Workforce Committee of NIIMBL led by John Balchunas published the paper “Innovation of the Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing Talent Pipeline” that formally examined this phenomenon.? https://www.niimbl.org/Downloads/Innovation_of_the_Biopharmaceutical_Manufacturing_Talent_Pipeline_Oct2022.pdf

The paper makes the point:?

Traditional hiring practices, including a longstanding preference for bachelor’s degrees for manufacturing and technician roles, hinder the biopharmaceutical manufacturing sector’s ability to increase the intellectual diversity that’s critical for success and innovation.

???????????And this has an impact on the ability of industry to diversify the workforce:?

Diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives have moved from being “the right thing to do” to being seen as mission-critical for industry growth and innovation. Yet, the collective system of educators, employers, workforce development organizations, and intermediaries in the U.S. are deeply rooted in traditions that may be holding back growth. Workforce and talent development innovation hinges on our collective ability to pay conscious attention to, adapt, adjust, and in some cases, pivot away from, traditions and hiring approaches that are no longer serving the needs of the biopharmaceutical manufacturing ecosystem.

At a recent meeting of the diversity, equity, and inclusion committee of a local trade organization, committee members resisted the idea of dropping Bachelors degree requirements.?The comment was “we don’t want to be perceived as ‘dumbing down’ requirements.”?I could see how it could be perceived as reducing requirements, but every requirement reduces the potential employee pool and therefore reduces the number of candidates who could diversify a company.?The Diversity committee did not recognize that this policy that they supported directly and actively diminished the diversity of the workforce.?The academic tradition of requiring formal academic credentials is so ingrained in the field that a DEI committee cannot recognize that this approach undermines their core mission.??Diversity of the workforce is most likely to come through the community and technical colleges – along with specific training.?I wrote an article earlier in the year with the title “what is obvious isn’t really obvious.”?This represents another example.?

???????????For many years the community colleges have played a major role in post-baccalaureate training.?Some semesters over half of my class were graduates from the University of California system.?This might not be widely known, but university graduates routinely go to their community colleges for additional courses.?In a run-of-the-mill biology or microbiology class, I estimated that one sixth of the students already have a degree.?For biotechnology, it’s typically one in four (we find 20% - 25% when we formally do the surveys).?Some biotech programs in California are almost entirely university graduates.?In the big public universities students sit in amphitheater sized lecture halls for four years and often gain relatively little laboratory experience.

??????????Community colleges have started to formalize this role.?Students with a bachelors degree earn a “post-baccalaureate certificate” at Austin Community College and other community colleges in Texas.??Madison Community College has a post-baccalaureate certificate primarily filled with Biology graduates from the University of Wisconsin.?I’m thinking of taking a certificate with the title of “post-baccalaureate certificate” through our curriculum committee – even though California has not formalized this common phenomenon.

???????????I had a student taking a class who had earned a Bachelors of Science in Biotechnology from a local university.?

???????????“So, that’s a bioreactor,” she said.?

???????????“Yup, that’s a bioreactor.”

???????????“I took a quarter long class on bioreactor operations, but that’s the first time that I’ve actually seen one.”???

In community college biotech programs here are usually one or two people holding doctorates; and these are often international students or recent immigrants.?My favorite story involves the veterinarian from the Philippines whose specialty was water buffaloes.?After he immigrated he encountered few positions that required a water buffalo specialist.?He went through Solano College’s biotech program, earned a certificate, and got a job in quality control at Genentech.?The certificate often “Americanizes” their credentials.?I’ve been surprised over the years how much value a doctorate holder places on their credential.??But again, it’s the specific training and the experience with equipment that remains the major benefit.?

I had a student who applied to Genentech.?Her experience was so unique I asked her to write it up.?

The first interview was a group interview with four candidates.?

The first question was “where did you go to College?”

“UC Davis”

“UC Berkeley

“Stanford”

“Solano Community College”

Second question, “What was your specialty?”

“Genetics”

“Cell and Molecular Biology”

“Biochemistry”

“Industrial Biotechnology”?

Third question, “What do we do here?”

??????????????????????“You make drugs?”

??????????????????????“That’s right, you genetically engineer E. coli to make drugs.”

??????????????????????“That’s right, you genetically engineer E. coli with human genes to make insulin.”

??????????????????????“Research and E. coli production are solely located in South San Francisco.?Vacaville exclusively uses Chinese Hamster Ovary cells to make proteins, mainly monoclonal antibodies.?The cells are grown under aerobic conditions in tanks called bioreactors you’re your smallest bioreactor you use Applikon 20 liter bioreactors with Braun controllers – the same model that we use at Solano College.?The cells produce the protein and secret it into the surrounding media.?For recovery, in the past you used filtration to separate the cells from the Harvested Cell Culture Fluid, but now you favor centrifugation.?After the cells are pelleted the HCCF is passed through a depth filter and then taken through a series of chromatography and tangential flow filtration steps.?The main purification is accomplished by affinity resin Protein A, but then there are two to four additional polishing steps.?Since this involves mammalian cell culture, a virus inactivation step must be included – for antibodies it’s usually an acid hold after the Protein A chromatography.?You formulate the drug substance using diafiltration, sterile filter it, and freeze it in bulk tanks to send it to Hillsboro Oregon for final sterile fill finish.?All of these steps are regulated by the US Food and Drug Administration (or other international agencies) and performed under current Good Manufacturing Practice conditions, otherwise the cells would be adulterated and unable to be sold.”?

???????????The Solano College student was hired and had a long tenure there.?

???????????I’ve always told students that they should continue their education while they are working.?The additional knowledge provided by the appropriate bachelors degree will be valuable and will contribute to their careers and to their job and life satisfaction.?Companies often have a tuition reimbursement program that everyone should take advantage of.?But a company’s “have a degree for a degree’s sake,” never made much sense to me.?But they will be the reality and I tell students “without a degree your upward mobility will hit a ceiling.”?I now have the right term, “a paper ceiling.”???

?????????????Our graduates are often told this explicitly.?One of our graduates was explicitly told, “you are the workhorse of this department but I can’t promote you without a bachelors degree.”?So she attended the local state university and ground out a Biology degree for six years.?As a single mother, it was very difficult.?And the local university didn’t make it easy.?Counselors were hard to find, they had different interpretations of how her community college prerequisites transferred, and the courses were so crowded that often she couldn’t get into a class for several semesters.?But she persisted and her family and friends celebrated her graduation.?

???????????During the six years during one of these discussions with a supervisor she said, “you just want any degree.?Why am I killing myself to earn a Biology degree at the public university??Are you saying that I should have just paid for online classes at a for-profit degree and just checked that box??“No, no, that’s not what I mean.”?Except that it was.

???????????I don’t mean to denigrate degrees and I would never want the pendulum to swing too far.?I’ve written before about how important the university experience can be.?I merely want to point out that there are other paths that should be respected.?The paper ceiling webpage calles these STAR:?Skilled Through Alternative Routes. And if we need to dramatically expand and diversify the workforce, a lack of respect for these alternative routes will hamper the effort.?

Again, degrees are valuable, and sometimes essential (I’m thinking about fields like engineering), but sometimes a degree merely “checks the box” for no good reason.?Requiring a degree (in anything) is easy, but not useful.?I have heard the other approach????

Simply stated, not enough employers and/or hiring managers place significant value on non-traditional and innovative pathways into biopharma manufacturing careers.

“Workers with experience, skills, and diverse perspectives are being held back by a silent barrier.?It’s time to tear the paper ceiling and see the world beyond it.”

???????????I’ve adopted the above quote as a tagline: Don't Waste Talent.?It isn’t original, nor especially profound.?But I believe that it’s an essential principle – I believe this to the core of my being.?No one should waste talent.?In countries that suppress women I think, “that’s dumb – you’re wasting half your talent.”?In places that discriminate against an ethnic minority I think, “what talent are you throwing away?”?In nations without a public education system I think, “who is out there whose talent you are missing?”?The world has so many challenges that we must capture all of the talent available.?Of course we aren’t, and we have to do better.

???????????Biotechnology as a field is especially susceptible to valuing paper since it owes its origin to academia which values paper.?But to power the bioeconomy we need a million more workers in this field.?We can’t waste a single drop of talent.??