Today is my last day in the Drug Discovery Unit at CRUK-MI. There has been so much change this year it’s been hard to keep track! In April our previous group head Donald Ogilvie retired, and on the day he retired there was a serious fire at the Institute. We have subsequently relocated to Alderley Park, where I used to work when I was at Astrazeneca, which is causing me serious problems from a commuting perspective - rather than just over an hour on the train I now have to change trains and get a bus. When combined with the inevitable uncertainty that comes with a change in group management, it just seemed like a good time to move on from a job I’ve really enjoyed for 5 years.
So what next? Well I’ve taken a job as a Data Scientist at DWP Digital. I have no idea how this will turn out, but I’m really looking forward to finding out how well what I’ve learnt as a bioinformatician translates to a different role, and hopefully learning loads of cool stuff as well. I see it as a no-lose proposition, if it’s not for me I’m sure I won’t be any less qualified for a bioinformatics role than I am now, but if I enjoy it then it opens up a much deeper job pool than there is as a drug discovery bioinformatician, which is rather a niche of a niche. We shall see!