Chantal MacDonald graduated from UTM in 2009 with a double major in anthropology and biology, followed by a postgraduate certification at Seneca College. Since then, Chantal has been in the pharmaceutical industry for about ten years, and is currently the clinical file lead at AstraZeneca Canada. Below is a transcript of her question and answer session at our March 2024 program information session. We thank Chantal for sharing her time and insights with UTM students!
What attracted you to anthropology?
I think this might date me a little bit, but it was the Temperance Brennan book series by Kathy Reichs. She is a forensic anthropologist. The TV show Bones premiered the first year that I started UTM, so I got into anthropology through the book series.
I did my first-year forensics course and decided that it was not for me, but I stuck with the anthropology part of it.
How did your anthropology degree prepare you for your current career?
I think the critical thinking skills and problem-solving skills that I learned in anthropology, they're super important to what I do now. Critical thinking where you're taking information from a variety of sources, choosing what to highlight, focus on aggregating data into a specific message, and even things like examining biases and compensating for them in research - I that's a really big one in my work in clinical trials. The problem-solving, looking at different angles of problem, gathering information, locating resources to support my arguments.
Then there's also the writing skills - both technical and the informal. I do a lot of scientific writing as you would see in a scientific journal, but I also do a lot of informal writing. I spend a lot of my day negotiating with [our government agency], so the informal writing really comes across with my negotiating work there.
Also, the interpersonal skills; I find anthropology straddles really nicely with the hard sciences and the kind of softer sciences, but being able to have those conversations has been has been very helpful to my career, and just learning in general.
I mean, information is constantly evolving and changing. Being open to new ideas, getting rid of any bias, being adaptable, being able to change your mind and your argument as new information is uncovered, all of that starts with what you're taught in anthropology, because are changing as new things are discovered.
Knowing what you do now, what advice would you have for anthropology students?
I've had to think about this question a little bit. One is networking is so important, even when you're an undergraduate. Keep in touch with your roommate, your professors, your TAs. My fourth-year roommate’s then-boyfriend, now-husband, had his job in pharma because I had my job in pharma and we know each other. So quite often the people that you know starting from when you're eighteen, nineteen years old can really help you out when you are ten years down the line and looking to switch careers or looking for a different job opportunity. So networking is super important, and I would keep in touch with the people that you like.
I would also suggest that being a student can be a little bit overwhelming; you can tend to hyper focus on certain things, but being open to opportunities outside of your field of study and remaining a well-rounded person - you know, developing interests - it's really important in order to figure out where you want to move in your career and then how you want to be happy in your career. I love my job, I have almost always loved my job, and not everyone gets to get to say that, and I credit a lot of that to knowing who I am and knowing what I like and to developing those interests along the way.