I led a team of fantastic medical writers for over nine years. I loved the role – but it didn’t come without its challenges.

I’ve been speaking to leaders of medical writing teams in a variety of agencies around the UK and US, to find out if the challenges I experienced are common in other agencies.

Here are the top five challenges facing leaders of medical writing teams in med comms agencies today:

1. Constant search for Senior/Principal medical writers
   Are you seeking a good, experienced writer for a permanent agency role? Of course you are, and you’re not the only one, and your search may be a long one. Medical writing team leaders often operate for prolonged periods with significant skills gaps at the senior level.
2. Ongoing training of heavily junior writing teams
   It takes time and resources to train up junior writers, placing additional pressure on senior team members. The added problem is that once trained, junior writers may be tempted to jump to a new agency. You can’t find an experienced writer, so you hire more juniors, perpetuating your heavily junior team.
3. Medical writers’ strengths are under-appreciated outside of writing teams
   By nature, writers are often introverted, which means their talents can be easily overlooked by the wider organisation. Team leaders must work harder than most to get their writers recognised for advancement or explain what to look for in new hires.
4. Need for ongoing training beyond graduate programmes
   Graduate training programmes are great to entice more people into the med comms industry. But research shows that writers want more relevant training to support them throughout their career. But if everyone’s so busy delivering billable client work, who supports these ongoing training needs?
5. Difficulty finding good freelancers with availability to fill the gaps in agency teams
   Just as good experienced agency candidates are hard to find, the same is true of freelance writers. We’re often booked up for months in advance. Editorial team leaders constantly grapple with resourcing to book freelancers to supplement the gaps in their team.

If you are facing any of these challenges, you’re not alone!

But it’s not all doom and gloom – there’s evidence of agencies and external providers using a variety of innovative tactics to overcome these common challenges. Look out for coming articles on innovations in medical writing recruitment.