Michelle Bell
What does a typical day in your job involve?
Working in a busy Quality Department within Almac no two days are the same! There are two aspects to my role – in addition to my disposition role I am also a Line Manager and responsible for the Batch Review Team. My day starts off with a review of my calendar to identify availability and resource to enable batch review activities for the current day. Batches for QP review/release are distributed and then I prepare for the daily “walk the queue” meeting where representatives from various departments meet together to discuss the availability of batches for release and any constraints that are delaying progression of batches to final QP certification. Following this meeting I then prioritise batches for review and assign into the visual queue. The remainder of my day can consist of any of the following – attending meetings, dispositioning activities, documentation review and updates, recruitment, training for new and existing employees and generally ensuring everything runs as smoothly as possible.
What type of other skills do you need for your job, other than educational qualifications?
Apart from having a level head on your shoulders and being able to manage yourself, there are a number of skills required for such a varied role. Time management and good communication skills come high on my list! You need to be able to cascade organisational goals to team goals by quickly identifying what is important and communicate to the team. Another skill is to acquire knowledge of the business processes and how the organisation works to be able to provide training and support when needed. Knowing how and when to delegate is also very important, you have to ensure the people who you are delegating work to are competent with that task and if not provide the necessary training for them to do so. Problem solving is another key skill for this role, being able to analyse information and evaluate. Always be willing to learn new skills, this is what motivates me most, being able to do something today that I couldn’t do yesterday!
What do you love most about your job?
I guess for me it’s that feeling of accomplishment when we are up against a deadline and it turns out better than we could have imagined. I have great passion for Quality and Almac as a whole. Quality is forever changing, improving and evolving constant adventure. The people within Pharma Services from entry level to Senior Management are all great people and I have been fortunate to have had strong and supportive managers throughout my career in Almac. I enjoy variety and my job never fails to provide it!
What great opportunities have you had in your role?
The opportunities I have had in Pharma Services are endless! As a Line Manager I was able to participate in many courses to support my role from recruitment training to Supervisory courses and much more. When I requested to enrol in a part-time course, over two years, to achieve a Chartered Quality Institute Level 5 Diploma qualification, Pharma Services fully funded this. I was provided with travel and accommodation to sit exams in Dublin and throughout the course I was given all the support I needed which was amazing, something I could never had done alone! I got the opportunity to travel to Pharma Service’s Audubon site in America on numerous occasions to provide training in batch record review. I requested to take part in Audits as this was one of the modules on my course and I have now performed numerous internal audits and one external audit to date! I am looking forward to more opportunities with Pharma Services in the future and I am very grateful for all I have achieved through their support.
Can you outline your career within Almac to date?
I have been working in Almac for 12 years now, throughout this time I have achieved the following career path to date: