Name: Jessica Ribado (she/her)
PhD: Genetics, Stanford University, 2019
What was your main area of research?
During my PhD, I applied metagenomic methods to characterize the gut microbiome in a variety of contexts. My research varied from understanding the impact of household personal care products with antimicrobials on the developing human infant and adult gut microbiome to completing novel genomes for bacteria in the mouse gut microbiome.
What is your current job?
I am a Senior Research Scientist at the Institute of Disease Modeling (IDM) at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, Washington.
My job consists of creating or using models and analyzing empirical genetic data to understand infectious disease transmission. IDM's mission is to support quantitative decision making, so science communication to a variety of audiences is a major component of the job.
I love the ability to collaborate with folks across research, academic, industry, government, and nonprofits. I have great collaborators and get to learn from them about the larger ecosystem of global health constantly.
How did you find this position? What were the career steps you took to get to where you are now?
I did a Google search with pointed search terms.
PhD graduate ➡️ Post-doc (same company) ➡️ Researcher
Why did you decide to not pursue a career in academia?
Academia is a lifestyle choice as much as a professional one. I enjoyed research projects that led me to impact outside of the lab which led me to an interest in science policy adjacent work.
What advice do you have for someone getting their PhD and looking to pursue a career outside of academia?
The best way to learn what jobs exist outside of your own knowledge is to talk to people. Attend seminars and networking events with alumni or in your area related to your career sphere to learn about jobs and companies. If you're not meeting folks at these events, reach out to folks for informational interviews on LinkedIn or social media.
When you find jobs that sound interesting, ask them about successful candidates in their job. It's the best way to learn what skills are valuable in jobs that interest you to work on them before graduation.
In my interest to pursue standard science policy, I started a science policy group. It's through that I learned there were more ways to do that type of work when I had only heard about fellowships.