From Postgrad To Patent Attorney – Guest Post

Mewburn Ellis are currently advertising several vacancies for patent attorneys and they’re keen to encourage postgrads from any science or engineering discipline to apply (in particular, they could do with some more good chemistry applicants this year).

However, excellent though their Graduate Recruitment web pages are, you don’t always get a feel for how this sort of career would compare with your own experience as a postgrad – which is why they volunteered one of their recent postgrad/postdoc recruits to write a guest post for our blog.

We’ve kept the post anonymous, as our guest blogger has a busy job and lots of training to do, so they can’t really act as an unofficial careers adviser or organise work experience for you. However, if you do have questions about the role, I’ll try and find some answers for you, either from our guest blogger or other sources.

Hope you like the realistic insight it gives you, and inspires some of you to consider this sort of career :

From Postgrad To Patent Attorney 

“About me
I joined Mewburn Ellis in 2006, after quite a long stint in academia (research Masters, PhD, and post-doc), interspersed with some time in industry. I decided it was time for a change when I realised that the more peripheral aspects of my work (lecturing, writing papers, giving presentations, acting as a referee for scientific journals) interested me much more than the main part of the job (focussing on one research topic for years at a time).

So, I looked around for a job that was a better match for all the things I’d enjoyed most, and soon came across the patent attorney profession, which seemed to fit the bill pretty closely. It’s a challenging career that offers variety, a chance to stay connected with scientific developments, and the opportunity to use communication and language skills.

So, would a career as a patent attorney suit you?
Obviously, the leap from research lab to patent attorney firm is quite a large one, so here are a few thoughts about the transition, based on my experience so far:

• Don’t worry that you’ll feel like an aged crone in amongst a sea of fresh-faced graduates! At my firm, the intake is evenly balanced between recent graduates and people with post-grad, post-doc, or industrial experience, and that seems to reflect the profession in general. The trainees here come from a variety of backgrounds, and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t fit right in.
   
• Having said that, you may find life as a trainee takes some getting used to. Not only will you be back at the bottom of the food chain, but in my firm, trainees share an office with their principal (supervising partner), which means that he or she knows what you’re up to (almost) every second of the day. Gone are the days of reporting to your supervisor once a week (if that) and organising your own work in between times! Still, the system isn’t intended to be purely sadistic, but is actually a really effective way for trainees to pick up a wide variety of information beyond the cases that have actually been given to them.
   
• Small things can make more of a difference than you’d expect. For example, it’s taken me a while to get used to the fact that my working day is now spent sitting in front of a computer. I never realised how much I’d miss the gentle physical exercise of doing experiments in the lab.
   
• More importantly, though, you’ll need to be prepared to work on a wide range of subject matter. My background is in materials science, but I’ve worked on cases ranging from pharmaceuticals through to electronics and software. I’ve had to learn to form a quick opinion on subjects that are far removed from my specialist background, and I tend to use my A level knowledge almost as much as the knowledge gained during my degree and PhD. I’ve actually found it very satisfying to be able to produce useful work in subject areas outside my “comfort zone”, but if you’re the kind of person who has an overwhelming interest in your own particular specialism, this might not be the career for you.
   
• Although you’re a highly-skilled scientist, the chances are that you know very little about the law. And that means you have a lot of learning ahead of you! When I was taking science exams at A level or undergraduate level, I always relied on the fact that I could work things out from first principles, if need be. As an attorney, however, you’ll need to have all sorts of detailed knowledge at your fingertips, and there is no substitute for sitting down and learning it! Having said that, I’ve just returned to the office after studying for the Certificate in Intellectual Property at Queen Mary University, and I’ve really enjoyed the chance to start getting to grips with a whole new subject.

After working in the patent attorney profession for almost two years, I can definitely say that I haven’t missed the lab once and I think the same goes for all the other people here who made the switch after working in research.”