What do you do if you're a beginner in R&D and want to impress employers with your skills and experience?

👉Ensure you have a solid educational background in your field of interest, whether it's science, engineering, technology, or another related area. 👉Many R&D roles require at least a bachelor's degree, and some may require advanced degrees like a master's or Ph.D. 👉Take advantage of online courses, tutorials, and hands-on projects to build your skills in areas relevant to R&D. This might include programming languages (like R, Python, or MATLAB), statistical analysis, experimental design, data visualization, or specific laboratory techniques. 👉R&D is a rapidly evolving field, so it's important to stay up-to-date with the latest developments and technologies skills.

It is essential to have proficiency in your field coupled with a curious mindset to thoroughly understand how things work. Be ready and eager to learn, acquire new information and skills, while maintaining an open-minded approach is crucial. It is important to always be ready to work hard and offer assistance when needed. Crucial qualities include being a strong team player, an effective communicator, and an adept networker. Developing this well-rounded skillset and mindset will position you for success in your field.

No person in his/her right mind hires someone because of skills in a tool. A bright scientist learns any tool in just weeks. The one thing that really matters is the way how you approach challenges. What really sets you apart is demonstrating a cool, thinking with the end in mind, mindset and training yourself in communicating in a „peace of mind“ proactive way. Any employer will love that.

If you truly are a beginner, your skills will honestly not be impressive. Yet. But your ability to learn can and should be. (We will look for potential and not just immediate value).

For industry, the first objective is to learn the business. What can a sales rep show to a customer that will turn into a new order? What new product can be inserted into current production? Do the line engineers understand how it works? Better yet, can the line engineers suggest improvements? Then there's the sage advice that I read in an old Brown and Sharpe guide: listen to the people who have reached technical leadership. There's a reason why the company has valued this knowledge. Learn to follow before leading the charge.

R&D is about understanding a domain well enough to solve one the problems that exist. You may not have a complete solution, but even a partial solution may very well impress those who are aware of the challenges within a given realm. Create a portfolio of your work, your solutions to real-world problems which expose your knowledge, and ability, to create novel solutions.

I would go one step further than Felix and say that R&D requires understanding the domain well enough to know what the problems are and what if anything has been done already. You need to understand failure as much as success so that you don't waste time on your fantasies. Quora eg is full of posts where people have insisted that they have solved some difficult problem only to be put down by the experts (PhD, professors, etc) who really understand the problem.

Take the lead in innovative projects, bring internal and external people together, initiate new projects, propose new directions and active participation in conferences or presentation opportunities. When you come into a new group study the skills of the others and combine the those with external people you know. Taking initiatives is mostly welcome and appreciated!

I guess another item that can perfectly give you a credit among experienced R&Ds is the balance between the quality of your work and the speed of your accomplishment during the research projects.