Scholarship / Chevening scholarship essay on Leadership and Influence: Managing a team at workplace [3]

Dear experts, please review my essay on leadership and influence which I wrote with a view to submitting it for the Chevening scholarship. Your valuable input will highly appreciated and your comments on my essay will be regarded as guidelines for me.

Chevening is looking for people who will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answers.

a self-driven and compassionate leader

I believe that my intent to accept challenges as opportunities and to be able to empathetic towards others define me as a self-driven and compassionate leader.

To begin with, starting my career with the 4th ranked pharmaceutical company in Bangladesh was a real boost for me that reflected initially on my confidence to give an instant speech on the very first day at my work on the orientation program for the new employees. However, when I was appointed as the acting in-charge of the analytical validation team I accepted the challenge as an opportunity to excel my expertise in my passionate field of work. At that time, validation team was not functioning effectively by not meeting deadline for different methods validation. After interacting with co-workers and from past few years' experience, I figured out the underlying reasons: one is the lack of proper distribution of works with proper accountability and another one is the deficiency in motivation among the team members. After consulting with my supervisor, I arranged a team meeting where I outlined team's next one-year goal and breaking down it to per month tasks where four of us were well assigned our duties. I allowed everyone to express their fear and reservations about the goal and I sold my vision to them and also tried to encourage team members highlighting how our work is directly related to company's growth which in turn related to individual's career development. They felt valued and everyone accepted my plan. This worked very well that made the team efficient and proactive. Furthermore, besides performing validation, team got additional responsibilities of "Instrument Calibration" considering its performance and I was awarded promotions in following two consecutive years. I learned from this that employees get motivated when they feel as an active part of the organization and have a definite goal ahead of them.

Earlier, while being involved with an educational organization where I used to teach chemistry to secondary school students, I launched a campaign along with my students for collecting warm clothes for destitute families in our community during a winter season. I motivated the students by pushing them to think about the other part of the society where people cannot afford to protect themselves from cold weather whereas some of us have old redundant clothes. I also instigated them to spread the message using Facebook by creating a page for this purpose and involve community people to participate in the humanitarian act. It was resulted in a huge response from the locals and I anticipated that whole success of the program was largely dependent on successful distribution. Therefore, two groups were made with respective team leaders and clothes were successfully distributed to the poor families living in slums in our locality. This campaign resulted in positive impact on the participated youths and on the society at large. I feel guilty for not being able to pursue the campaign on following years.

With Chevening Scholarship, it will broaden an avenue for me to learn from more advanced society, their proven way to deal with poverty and, on individual level, how leadership is linked with integrity and effective planning.

Scholarship / Chevening scholarship essay: Networking with work related professionals by using LinkedIn and Alumni [2]

Dear experts, please put your valuable comments on this essay. Any remarks will be regarded as guidelines.

Chevening is looking for individuals with strong professional relationship-building skills,

who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Please explain how you build and maintain relationships in a professional capacity, using clear examples of how you currently do this, and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future.

To me, networking is about establishing and cultivating relationships with people from diverse and same interest group and maintain regular communication with them by sharing ideas and information in order to grow professionally.

While developing an analytical method for Gastro-resistant Tablets, I was repeatedly experiencing the problem of a sudden decrease in the active content of the drug material even after applying several techniques. Even after the consultation with my supervisor, the problem persisted as the product was new for us to develop. I thought of presenting this problem with international pharmaceutical R&D community through LinkedIn as the professionals of this field across the world are experienced dealing with similar issues. I found some groups comprised of highly experienced professionals across the world and approached them highlighting every detail of the problem and, to my surprise, I was given some practical suggestions with a detailed explanation of underlying reasons. They advised me to use amber colour glass apparatus as the drug material is susceptible to light and they also suggested me to use a special coating in order to protect the drug material from being affected by acidic medium. These measures enabled us to come up with the solutions to develop the product and more importantly, I was appreciated by my supervisor for being in touch with the global community of my field. I have been maintaining active connection with some professionals and often get benefited when they share their ideas and problem-solving experiences. Furthermore, I was referred to be a member of the RAPS (Regulatory Affairs Professional Society), an international association offers seminars and training on regulations and guidelines generated by various regulatory bodies like FDA, MHRA. This has opened an avenue for me to stay connected with the pioneers of my field.

Earlier, Jagannath University Alumni association allowed me to stay connected to Chemists who have been graduated from the same university and have been working in various related fields. Most importantly, my connection to the seniors who are members of the Alumni, helped me a lot for landing my first job. When I was seeking jobs after postgraduation, I was referred by a member of the Alumni who had been working for Renata Limited. His positive recommendation and my overall performance at the interview contributed to secure the position of a Research Chemist at the R&D Department. Since then, I was more involved in the association and have been an active part of the organization. By using this platform, I have been able to broaden my horizon and have a wide range of active contacts working in various sectors who will be of great help in future being recommended for senior Chemistry related positions in different organizations.

As pharmaceutical sector is highly regulated by the regulatory body like MHRA, my professional goals push me to build strong relevant networking which can be attained by meeting and interacting with the Chevening community consisting people of diverse and same interest group that will propel my career back in my home country.

Writing Feedback / Chevening scholarship essay: Studying in the UK_ I have chosen my courses focusing on my career goal [2]

I would request an expert to review the essay as the last date is fast approaching, hence, I won't have enough time to have a second review. I intend to submit the application after receiving an effective feedback. As I exceeded the word count, I would appreciate any recommendatoin on reduction in words.

Outline why you have selected your chosen three university courses, and explain how this relates to your previous academic or professional experience and your plans for the future.

three desired programs choice

I have developed my interest in medicine while studying themodule of "Pharmaceutical Science" during my undergraduate study in Chemistry. Dueto not having the facility of pursuing Masters in "Pharmaceutical Science" inBangladesh and as a Chemistry graduate, I was not eligible to pursue Master ofPharmacy, I pursued my postgraduation in Chemistry. I was further motivated tolearn about medicine while studying the module of "Medicinal and PharmaceuticalChemistry" during postgraduation study. Although I have acquired hands-on experience in laboratory work and operatingsome sophisticated pharmaceutical equipment and instruments while working as aR&D executive in a pharmaceutical company, I have understood theimportance of having in-depth knowledge of medicine and pharmaceutical aspectswhich an academic degree of the field can offer. Obtaining a well-equippedMasters degree in Pharmaceutical Science related program will enable me toovercome the deficiency in knowledge and enable me to become a leader capableof leading an entire R&D team.

Based on the above, I have chosen three programs of mypreferences:

1. The PharmaceuticalAnalysis & Quality Control MSc offered by the King's College London is myfirst choice. The curriculum includes Quality Assurance, Quality Control andregulatory affairs which cover all areas that I need to bridge my knowledgegap, especially the regulatory affairs module which will add a great value to my skills set becausethe pharmaceutical companies in Bangladesh are focusing more on licensing andinternational regulatory markets while the country has a shortage ofexperts due to unavailability of such course locally. Furthermore, well-equippedlaboratories with modern techniques and instruments allowing an additional offerof choosing an extended project in the labs with internationally-ratedscientists will allow me to have hands-on laboratory experience and extendedinternational networking that will enable me to become a leader in this fieldback in Bangladesh by handling critical projects through networking.

2. IndustrialPharmaceutics at the Queen's University Belfast is my second preference owingto its wide range of modules that cover all aspects of pharmaceutical sciencesranges from the formulation of pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical products tomanufacturing and validation with the data management system. As a Cheveningawardee, this course will equip me with diverse knowledge which will counter mylacking that I have been experiencing in my professional field. It's StrategicManagement and Leadership course comprised of the associated challenges that are posed to industry, and appropriate problem-solving approaches will nourishmy dream to become a leader in the sector.

3. Ihave chosen Pharmaceutical Technology and Medicines Control MSc at theThe University of Bradford as third preference and I have already received anunconditional offer for this course. Apart from the course of general pharmaceuticalscience, it also offers the Medicine Control that encompasses clinical trials,drug regulations, drug licensing, testing and safety which really appeals to meconsidering the regulatory market focus of pharmaceutical companies inBangladesh.

As Bangladesh has started export medicines to UK throughlicensing and regulations, having a UK standard pharmaceutical degree willallow me to contribute to ensuring the UK standard of pharmaceutical processand manufacturing back in the home country which will, in turn, allow me to dosomething in return for the UK as well.