Organisations often warn of looming shortages in STEMM capability, yet many trained professionals are leaving the system. For leaders across healthcare and life sciences, addressing that contradiction requires a stronger focus on retention and career pathways within organisational design.
There is a contradiction at the centre of the life sciences workforce conversation. STEMM skills acquired through traditional scientific or research training are widely recognised as critical to the industry, yet very little has fundamentally shifted in terms of how those skills are recruited and retained.
Demand for technical capability continues to grow. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics projects STEMM employment to increase by 8.1 percent from 2024 to 2034, compared with just 2.7 percent growth in non-STEMM occupations over the same period.
Yet the health research sector is also losing a significant share of the talent it has already trained. The Australian Health and Medical Research Workforce Audit, released in November 2024, shows that over a five-year period 62% of traditional researchers and 64% of non-traditional researchers leave the research workforce for other roles and sectors. Among current researchers, 75% of traditional and 65% of non-traditional researchers have considered leaving research, with financial pressures cited as the main reason.
“The contradiction is stark. On one hand, we’re worried about shortages of professionals with a STEMM background. On the other, we’re losing a significant proportion of the very people we’ve worked so hard to bring into the system,” says Dr Melina Georgousakis, medical research scientist and former Founding Director of Franklin Women.
The issue is increasingly recognised at national levels. For example, the Ambitious Australia: Strategic Examination of Research and Development found limited mobility between academia and industry, with relatively few researchers working in business. This highlights the need for stronger pathways between research and industry.
In many cases, that loss reflects talent stepping away from traditional pathways such as academia, clinical practice or research, where career progression can be uncertain and long-term stability difficult to sustain. These individuals should be considered top STEMM talent in non-academic health environments like life sciences, biotech and corporates yet that transition is not currently supported.
This creates a paradox for the life sciences sector. Large numbers of scientifically trained professionals are stepping away from traditional research careers, yet organisations across healthcare and life sciences still report difficulty accessing STEMM capability. For many of these professionals, an adjacent role in industry could be a strong option. But organisations across the life sciences sector need to be more deliberate in ensuring those pathways exist and are supported.
“The need to support career pathways between research and industry was raised in the recently released Ambitious Australia report which highlighted an underutilisation of skilled STEMM research professionals outside of university settings,” Melina says.
Key takeaways for life sciences organisations
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Why the industry needs STEMM
If ever there was a time for life sciences organisations to take a more deliberate approach to attracting and retaining technically trained STEMM professionals, it is now, as the sector navigates rapid change driven by the expansion of AI, digital health, data science and tech-enabled care.
Melina says there are several reasons for this need, from innovation to risk-mitigation as companies expand their product portfolios and ambitions beyond inhouse capabilities. From a governance and compliance perspective, if an organisation is contributing to the delivering healthcare interventions, even indirectly, leaders need access to individuals with scientific and implementation expertise who can interrogate the evidence and provide informed advice.
“Take a private health insurer as an example. There are on a drive to keep members healthy but also provide a positive user experience, which has seen a large investment in preventative intervention as well as tech-informed innovations. On paper, a new health app or digital program might look commercially compelling and attractive from a marketing perspective,” she explains.
“But without someone with technical expertise at the table who can assess whether the intervention is clinically effective, safe and accessible by appropriate population and design a robust evaluation framework to test this, the organisation is introduces a credibility but also governance risk.
“The organisations who contribute to healthcare system now days are so diverse, as are those who contribute to research and development, irrespective of whether we label them that way or not. Without STEMM expertise embedded in governance and strategy, the opportunities as well as the risk simply goes unrecognised,” Melina adds.
Key takeaways for STEMM professionals
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More science in the boardroom
If STEMM expertise is becoming more central to strategy across a range of sectors and organisational types, the question for leaders is not only where to find talent, but also how well that expertise is represented in senior leadership and boards.
“The acceleration of change in healthcare is forcing an urgent question: what do we actually need from our STEMM graduates, and how do we embed that capability across organisational structurers, especially at decision-making level?” Melina says.
Last year, ASIC Chair Joe Longo gave a speech to the Australian Institute of Company Directors where he called for “more science in the boardroom”.
He pointed out that the average number of board members with an accounting, banking or finance background is 40%, while the combined total of those with a legal, finance or general management background is around 70%. By contrast, those with a background in technology account for just 7%.
“There isn’t a single material issue currently facing business – and our institutions more generally – that doesn’t require data, systems, technology, and processes to effectively address,” he said.
“But there is a real opportunity to broaden the skill sets and the perspectives of company boards, both by strategic hiring and by upskilling current board members in areas such as science and technology… and ensures that directors can understand and engage with the risks facing their businesses and bring their skills and experience to address these risks.”
Filling the gaps
However, despite their importance, barriers to industry entry remain significant at all levels. The levers for this come from both sides, says Melina.
One of the biggest structural challenges is the lack of clear career pathways for technically trained STEMM professionals. The Australian Government health and medical research workforce audit shows that 78% of researchers consider limited development opportunities to be an important factor when deciding whether to leave health and medical research.
“We struggle to retain talent across the STEMM ecosystem because we are not great at providing career stability or clear progression pathways across silos. Something that was also highlighted in the Ambitious Australia report as critical to a high-functioning innovation system,” she says.
“Research and industry are working with different career incentives and while industry may recognise the skills that STEMM professionals bring, there is a tension with translating that expertise in a commercial or leadership capability.”
The challenge also sits with the candidate to communicate their transferrable skills in an industry setting, which is hard to do when their career has purely been in an academic environment which for a long time has only recognised and rewarded outputs like grant funding and peer-reviewed manuscripts. While it is changing slowly, STEMM professionals receive little structured training in identifying and communicating their skills that can be utilised in non-academic environments.
“Take someone who has led a cancer therapeutics research group for 20 years. They’ve published extensively and presented at conferences, but they haven’t led international collaborations, managed complex budgets, lead diverse teams, negotiated contracts and partnerships and set a visionary strategy,” she explains.
For those looking to transition into industry roles, structured training can be a big help. Networks also matter enormously, particularly in sectors where clear, supported career pathways do not yet exist.
“There isn’t a transparent roadmap showing how to move into adjacent roles across industry, government, startups or leadership. Until this changes, mentors and sponsors become critical. They see capability beyond what’s written on paper and can open doors otherwise not possible,” says Melina.
Changing attitudes
The challenge is that while organisations undoubtedly need to do more, shifting mindsets around STEMM expertise can be difficult, particularly when convincing senior leadership and boards that it is not simply a nice-to-have, but a strategic capability. Melina points out, however, that as new leaders step into senior roles, they are beginning to recognise the gap.
“The old guard is moving on, and the next generation understands the value that STEMM expertise brings at a governance level,” she says.
However, change rarely happens quickly.
“You can’t simply walk into a boardroom and declare that it now needs a STEM-focused director. It takes push and pull, and often a clear sense of urgency,” Melina explains.
One of the first changes required is clearer entry pathways. If organisations genuinely want to access this expertise, they need to design for it — creating structured on-ramps, translating job criteria so they don’t unintentionally exclude researchers or clinicians, and investing in transition programs.
The second lever is development, particularly equitable development. The previously referenced workforce audit found women make up 52% of the research workforce, yet account for only 25% of the most senior positions.
“That’s an enormous loss of capability,” Melina says.
If organisations are serious about closing the STEMM skills gap, the focus must be on retention, progression and embedding STEMM expertise into strategic planning. Otherwise, leaders will still be having the same conversation in another ten years, wondering why the problem hasn’t changed.
About Hunton Executive
Hunton Executive is a specialist executive search and leadership advisory firm dedicated exclusively to healthcare and life sciences. We work across the full healthcare and life sciences ecosystem – from early-stage innovation through to multinational scale and healthcare delivery – supporting organisations at the moments where leadership decisions shape growth, performance and long-term value.
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