Terry McCarthy Interviewed at Octane's Medical Innovation Forum in Irvine, California

Hey, I'd like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you'd like to apply to be a guest on the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, so today I am in Irvine, California at the Medical Innovation Forum, powered by Octane, and my guest is Terry McCarthy. Terry, welcome to the show. All right, we're in day two of the conference. We're kind of heading towards the tail end. I just have to ask, how was the conference for you so far? I've been coming to this for many years, and every year I'm always very, very happy I came. It's really great how, in the years that I've been coming, how much the industry continues to evolve. And it's, I think, very important to be here to keep your people safe. Finger on the pulse of what's happened. So so then you've been coming for how many years would you say? Just roughly, just roughly. About 10. Amazing. So this is only my second conference covering it. So I'm a newbie, I'm a newbie, but I love it. I cover conferences all around the world. And one of the things I've noticed here is just this amazing community of people coming together and exchanging ideas and, and deals being done. Frankly, I hear the chatter, right? Exactly. So what keeps you coming back? Well, we're in the recruiting field. Really quick, my background actually was in medical device marketing for years. Worked in major, you know, large Fortune 500 companies and they went into the startup world. Once you get into the startup world with early stage companies, it's almost impossible to want to go back because it's so exciting. And you're on the cusp of what's happening. Well, our last venture We were left at the altar, unfortunately, for very many reasons. But I ended up making a pivot away from marketing and went into recruiting. And as a recruiter, we have now focused almost exclusively on early stage companies. So it's really important for us to be here to see what's coming up, what's the next, what are the trends. And also to make connections, and we've made phenomenal connections here. It's really a wonderful opportunity to kind of keep, not only keep your finger on the pulse, see what's coming down the pike, but actually meet the leaders and meet the folks who are making these changes our. And it's been wonderful, it's been great for us to make these connections, so. Talk a little bit more about your business and other, other industries you focus on or is only medical or like, give us a little bit of a flavor for that. Well, again, because my background was in medical device, it's the industry I know best. And when you're in a marketing role, especially when you're, you know, in a more senior level marketing role, you interface with every single function in a company. And I look at that and I'm thinking with the connections in the medical device and the understanding of the industry, it's just been a natural progression to leverage that into recruiting. Yeah. So for better or for worse, we are pretty much focused in this industry. We sometimes venture out into pharma and, and some, you know, and certainly biotech, but we have really narrowed it to life sciences. Talk about the industry in general and life sciences. Like what is, what is the pool look like for talent? Like, well, every year since we started every year is different. And we literally started our recruiting firm in the depths of the recession in 2009. That's when we started recruiting. And it was interesting because companies always need talent. No matter what, no matter what. They might not need as much talent, but at that time, heck, it was a great year for us when we first started because there weren't that many positions, but we had, you know, candidates lined up out the door for a position that was open. So every year it changes. Right now, you know, we have seen a little bit of a dearth, I guess, of investment, you know, last year in 2003. It, in our opinion, and I think that folks would hold this up, but it is definitely getting better this year. It's really getting better. Things are happening. I think the elections have put a little bit of a question mark on it, and some companies are a little bit uncertain as to what's going to happen. But I'm very optimistic. I really, we've been quite busy and we look at the industry as Being a little bit more robust. The presentations here of the companies. It's so fun to watch, isn't it? Like all these ideas and all this, this ambition. And like, and for me, it was some of the things I'm like, that's already happening. What? And like, I wouldn't have that asked me, honestly, I'm always just awestruck. Sometimes are, Oh my gosh, where were you when I made it? So that's what I'm saying. It's just. It's an industry that's always going to change, it's always going to evolve, there's always going to be people that are needed, and finding the right talent, especially for early stage companies, is so cri

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