Former Carnegie Mellon University cross country and track runner Aaditya Mhatre shared his early-career story on mentorship in Merck's weekly leadership blog, which was picked up by LinkedIn.
By Aaditya Mhatre
As I reflect on the first year of my full-time career, one common saying stands out to me:
“It takes a village to raise a child”
This idea is true in many aspects of life, especially when it comes to your career. You can’t truly succeed without the support of your colleagues.
I remember when I was a wide-eyed college freshman, unsure how I was going to apply my major in the real world. I didn’t know where to start but, I was fortunate enough to take part in my university’s athletics alumni mentoring program.
My first professional mentor introduced me to the dynamic field of pharmaceutical manufacturing, giving me a new outlook on my career and purpose. For the first time, I saw how I could directly apply my passion for engineering to help improve lives.
This governing principle led me to Merck as an intern in the Global Operations API Sourcing group. However, like my freshman year, I was full of uncertainty and I thought to myself “Merck is such a large company. How am I going to narrow down my interests in manufacturing?”
Yet again, mentoring played a pivotal role in my career development. Through the Next Generation Network (NGN), an employee business resource group (EBRG) at Merck, I was matched with a professional mentor in the Intern Mentoring Program (IMP). He advised me based on his experiences and connected me with colleagues in my areas of interest. The IMP helped strengthen my career plan and gave me a better understanding of Merck’s big picture strategy.
Fast forward to today, I have just finished my first year at Merck in the Quality Line Oversight (QLO) rotational program. I meet every month with my professional mentor to seek guidance and draw upon her 30+ years of Merck experience. I have even come full circle to serve on the IMP leadership team as the Mentor Lead, helping run the mentoring program that had such a profound impact on me just 2 years ago.
Through all my experiences with mentoring, I’ve learned that it is a career necessity. A common equalizer for Gen Z, as we start to enter the workforce, is our lack of extensive work experience. Mentoring helps bridge the experience gap and encourages dialogue in our new, multi-generational workforce.
Just as it takes a village to raise a child, it takes the right company to grow your career. I am grateful that my colleagues at Merck take the time out of their day to help me along my career journey. I encourage you to seek out and make those mentoring connections as it will make all the difference in your career development!