Fowler Alumnas Love of Science + MBA = Success

Fowler Alumna’s Love of Science + MBA = Success

Dara Grantham Wright

Since she was a child, Dara Grantham Wright had a passion for science.  She double majored in Spanish and biology when she earned her bachelor’s degree from Willamette University and eventually planned to become a research scientist. 

However, Wright’s first job out of college wasn’t in a lab: It was as a position as a product manager for Chemicon International (now EMD Millipore) a company in Temecula, California that provides products for Life Science research and discovery. It was a job that changed the course of her career permanently. “I thought I would pursue a Ph.D. in science,” said Wright, a native of Eureka, California. “But once I had the opportunity to learn about the industrial side of science, I was hooked.” 

After working only two years at Chemicon, Wright was offered a position in global strategic marketing at medical technology giant, BD (NYSE: BDX), in their San Diego office, where she worked for 13 years in strategic marketing roles of increasing scope and leadership responsibility. While at BD, she realized she needed to make a move toward expanding her knowledge base. “I started my career as a product manager and in this role, you need to create compelling business cases for investments and have a deep understanding for commercial enterprise,” she noted. “That is when I realized – having only a science background – that I needed to hone my business skills.”

MBA Replaces Science Ph.D. 
With that in mind, Wright put her quest for a Ph.D. in a science-based field on hold to pursue a Master of Business Administration Degree (MBA). She chose to enroll at SDSU’s Fowler College of Business because: “SDSU had a flexible class schedule which allowed me to still work fulltime and go to school in the evening,” she said. “I think that an MBA degree is always powerful, but since I was working at the time, it became even more powerful for me as it provided real-time context to the learning experience.”

Wright earned her MBA from SDSU in 2003. Shortly afterwards, she earned a promotion and relocated to BD’s divisional headquarters in Silicon Valley. In 2010, Wright was offered an executive role with another Bay Area biotech company focused on genomic analysis technologies. In 2015, Wright and her family returned to Southern California when the company Wright was working for was acquired by a San Diego-based company and she was given the opportunity to lead the newly acquired business as the senior vice president and general manager.  

Currently, Wright lives in the San Diego region and serves as the executive vice president and president of the clinical diagnostics group for Bio-Rad (NYSE: BIO). While a combination of her hard work and her passion for science have helped propel Wright toward the top of the career ladder, she also believes that the lessons she learned at SDSU gave her a solid foundation in the business world. “I really love that the curriculum exposed me to areas of business that I might not have explored otherwise, but it certainly paid off over time as my career scaled,” she noted.

Her Advice: Don’t Overlook Business Jobs in Biotech
For recent SDSU graduates thinking about a career in the biotech industry, Wright – who once wanted to work in a laboratory – wants to remind them the industry is looking for much more that research and development technicians. “I think many new grads don’t know about the range of jobs available in biotech and pharma companies,” Wright pointed out. “A lot of people assume that it’s mainly technical and R&D, but there are also positions in digital marketing, regulatory affairs, data analytics and others to explore.”