Have you ever been confused about how you could land up with that ever elusive dream job? (Hey, I was there too..!). You may be at the beginning, middle or end of your degree, and you may be thinking about your future career, but what, where and how?

Just how beneficial would it be to be connected to someone in your desired field of work? You have guessed right! It is unbelievably fruitful to seek the guidance of an expert to take you to that dream job; and both student and expert can learn a great deal from each other.

The question is - will you take action?

Hi, I am Elizabeth, a Neuroscientist, and Founder of MindTorch®. MindTorch is an organisation looking to connect Physicians, Scientists, Health professionals and Pharmaceutical experts who share our vision to provide insight and expertise to medical and life sciences students; to give that leg up in achieving their career aspirations. We want to mentor the next generation of Scientists.

So here goes my story - why I ended up doing what I am doing.

After I graduated with a BSc in Pharmacology, I was confused about where my life was going. I was always talking to Career Consultants, and when the opportunity arose to do a PhD in Neuroscience - boy, did I jump at it! My reasoning was simple - I was fascinated by the brain, and I enjoyed research (so I thought at the time). Nevertheless, I really enjoyed my PhD - I met and worked with some of the most creative and intelligent people possible.

After my six years as a Life Science student, I thought that dream job would be around the corner (naive scientist, Elizabeth!). It used to be that you go to university, get a good degree and you get a job. Whether you enjoy the job, and it suits your personality is a different question entirely.


Enter reality: the job did not come, but confusion sure did. It was mentally challenging.

I took the first job that came my way. I soon realised that I wasn’t using my years of academic training; nor was I fulfilling my desire to achieve. And to think that the cause of such misery was, of all things, ignorance...! If there was one thing I learnt, it was this – ignorance doesn’t come cheap.

It was then that I got my greatest gift – my Mentors.

The awareness, confidence and support I needed to start laying the building blocks towards my dreams; and to bring my ideas to reality was strongly encouraged by my Mentor – Ms Kiki Maurey, MBA, OBE.
I met KiKi in a chance meeting when I was asked to drop Kiki off at the train station after an event in South London. During the short ride, Kiki asked me thought provoking questions about my career and within 3 minutes of conversation, she changed my vision of my future.

KiKi kindly offered to virtually mentor me for a year; and she helped identify my values, strengths, interests and skills through questioning, coaching and mentoring. Feeling empowered and armed with my new found awareness I made a commitment to myself – to help students aligned to biosciences/medical degrees find a fulfilling career with the support of renowned scientists, physicians and pharmaceutical experts (and others allied to biosciences) who have been where you are, and want to help you achieve your career aspirations.

And so in 2013, I created MindTorch. We are a growing dynamic organisation and I am grateful that I have started fulfilling my goals of providing that vital need for mentoring. I aim to recreate my mentoring success using MindTorch’s online platform to create a network of virtual mentoring. I also want to bring experts and aspiring students face-to-face through speed mentoring events (at Universities), breaking down barriers and sharing knowledge.

I believe we all go into our field of training because we all have one goal: to find healthcare solutions to patient problems and through collaboration, we CAN.

Help us mould the future of Science: register as a mentor on the website