50 Applications. Zero Interviews. Then One Course Changed Everything.
- 3 hours ago
- 11 min read
Part of the Entry to Regulatory Success Stories Series
Prabhjot Malhi spent almost five years in Quality Control, applied to over 50 regulatory affairs roles across a full year, and received not a single interview. This is the story of how she went from a 0% success rate to a Senior Regulatory Affairs Specialist offer at Amgen — and what it took to get there.
A Year of Applications. Not One Response.
There is a specific kind of professional frustration that doesn't get talked about enough in the life sciences industry: applying for roles in a field you are clearly qualified to enter, doing everything that the conventional advice says you should do, and receiving nothing back.
That was Prabhjot Malhi's experience. She had spent close to five years working in Quality Control within the pharmaceutical industry. She understood GxP environments, documentation standards, analytical processes, and the relationship between manufacturing quality and product compliance. When she decided she wanted to move into regulatory affairs — a move that makes obvious sense given that QC experience maps directly onto CMC regulatory work — she began applying.
For a full year, she applied to every relevant role she came across. By her own estimate, 50 to 60 applications or more. She tailored her CV. She refined her cover letters. She tried every adjustment she could think of to make her profile land with regulatory affairs hiring managers.
The result: not a single interview.
“I had applied for so many jobs, I wasn’t hearing back, wasn’t getting any responses, not even a single interview, which was quite disappointing for me.” — Prabhjot Malhi
This is not an unusual story. It is one of the most common patterns among pharmaceutical professionals attempting to break into regulatory affairs — and understanding why it happens is the first step to fixing it.
📣 Have you been applying for regulatory affairs roles without getting interviews? At Entry to Regulatory, we provide training to anyone looking to build a career in Regulatory Affairs. We offer job support, real-life work assignments to work on, expert CV review, mock interview preparation, and mentoring from ex-MHRA professionals — designed to bridge the gap between your current experience and what regulatory employers need to see. |
Why Strong Candidates Don’t Get Regulatory Interviews
The answer isn’t a lack of ability or industry knowledge. It is a documentation and framing problem that sits at the intersection of how regulatory affairs roles are advertised and how applicant tracking systems and hiring managers filter candidates.
For a typical entry-level regulatory affairs role, the applicant pool can be segmented roughly as follows:
• Tier 1: Candidates with direct regulatory affairs experience
• Tier 2: Candidates with a completed, recognised RA qualification or course
• Tier 3: Candidates with adjacent pharmaceutical experience (QC, manufacturing, clinical operations)
• Tier 4: Candidates with no relevant background
Prabhjot sat firmly in Tier 3 — one level below where shortlisting decisions are made in a competitive field. Her QC background was relevant and valuable. But without documented regulatory knowledge, RA-specific work experience, or an industry-recognised credential, her applications were filtered before a human reviewed them.
The solution was not to submit more applications in the same condition. It was to change the tier she was being placed in.
The TOPRA Careers Fair and the Decision That Changed Everything
The turning point came when Prabhjot attended a TOPRA careers fair — an event designed to connect professionals with the regulatory affairs industry. It was there that she met Rabia from Entry to Regulatory.
The conversation was direct and practical. Prabhjot described her situation: the experience she had, the applications she’d submitted, the silence she’d received in return. The response she got wasn’t a sales pitch. It was a clear diagnosis.
“You’ve got all the experience, you just need some more guidance. Guidance on what the guidelines are, how it works, what regulatory affairs actually is.” — Entry to Regulatory
Prabhjot took home the information. For a while, she sat with it — weighing whether to commit. It’s a familiar feeling for anyone who has considered a training investment during an already uncertain period. The course cost. The time required. The uncertainty about whether it would actually make a difference.
Then, in her words, it clicked.
“It’s either now or never. And I called up Rabiea one day and I was like, hey, I’d really like to be put onto the course.” — Prabhjot Malhi
What happened next surprised even Prabhjot herself.
What the Course Revealed
Prabhjot’s account of what the course showed her is worth sitting with, because it is honest in a way that many testimonials are not.
“I realised I didn’t know anything about regulatory affairs before this. I thought I did. I thought, what am I missing out on? I’m sure I understand the pharmaceutical environment, how drugs are put onto the market. But actually I did not know anything.” — Prabhjot Malhi
This is a common realisation, and it matters precisely because it explains the gap that Prabhjot was experiencing. Knowing that pharmaceutical products go through regulatory approval is not the same as understanding CTD structure, variation types, MHRA administrative requirements, eCTD compilation, regulatory strategy frameworks, or the specific way that each module of a regulatory dossier is constructed and assessed.
QC experience teaches quality systems, GMP compliance, analytical methods, and deviation management. These are directly applicable to CMC regulatory work — but only once the regulatory framework that connects them has been learned. Without that framework, QC experience and regulatory experience remain in separate categories in a hiring manager’s assessment.
The course bridged that gap. In Prabhjot’s case, the course content did more than build knowledge. It gave her a way of articulating and applying her existing QC experience within a regulatory context — which is what employers needed to see.
The Features That Made the Biggest Difference
When asked to identify what specifically the course provided that made the difference, Prabhjot was precise. Four elements stood out:
1. Depth of Content and Module Quizzes
The course covers EU, US and UK regulatory frameworks across all major submission types, variation categories, and product lifecycle stages. After each module, short quizzes reinforced learning and helped ensure that the knowledge was retained rather than passively absorbed.
“I really enjoyed the content, the depth that it was in, the examples that were given. We had small quizzes after each module which was really good.” — Prabhjot Malhi
2. Hands-On Work Assignments
After each module, students complete intensive work assignments based on real regulatory scenarios. This is the feature that appears most consistently in feedback from students who secure roles, and Prabhjot was no exception.
“The work examples that we did after each module was done were very intensive and would give real life experiences and allowed me to apply the knowledge I had learned in the course. Without that I wouldn’t have been able to apply that knowledge in any real life setting.” — Prabhjot Malhi
The importance of this cannot be overstated. Regulatory affairs hiring managers don’t just want to know that a candidate understands regulatory theory. They want to know that the candidate has done regulatory work — and can describe specific examples. Work assignments create exactly that documented, verifiable experience.
3. CV Review and Job Drop-In Sessions
Following course completion, students have access to structured CV review and job application support. Rabia reviewed Prabhjot’s CV and cover letter, repositioning her QC experience in the specific language that regulatory hiring managers respond to.
“After the course was done, we had job like drop-in sessions or just overall CV help as well, which was really useful. That really helped because I was able to tailor my CV to get it noticed by companies.” — Prabhjot Malhi
This is where the 0% to 12.5% interview conversion rate shift originated. The same underlying experience, repositioned in the right language, moved Prabhjot’s applications from invisible to shortlisted.
4. Pre-Interview Mock Preparation
Before each real interview, Prabhjot called Rabia for a dedicated mock interview session. This is not a generic preparation resource — it is one-to-one preparation with someone who knows the course content, the candidate’s background, and the specific role and company being interviewed for.
“Before each interview I’d call Rabia and we’d have a mock interview. And that was very beneficial to me. I feel like without these mock interviews I was able to really tailor my skills and practise before going ahead and doing interviews.” — Prabhjot Malhi
Given that Prabhjot ultimately went through six interviews for the Amgen role alone — speaking with stakeholders in Singapore, America, and the UK — this preparation was not incidental. It was foundational.
The Numbers: From 0% to 12.5%
The clearest measure of the course’s impact comes from Prabhjot’s own application data, which she shared directly in the feedback call.
Metric | Before the course | After the course |
Applications submitted | 50–60+ | ≈40 |
Interviews received | 0 | 4–5 |
Interview success rate | 0% | 12.5% |
Companies responding | None | 5 (incl. Amgen, MHRA, medical device companies) |
Outcome | No progression | Senior RA Specialist offer at Amgen |
The 12.5% interview conversion rate after the course, against 0% before, represents a complete transformation in how Prabhjot’s applications were being received. It also reflects the specific CV repositioning and documented experience that the course provided.
The companies that responded illustrate the reach of that change: Amgen (one of the largest global biopharmaceutical companies), the MHRA, and several medical device companies. These are not companies that respond to undifferentiated applications.
The Amgen Offer: What the Role Actually Looks Like
The position Prabhjot accepted is a Senior Regulatory Affairs Specialist — not an entry-level Associate position, but a specialist-level role at a globally recognised biopharmaceutical company known for its CMC regulatory capabilities across complex biologics and small molecule products. The specifics of the offer:
• Title: Senior Regulatory Affairs Specialist
• Company: Amgen — global biopharmaceutical, operating across biologics, biosimilars, and small molecules
• Focus: CMC regulatory affairs, providing information to subject matter experts for authoring
• Location: Uxbridge, UK; two days on-site per month
• Salary: £47,000 base, with performance bonus bringing total package to £50,000
• Working pattern: predominantly remote
The senior designation in the title reflects Prabhjot’s existing QC experience — which Amgen specifically valued for its direct relevance to CMC regulatory work. This is a point worth emphasising: a strong adjacent background, when properly framed and supplemented with documented RA knowledge, can position a candidate above pure entry-level.
The salary is also notable. At £47,000 base (rising to £50,000 with bonus), this is at the upper end of the entry-to-specialist range for UK regulatory affairs roles. Entry to Regulatory’s course page lists up to £50,000 as the upper range for entry-level RA roles; Prabhjot landed at exactly that threshold on her first regulatory appointment.
Six Interviews, Three Countries: Preparing for a Global Process
The Amgen interview process was not a simple two-stage affair. Six interviews, conducted with stakeholders in Singapore, the United States, and the United Kingdom, is an intensive process designed to assess candidates for a role with global regulatory scope.
What made the process manageable — and ultimately successful — was the preparation infrastructure Prabhjot had built:
• Work assignment examples she could draw on for STAR-structured answers
• A repositioned CV that communicated QC experience in regulatory language
• Mock interview preparation before each round with Rabia
• A clear understanding of CMC regulatory frameworks and how her existing QC experience applied within them
“It was honestly really straightforward. They asked about my skills, my personality, what I would do in certain situations and then obviously some experiences where I gave my star examples.” — Prabhjot Malhi
The company also asked about the course itself. Their response to hearing about Entry to Regulatory was notably positive.
“They were really intrigued, and they were quite happy with the fact that I had used a difficult time to benefit me in some way and used it to pivot and redirect myself to get into regulatory affairs. And they were quite excited to hear that there was a course like this available, because they’d not ever come across it before.” — Prabhjot Malhi
This is a significant data point. Amgen — a company with substantial regulatory infrastructure and established criteria for assessing RA candidates — was sufficiently impressed by the course to respond positively to it in an interview context. The practical, work-assignment-based structure of the course translated into credibility with an employer that had not previously encountered it.
Using a Difficult Period as a Pivot Point
Prabhjot’s journey to Amgen took place against a backdrop of personal difficulty. She was navigating significant life changes at the same time as building her regulatory career. She referenced this during the feedback call — not as an excuse, but as context for why the career pivot mattered so much.
“I used a difficult time to benefit me in some way. I used it to pivot and redirect myself to get into regulatory affairs and strengthen my experience.” — Prabhjot Malhi
This is worth noting not for its personal detail, but for what it demonstrates about the nature of career transitions. The decision to invest in the course was made during a period of uncertainty, not stability. The job search was conducted while managing personal upheaval. And the outcome was a senior specialist role at one of the most recognised pharmaceutical companies in the world.
For anyone who is considering the course but feels that the timing isn’t quite right, or that they need to wait for circumstances to stabilise before investing in their career — Prabhjot’s story is a direct counterargument. The course itself became a stabilising factor.
“Sometimes all you need is your career. If your career is good, that’s one thing that’s at least in control.” — Prabhjot Malhi
Business Insight: How This Course Compares to the Alternatives
Prabhjot’s story raises a practical question that many candidates face: given that she already had relevant pharmaceutical experience, what specifically did the Entry to Regulatory course provide that she couldn’t have acquired through other routes?
Why existing pharma experience alone isn’t sufficient
Prabhjot had already tailored her CV and cover letters as thoroughly as she could before the course. She had nearly five years of GxP-grounded QC experience. And she had applied to 50-60+ roles. The result was zero interviews. The gap was not effort or underlying capability — it was documented, verifiable regulatory experience and the specific framing that RA hiring managers need to see.
Why academic qualifications alone don’t close the gap
The most commonly cited alternatives to a focused RA training course are academic qualifications.
The distinguishing features of the Entry to Regulatory course — work assignments, mock interviews, CV review, and job mentoring — are precisely the elements that academic qualifications don’t provide. And they are exactly what Prabhjot identified as the factors that changed her outcomes.
One further point worth noting: when Prabhjot mentioned the course to Amgen during the interview process, the company’s response was positive. Rabia’s observation on this is worth repeating: accreditation is less important than recognition. A qualification that a hiring manager at a company like Amgen responds to positively is, in practical terms, a qualification that works.
What This Means If You’re in a Similar Position
If you have pharmaceutical industry experience — in QC, manufacturing, clinical operations, analytical development, or a related function — and you’re applying for regulatory affairs roles without receiving interviews, Prabhjot’s story is directly relevant.
The barrier is not your underlying capability. It is not your work ethic. It is not the effort you’ve put into tailoring applications. The barrier is a specific gap: documented regulatory experience and RA-specific framing that hiring managers can recognise immediately.
That gap is specific. And because it is specific, it is fixable — in three months, part-time, while you continue in your current role.
Prabhjot’s final advice, given directly on the feedback call, was unambiguous:
“Do it. It’s worth every penny. It’s worth the investment. It is an investment in your career, in your education and that is very valuable. I’m very glad I did it. So I’d encourage anyone who’s in two minds to just go ahead and enrol in the course.” — Prabhjot Malhi
Start Your Regulatory Affairs Career Today
At Entry to Regulatory, we provide training to anyone looking to build a career in Regulatory Affairs. We offer job support and real-life work assignments to work on. Speak to us and see how we can help you.
Whether you’re coming from QC, manufacturing, analytical development, pharmacy, or any other pharmaceutical function — the Introduction to Regulatory Affairs course is designed to bridge the gap between your existing experience and what regulatory affairs employers need to see.
Next cohort starts: 12th July 2026. Limited spaces available.
About the Author: Rabiea is an Honorary Associate Professor at UCL, former MHRA Health Authority reviewer, and CEO of Entry to Regulatory and Advanced Regulatory Consulting. After transitioning from retail pharmacy to regulatory affairs, she has dedicated her career to helping others make the same successful career change. Connect with her on LinkedIn for the latest regulatory affairs insights and career advice.
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