S2: Episode 8: Marcella Trembley: Scientist, Artist and a Canadian in Switzerland

Career Growth and Brave Choices - Marcella is one of those people who are open to change and seizing the possibilities in life. Growing up in Lambeth, Ontario, she became a business owner and worked on developing her artistic talent. She switched to science and made the move to Switzerland for her PhD in molecular and cellular biology. Through this, she learned German in order to build a life in Switzerland. All in all, a path with many twists and turns. Marcella’s story is one of resilience, bravery, and an understanding of herself and what is important.    

Job title: Deputy Director Publications, Ophthamalogy, Bayer Pharmaceuticals, Basel, Switzerland

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Jann Danyluk, Career Resilience.

Transcript

 | 00:11 | Hello and welcome to season two of Career Resilience, where we talk with people about their career path and their career journey. And maybe we can all learn from each other. My name is Jann Danyluk and I'm a human resources consultant in London, Ontario, Canada. I work with Ford Keast LLP, providing human resources, advice and counsel to my business clients.

 | 00:32 | I also support people through individual one on one coaching in helping with career development. I hope you will enjoy our series where we talk with ordinary, extraordinary people. We get to hear about interesting journeys. We get to talk with people about failures, successes, advice and counsel to us as we develop our own careers. I really appreciate the opportunity to talk with these people, and I hope you'll enjoy listening to us. And now for some logistics, please subscribe on YouTube.

 | 01:03 | Or if you're a listener, please follow me wherever you get your podcasts. And if you have a chance, I hope you'll visit my website carrier dash resilience dot com welcome. My guest today is Marcella Trembley, Marcella. Welcome to career resilience. Thank you, Jann. It's a pleasure to be here. It is so nice to have you here and you have such an interesting background, and we're going to talk today about your schooling and your profession.

 | 01:32 | But I'd like to just start with clarifying where you live. So where do you live in this world of ours? So I live in Basel and that's in Switzerland, OK? And how long have you lived there? Approx. Approx. 20 years. OK, and where were you born and raised? So I was born in London, Ontario, was raised in Lambeth, Ontario, and came to Switzerland.

 | 02:06 | I don't want to give away my age or anything like that, but when I was starting, let's see when I let's say thirties. OK, so you have an accent? I mean, I think any of us listening to you right now will be picking that up. And yet you were born and raised in London and Lambeth. Very Canadian. So where does this accent come from? Well, it's funny you say that because I don't hear my accent, but I know that I have one.

 | 02:38 | So when I think Switzerland is really interesting because it has four national languages and I live in the German speaking part. And so I've had to learn German, and it's really interesting because Swiss speak a different German than actually written. So you hear German, you speak a different kind of German. I need it in everyday language for shopping. I worked for German in German for a few years. So I think my accent comes from that.

 | 03:08 | And also, if you're a native English speaker in Europe, I think your accent tends to flatten out because you speak with people from all over. For example, the department I'm in, I think there are at least 20 nationalities. So you don't you don't hear a lot of native English speakers.

 | 03:34 | In your surroundings, so I think the English tends to take on its own life and accent, obviously. Well, it's a lovely accent that you pick though at work. Do you work in English or German or so you work in English, English? Well, OK. Got it.

 | 03:54 | OK, so let's get into that because we're all about career resilience here, and I'd like to chat with you about the resilience that you had actually not only in work and in education, but what was it like for you to move to a new country? It was exciting. Terrifying. It was really an eye opener because I thought.

 | 04:26 | Being Canadian, all Canadians. Tend to have a background that is it can be from Europe, so some in my background, at least I had ancestors from England, Germany, and France. So you somehow think you are somehow familiar with the cultures?

 | 04:53 | As such, so that when you come to Europe, it shouldn't be such a culture shock, but it was a total culture shock was very difficult because I didn't speak any German before I came here, so that was very difficult. And just some funny, strange things happened at the very beginning. So, for example, I arrived in June. My birthday's in July and in the team where I was.

 | 05:21 | So I came to do my Ph.D. in Switzerland. I said, OK, it's my birthday. Somebody, my Ph.D. advisor might bring the cake or one of the other girls in the lab might bring a cake. And they were thinking, Oh, it's Marcel, his birthday tomorrow, she's going to bring a cake. So we arrived on my day and there was no cake. And things like that are so funny because you cannot anticipate that that is so different, right?

 | 05:50 | Really, we're all kind of thinking, OK, first international incident. Nobody. Right? Oh, so your page? What? What is your Ph.D. in? So I did a Ph.D. in molecular and cellular biology, and that was actually critical, estimating it was looking at lichens. I'm not sure if you know the lichen use, but that's a symbiosis between a fungus and analogy.

 | 06:19 | So actually, what I did was take the fungus in the algae apart, cultured them separately and then put them back together and try to look at based upon their gene expression. What was different between them when they were separate and when they came together? So I was looking at a special group of proteins and then looking at some patterns in gene expression. And what was your thesis?

 | 06:50 | So that it was on that it was actually looking up at that and also looking at protein family that allows them to make this wonderful three dimensional form, all of the different various kinds of forms that lichens take on and be able to take up water and try out photosynthesis, feed each other and feed the fungus the algae. That's a really fascinating, fascinating.

 | 07:21 | Creatures, I don't want to say, but some symbiosis and just trying to understand that symbiosis more than so Marcella, what made you decide to move in that direction? I mean, here you are in Canada, obviously getting your undergrad degree and then what made you decide to go there? Yeah, good question. I think I never really had a clear plan what I wanted to do, and I kind of envy people who know where they want to go, what they want to do
.
 | 07:52 | I was always so interested in in many different things, and I actually started out. My first degree was in art, in fine arts, and I did painting drawing. I opened the art studio with a girlfriend. We did framing selling paintings as well. And then I took a course in biology about trees, and I got so fascinated by that that I started.

 | 08:21 | I went back to university and did a degree in biology, and then I did my master's at McGill. And this was in plant sciences and also really tried to understand and look at some symbiosis as well in the plant world. And when I finished my masters, my wonderful supervisor back in London, Ontario, said, You'd probably like to do a Ph.D...

 | 08:51 | I would have a position here or I know a professor in Switzerland who's also interested in this, this area in symbiosis. I could drop her a line and she dropped her line. She said yes. She also had a position and I thought, Well, OK, let's go back to London, Ontario or go to Switzerland. And I thought, Well, I'm not for it, I'll go to Switzerland. So my original plan was to come here, do my Ph.D., which would take normally three or four years.

 | 09:22 | And you see, I'm still here. So yes, that does tend to happen. I will say I'll just refer a year or two or three or four. And the next thing you know they've made when you gave me the light there, how brave was that? Looking back, it was really brave. And I think that's probably something easier to do when you're younger.

 | 09:51 | And sort of more on the students side of things. Mm hmm. I think it was probably a little bit more challenging because the department that I ended up in hadn't really had any experience with foreign students, so they weren't really sure how much support I needed. So I did do quite a lot of things on my own, but.

 | 10:18 | I made friends quickly, and I wouldn't say necessarily that it was easy because Swiss are really wonderful in the sense that it takes them a long time to bring you in to be your friend. Mm-Hmm. But as soon as they decide, Yes, I want to be your friend, you have them as a friend for life. It's really an amazing commitment. I've had people Swiss say to me, I really like you.

 | 10:46 | I'm really interested in what you're doing, but I don't have time to be your friend because it it's I know it's crazy, right? But I remember when somebody said that to me and I was so shocked and upset, but then I realized it's actually really honest and true if you don't have time to be somebody's friends. Or you can't do it. You don't have the time to do it in a proper way. It's unlikely.

 | 11:16 | Quite wonderful to be able to say that and mean that and not just trying without knowing that you can't commit to a certain. Who is he British? It's that is really interesting. Yeah. How would you compare that to Canadian culture of a similar experience? I wouldn't I don't think I've ever heard someone say that to me in Canada.

 | 11:46 | I think what's cool about the friendship I had in Canada is that you can you can have friendships that are. To me, it was like intense. Wonderful. And then the time was gone and then the friendship was over, but it wasn't any less. I think there's maybe a little bit more flexibility I have friends that have had my whole life from Canada still have close contact with.
 | 12:19 | Yeah, it's just very different. Yeah. And just on that, you and I share our friend and that's our friend, Lisa. And that's how you and I connected. And I think that if she is just such a great friend that she understands friendship, so that must mean we do as well. So, so what resilience did you need to have getting through your Ph.D.? You're committed.

 | 12:47 | It's problem-solving, it's trying to figure something out. And to the questions that come up. Kind of a vision where it's going to a certain extent that you can bring all the pieces together because the ultimate goal would be to publish your work, to make sure hopefully that it's something that makes a contribution.

 | 13:19 | I think. Probably my PHC was maybe a little bit more complicated because of having the cultural shock as well to be sitting in a room with people and not understand any word that they say because it took a long time to learn German, of course.
 | 13:43 | Even though the languages science typically is English, I think in the cultural setting to not understand was very difficult. So I spent a lot of time, I guess, in my own head, not knowing the language or having anybody that spoke it. But resilience is just sticking with your project. A lot of failures. A lot of.

 | 14:11 | Yeah, just perseverance, I think in the sense of if something doesn't work, try it again. Especially in the molecular and cellular biology, learning new techniques, so I did go sometimes to different universities, different labs to understand and learn some techniques to discuss the science with people to go to congresses to do presentations. Yeah, pretty exciting, I have to say. Yeah.

 | 14:39 | What's the room for a time, Marcelo? When you were going through that, you thought, this is too hard? Oh, gosh, this is a few years back, I have to say yes, because I may not remember a specific moment, but I remember the feeling. Yeah. Yes, it was difficult because just I think compounding it being here alone without family, friends. Yeah, sorry, Jen.

 | 15:10 | I don't know how to say it was difficult, but of course, obviously very satisfying everything learned and. Completely different things here, completely different skill sets of going to the mountains, hiking in the mountains, so you know, you've got the intense phase of study and the teaching and the drugs and things like that, but also had the opportunity. Switzerland is a small country.

 | 15:39 | It's like one, two hundred and fifty years of the size of Canada. It's all folded up with mountains, mountains, lakes, rivers. It's wonderful. And I think the overarching reaction I get from people when they ask, Where are you from? I say from Canada, they don't. Why are you here? Canada is so, so big. You have so much space, you have so much wilderness, and I have to laugh because how much wilderness do Canadians actually going to, you know, you've got berries, you've got black flies, you've got no path in Switzerland.

 | 16:15 | It's so organized. They have maps for everywhere. They have pests for everywhere. They have science to tell you what direction you're going and how long it's going to take you to get there. I've never been out in nature as often as here in the sense of going for a trek or going for a hike or a 10 day walk through the mountains. That's a major expedition and that's taking Canada here. It's so well organized.

 | 16:45 | It's a funny question why would you come here? That's really interesting. That whole organization, we almost have too much room. Yeah, it's too big to organize. It's too big to organize. What advice would you give someone? And I know that I'm making a sort of harking back to when you were doing your Ph.D., but it is such a tough slog when people are going through that that stage of their lives.

 | 17:13 | What advice would you give someone who's sort of in the middle of it and thinking, Gosh, this is this is so tough. You have to have a backup. I would say of somebody, I think I think things are maybe slightly different because I noticed the difference now, well, have that lifeline back to somebody that you can really pour your heart out into back home. And for me, that was my dad.

 | 17:43 | I remember being on the phone and just crying sometimes and saying, Oh, I was so lonely. And he was there and. I think that was so important just to have somebody to listen and understand because on this side, it was like. You know what, I don't really understand, because you've come here, you made the choice to come here, you should be happy. And yes, indeed it's it was fantastic opportunity. I don't deny that.

 | 18:13 | And I think I would encourage anybody. If you have the opportunity to go to a different country, take the opportunity. And if you're not sure it would work for you, say or try it for a year. I would say try it by stages, give yourself a goal or try for this semester. Mm-Hmm. And I think that's an easy way if you can break it down. Yes. Yeah. Have your lifeline. Maybe break it down into chunks because things now is well, you have.

 | 18:45 | The Bachelor is sort of universal now. So if you do one year here, for example, you're not going to lose it right? And I think it's very similar to what people around you. And I think what is valued also on a CV is you went to a different country. You gave it a try.

 | 19:07 | Even if it didn't work, you've gained valuable experience from that because so many of us now work in global companies for work companies where you've got people from different cultures and if you've had that experience. Doesn't it doesn't have to be the whole if somebody is intimidated and say they can't commit for a semester or a year, it will help you so much. I really think this. Yeah.

 | 19:37 | So Marcella, you're still there. So yeah, at some point you turn the corner and decided to settle. Where you where you are? Yeah. What? What was that like? How did you turn that corner? I think if you're somewhere, at least my experience was if you're somewhere for two or three years, that is kind of the corner because by the time you have two or three years under your belt, you're used to things, you've got friends, you've got your places, you like to go.

 | 20:17 | You may be from that place in the city where you'd like to live. For me, it was discovering the mountains and my legs of those mountains and hiking and mountaineering and climbing. I think all of those things sort of just fell in love with them. So if you don't want to stay somewhere, don't stay longer than two years because it starts to get under your skin.

 | 20:45 | And I can remember that feeling of I'm at home in Canada and I'm at home in Switzerland. Where's my home? It took a long time for it to change. Yeah, it took about 10 years and nothing would help with that and probably goes faster with people when they have a family here. I wanted to switch over to work. So. So tell us what you do for a living. Mm-Hmm.

 | 21:12 | So currently, I'm the publication reads in the ophthalmology department, in fair, and you may know better. From Bayer aspirin to the heritage companies to the department I work in is the medical affairs departments, and that is what I do is take the scientific study data and publish that. So it's published in scientific journals.

 | 21:42 | So this is really looking at retinal diseases and understanding how one of the company's drugs works in in that disease and publishing the data on that case. So you're doing important work. I like to think of it like that because it's really important for the people who are in the studies. It's important for the patients, for the physicians. Yeah, it's really something that touches people's lives.

 | 22:12 | It's really exciting because it's something it involves with, involves talking with people from around the world. So earlier in the week, we had an also discussion with folks from Europe and Asia, of course, on the call. We have one where we have to sometimes split because we're going from U.S. to Europe and to Australia, so we can't put everybody in one time zone calls.

 | 22:43 | So we sometimes have to split them. And I have to say one of the things that's been really nice about moving to virtual communication and relying on that so heavily is to actually get to see these people from around the world and, you know, just have that sort of visual connection. And it's really lovely that we have this technology to enable us to do that to have the world discussions.

 | 23:15 | And you know, I think what's interesting too about what people like you do is that and this whole global impact of what you do is when we listen to the news, it's all about global conflict. And yet there you are, talking with people from around the world about an incredibly important and helpful topic. And really, it's encouraging to sort of realize that that's all going on and that we're all just people.

 | 23:48 | Actually, that's really nice, that's a really nice take on it. I have to agree with you. It is really lovely and what I like as well is sometimes reading some of the scientific literature. I might see somebody whose name come up and up and up again, but then to actually be on a call and get to see them and meet them in person, it's really so cool. I really feel privileged to be able to do that. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think, you know, you are in a privileged position and we benefit from that.

 | 24:18 | So that's awesome. So thank you for what you do when you think about resilience in your current job. What comes to mind for you there? How do you have to be resilient in your role? So the rule is really its multitasking. So I probably have about, I would say, 80 or 90 projects on the go in different stages.

 | 24:50 | Oh yeah. So that's why I have the agency to really help me organize. We get together every week and look at a huge excel sheet that tracks everything that we're doing. Of course, we have to document everything in a system. We have a lot of support from digital systems to help do this. So thank goodness that it's not pen on paper trying to do that, that we can really actually rely on a lot of digitalization.

 | 25:21 | And this is something that there is also really been in the lead to do as well, which I think is fantastic. I think resilience in something like this involves being flexible, always learning. Troubleshooting, so you might recognize that what I did, my Ph.D. in is not what I'm working in. Yep.

 | 25:48 | And I think the skills that you learn in doing that, it's as mentioned before is its problem solving is troubleshooting, it's trying to figure out things, find solutions, and bring solutions. And I think those skills carry on here and. I think having that skill set helps with resilience, because it doesn't really matter what the topic is.

 | 26:19 | There's so many same things, so many of the same things that require those kind of skills. Yeah. And. As I said, it's so many different projects, its so many different groups from different parts of the world or different parts of the world or all over the world. It's. Resilience is also having respect, I think, for people, for the different cultural aspects that come to the call.

 | 26:50 | And those are things, some of those things, of course, it's not inherent. You have to learn them and you also learn them by doing it. And I think being plopped down into a country where I didn't understand the language, it's a crash course in doing that as well. I wouldn't say that it's necessarily so easy because I think what's also happened in time is that now being at home, working from home still or yes, on and off and back in the home as well.

 | 27:22 | I haven't seen that the workload has decreased at all. In fact, it's probably increased somewhat. And I think having resilience for resilience means also carrying the load and the demand. It's also making sure that. And my turn helps with this, my husband helps with this. Then I take breaks that I try to separate work from life now.

 | 27:51 | Well, maybe not separate life from work, work from life, because its work is also your life, but if you know what I mean, to make sure I take the breaks to keep myself healthy and re-energized and things like that. So what do you do for that to keep that energy going? You said that you love the outdoors. Does that help you? That helps a lot.

 | 28:20 | And we're so lucky in Switzerland to be able to hop on the train and go anywhere to go to the top of the mountain for the weekend to pop over to France or to Germany. Switzerland is smack dab in the middle of Europe, so we're really spoiled that we can go quickly somewhere and get a different landscape, a different cuisine here, a different language. It's really quite cool.

 | 28:49 | What I also like to do and this is still coming back to my previous training, I Monday evening is painting, but I do that every Monday evening, and that's something that gets me completely out of my scientific mind just to free my mind from that and jump into something completely different. That kind of energizes me sports.

 | 29:16 | And I think what's different here as well is that we don't I have a car but don't need to rely on the car to go anywhere. I cycle mostly everywhere or walk on foot, which is I think we don't have big suburbs like that here in Canada, where you have to be getting your car to go get some milk. So every night, every little neighborhood has a grocery store or to move.

 | 29:44 | So that's kind of cool, actually. It's very impressive. It sounds lovely, actually. Surely you must sometimes think about that person that you were that was doing the framing business and think what happened to them. And I think that's what life is all about is so unexpected. It's so unexpected. And I think I never really had a clear idea where it was going.

 | 30:15 | I was lucky enough to just sort of follow the ideas that came, and I thought, Yeah, that's interesting. And even in choosing my career path where I ended up here, it was also a development over time where I started out working in the lab. My first job was working in a lab where skin cells. And then from there it was getting more into the communication of science rather than being at the lab, working in the lab and creating the data to writing about it.

 | 30:52 | Translating science into a language we can understand was something that started fascinating me and just having the freedom to follow that to a certain extent, it's probably maybe that a little bit of a late bloomer to end up where I am now, but it was a cool path to get there. Very cool path, Marcella. And that obviously throughout your life, you're open to opportunities and possibilities.

 | 31:25 | And I think that that's very impressive. For one thing, it takes courage for another. But also, I think the fact that you left your the comfort of your home and went out into the world in a different way sort of adds to that. It's all about other pieces and it. I have three questions that I'd like to ask you. First of all, what is the best career advice that you've ever received?

 | 31:57 | I would say the best career advice was actually. In a funny way, it was discouraging me from taking or taking a decision that I wanted to. Could do. So let me put that in the right context. I wanted to quit the job. I had to take a year off to just paint.

 | 32:27 | So what had happened? I did my fine art degree. Worked in that area for a couple of years, went to science, and when I started studying science, I found I couldn't paint or draw. It was somehow my brain was adjusting to science and I couldn't do both. And then I was in the science field for some years, and then I want to start to paint again.

 | 32:55 | But I didn't feel I could do the both at the same time, so I decided without having a plan. To take a year off just to paint. And the advice was, don't you dare do that that will kill your career. Right? And it's a.

 | 33:18 | Kill my career, and I thought, no, I have to do it for me, it was in a way it was not advice, positive advice how to help me, but it made me realize I need to do this and I have to do this even if it changes my career. Yeah, if you know what I mean. Oh, absolutely. Did you do that?

 | 33:45 | Yes, I took a year. I rented a studio and got painting things and drawing and everything because it's also a skill that you need to train back up again. So my I needed to train again, how to see how to draw, how to paint. So I did that and actually, it led me in a new direction when I went back to look for work.

 | 34:15 | I started working in medical communication agency part time, which allowed me to do both to paint and to get ease back in, to painting and science at the same time. So it actually was really, really good advice. It was nice. I guess I took it as a challenge to that exact thing. Think sometimes that's what we need.

 | 34:42 | My second question, which sort of puts you on the spot, but is there a book that you've read that sort of influenced your style or your approach to life or work or whatever comes to mind as a book that that meant something to you? Yeah, actually, there's a book that I've read several times. I think when I first started reading it, I read it twice a year for several years, and it's the shipping news by and improve and that I started reading when I was already here in Switzerland.

 | 35:17 | And that might have been something that really it spoke to me because it's Canadian. She's a Canadian author, it's based heavily in Newfoundland, and I just loved it. I could imagine the vistas in my mind. It's about family. It's about people. It's about feeling at home and finding your place at home and in the world.

 | 35:45 | And it was kind of my guide, I guess, and companion here in Switzerland. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that was really, really a comfort for me to think that again and again. Yeah, OK. And my third and final question in this series is what advice would you give your younger self?

 | 36:14 | One thing to believe more in myself and in the sense of. Believing what I felt or what I fear or what my opinion is, is a value and to be able to say that out loud. And that might be part of being a female in science. It might be part of. You know, being in science, it's a very hierarchical.

 | 36:48 | Environment sometimes and. I think when I look back, when I look at my step daughter who's 19, I also think you shouldn't have so much more faith in yourself and in your opinions and in your views. And maybe that's just you does not have that insight. Maybe it's just something that comes with age.

 | 37:15 | And because I can see that when I say to her, You know, you're smart, you can do that. You've got the commitment. Go for it. And I still see her sometimes wavering and I recognize that me. I would tell myself to have more faith in yourself. You can do it. Open your mouth and say it. Yeah, that's I think the advice they would get this, I would take it.

 | 37:43 | Maybe not, but yeah. Oh, I think that's everything I wanted to ask you, and I really appreciate the responses and so on. Marcella, is there anything that you'd like to add or sort of leave us with today? I think it's been so much fun and it's really great to have to think back about some of those things. So I thank you for the questions and for the opportunity to chat.

 | 38:11 | I would just say if anybody would like to ask or think about coming over to Europe, I don't know, reach out or try it. Just try it. I think it's worth it to give it a shot. It's been so, so great for me. So hard in many ways, but also it's just so rewarding and I would do it again.

 | 38:37 | It's yeah, although I miss Canada so much because I think you're always torn when you do something like what you've done. Yeah, you're always going to have your soul in two places, I think. And you just have to recognize that and appreciate it. Appreciate it. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, thank you so much for chatting with me today. Thank you. Yeah, it's been a pleasure.
 
| 39:01 | And to our listeners and our viewers, thanks so much for joining Marcella and myself today to talk about these various complexities of life and making the big moves with career and education and so on. It's a tough journey for all of us, but boy, it sure is interesting and satisfying. So, so thanks for joining us, and please follow me on YouTube and watch there and listen wherever you get your podcasts. And until we meet again.