A chemist usually heads a team of chemists on a specific project or task. Depending on the setting, the lead chemist may perform administrative tasks along with her chemist duties.
A day in the life of a lead chemist involves performing research, preparing compounds, creating reports of findings, and presenting findings to other colleagues. She may also supervise the work of team members and assign tasks to them. If a lab technician is on the team, the chemist's lead may also oversee her activities.
In some settings, a lead chemist may also be responsible for procuring equipment and supervising its care.
To become a lead chemist, you'll need a degree in chemistry or relevant fields. Employers favor advanced degrees and years of experience when filling this role. Skills like problem-solving and critical thinking are also an advantage.
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a chemist lead. For example, did you know that they make an average of $45.39 an hour? That's $94,404 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 4% and produce 3,500 job opportunities across the U.S.
There are certain skills that many chemist leads have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed analytical skills, communication skills and math skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a chemist lead, we found that a lot of resumes listed 12.8% of chemist leads included instrument maintenance, while 11.9% of resumes included analytical methods, and 5.8% of resumes included chemistry. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
If you're interested in becoming a chemist lead, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 63.2% of chemist leads have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 20.2% of chemist leads have master's degrees. Even though most chemist leads have a college degree, it's impossible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a chemist lead. When we researched the most common majors for a chemist lead, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on chemist lead resumes include doctoral degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a chemist lead. In fact, many chemist lead jobs require experience in a role such as chemist. Meanwhile, many chemist leads also have previous career experience in roles such as laboratory technician or analytical chemist.