My advice, now in the pharmacy biz for 37+ years. Started out with Home Infusion, quickly moved up to pharmacy manager, regional Director of Pharmacy Operations (in my late 20's). A great deal of responsibility, staffing, P & L budgeting, endless meetings. Always in conflict with Nursing and DME/Resp. Directors. Funny/sad how I was the only "director" who had to staff in his department. The others would only sit behind a desk. I had staff pharmacist who made more than me with OT, and on-call pay! Highly recommend management, until I don't! Agreed with corporate to step down and just staff. That didn't last long, the new director was real paranoid of my hanging around.
PIC and pharmacy manager at an Oncology Infusion Center. 5am-1pm, Monday-Friday, no weekends or holidays. Worked for a large Oncology Practice. Managed my patients at home and at the hospital. A great deal of autonomy and job satisfaction with the ability to direct patient care and have the doctors back me up with orders and therapy goals. The best job I have ever had, and I have had 9. You still have to deal with nursing, always seem to be on opposing sides.
To summarize:
Financially, never enough of a bump from staffing, to be worthwhile.
Middle management; you get squeezed from the top down, and from the bottom up.
As a career Pharmacist, you are expected to move up, into management at some point.
Your primary goals are conflict resolution, endless meetings, and accreditation readiness. Oh yes, patient care, down at the very bottom.
A whole lot of uncompensated stress and OT.
Very little actual power to affect any change.
Ongoing responsibility, beyond "office hours". Anytime, nights, weekends, even if infusion center is open M-F.
Let me guess, the "Rehab. Hospital" is Encompass Rehab Hospital, with 140 locations? I work there, Part-time. I always tell my pharmacy manager, and the staff pharmacist (both from Walmart), it's so cute that you call yourself a "Hospital". I am their only resource for clinical hospital information. That is a sweet management job, if you get it.
Bottom line: After a few management stints, I have stayed in my lane as a "staff pharmacist" for the past 20 years. Managed to make a very good income, working OT, and second jobs. Thinking, one should be able to do that until retirement, if one works hard and does a good job.
WRONG, you actually age out of "staffing". I was "let go" of my last hospital job, because I was old, making too much money (after 7 years of great performance reviews. Two older pharmacists were pushed out before me. I did Covid/travel Pharmacist for a couple of years. I was actively looking for a hospital staff job for those two years. It was exceedingly difficult, even with a five page resume, and 35 years experience.
I was competing with new grads, willing to take half of my hourly pay. Very lucky to land a staffing job with a major hospital system, willing to pay for my experience.
