Policy Manager, MSD

College alumna Anne-Maree Englund grew up in Canberra and originally studied an Arts/Science degree at ANU. Her love of maths and science soon enticed her to switch to a Bachelor of Engineering a year later.  

Since graduating from ANU she has worked in Australia and overseas as an engineer in the health sector improving health outcomes for patients, and making clinicians’ lives easier. She’s currently the Policy Manager at pharmaceutical company MSD, (Merck Sharp & Dohme). Making the move from engineering to policy was an important transition for Anne-Maree, as she wanted to learn more about bringing innovative health technologies to market.

“When I graduated I was lucky enough to secure a job at Cochlear Limited in Sydney and I stayed with the company for 13 years. It was great fun working as a Production Engineer helping to ensure that the manufacturing of the complicated but tiny Cochlear implants ran smoothly.

“After working as a Production Engineer I moved into a quality management role and spent a lot of time travelling in Europe and the US visiting Cochlear’s suppliers.

“I also worked at the Swiss and Belgian offices for four years. I’ll never forget my first week in Switzerland when I had to visit a battery manufacturer, which involved catching a little red cog railway up into the Swiss Alps.

“When I left Cochlear I worked as a General Manager of Operations at SmartWard, a brilliant health IT start-up in Canberra. SmartWard has developed an innovative IT system for use in clinical settings, and it was a real career highlight to manage a clinical trial of this system in a hospital.”

Anne-Maree said the support she received at ANU and the resources available to her as a student were invaluable.

“The Engineering degree was very new at the time, and we had a lot of young, enthusiastic lecturers. There was a real sense that we were all working together to create a really great degree.

“The Women in Engineering group was fantastic and I derived a lot of moral support from being involved with the group.

“Something I really enjoyed about being at ANU was access to knowledge and experiences outside of my own degree. I was a regular at Chifley Library, and took part in lunch time recitals at the School of Music,” she said.  

Anne-Maree says that studying systems engineering gave her a diverse skillset and experience that she has applied across many facets of her career.

“A systems engineering degree was perfect for me and it’s very relevant for students now. It gave me skills in all disciplines which made it easy for me to transition into project manager roles when I graduated.

“When I worked at Cochlear I was conducting supplier audits and visiting companies that were doing software development and manufacturing metal parts. I wasn’t just a Mechanical Engineer and the broad range of skills and knowledge I acquired during my studies helped me work across many areas within the company.”

“I’ve always been very proud to have a degree from ANU.”

She has also completed a Master of Public Policy at the Brussels School of International Studies.

Anne-Maree has been involved with Women in Engineering since she studied at ANU and is passionate about mentoring and being involved with industry groups in the future.

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