Senior Medical Writer at Costello Medical in Manchester, England, GB

Role Summary

• Responsibilities: You will lead diverse Medical Communications projects within a skilled project team to deliver high-quality work to clients. Responsibilities include reviewing junior colleagues’ work for accuracy, and quality, as well as planning and overseeing projects
• Salary: £50,000 to £55,000 per annum, depending on your previous experience
• Benefits: Discretionary profit share bonuses paid twice per year, hybrid and flexible working options, generous holiday allowance, private medical insurance, critical illness cover, income protection, full funding for external training, and more
• Role Type: Full-time, permanent
• Start Date: This role will ideally commence in January or February 2027, and you will be asked to state your availability on your application form
• Application Deadlines: Whilst there are no set application deadlines, we strongly recommend applying as early as possible. The role will close when a suitable candidate is found
• Location: This role is available in our Cambridge, London, Manchester, and Bristol offices. Although we will consider applicants across all four office locations, we strongly encourage candidates to consider Cambridge, which is home to our global headquarters

About the Role

Do you have experience delivering publications or medical affairs projects? Do you enjoy building long-term client relationships? Costello Medical is expanding its Medical Communications team in response to growing demand from both new and existing clients, and we are therefore looking for a Senior Medical Writer who enjoys high-quality content delivery alongside project and client management.

Senior Medical Writers play a leading role across projects, working closely with their teams to ensure client deliverables are produced to an exceptionally high standard and within agreed timelines. This involves providing strategic input at project initiation, overseeing project delivery, and maintaining regular communication with clients throughout. Senior Medical Writers also play a central role in quality control, reviewing colleagues’ work and providing clear, constructive feedback to support team development.

Our Medical Communications sub-teams collaborate closely, giving you the opportunity to work across one or both of the following project types:

• Publications:Including strategic publication planning, poster design, manuscript development, abstract production, and more
• Medical Affairs:Including advisory boards, congress support, the development of medical information and educational materials for various events, and more

You will contribute to business development by building and sustaining strong client relationships and identifying opportunities to extend or enhance our services within existing projects. As you progress in the role, you may also take on greater responsibility for client management, including budgeting and project finances, as well as line management of interns within your team.

Hybrid Working Policy: We believe that having face-to-face time in the office holds many benefits and is central to ensuring that the community we have created, where people have a workplace they belong to and feel part of, is never lost. At the same time, we recognise that homeworking can improve work life balance, reduce commuting times and costs, and provide the opportunity to juggle personal commitments.

Therefore, we offer flexible working arrangements that allow our colleagues who have passed probation to work from home up to half their time, measured across a 2-week rolling period. In the Senior Medical Writer role, you will be able to work from home 2 days per week during the probationary period (normally the first 6 months of the role).

A Day in the Life of a Senior Medical Writer

Learn more about a typical day in the life of a Senior Medical Writer at Costello Medical: https://www.costellomedical.com/careers/working-at-costello-medical/

Career Development

Senior Medical Writers can progress into Manager‑level roles, such as Consultant or Publication Manager, with fast progression available for high performers. In these roles, you would take full ownership of client management, including budgeting and business development, as well as project delivery. You would also line manage team members and contribute to internal initiatives across areas such as recruitment and training.

To learn more about the tailored career progression we offer at Costello Medical, our colleagues share their experiences of growing with the company. Please click here to read more: https://www.costellomedical.com/careers/working-at-costello-medical/profiles/

About Costello Medical

Costello Medical is a rapidly growing global healthcare agency specialising in medical communications, market access, and health economic and outcomes research. We work with a wide range of clients, including the industry’s most successful pharmaceutical and medical technology companies, patient and public health bodies, and charitable organisations. We have been listed in the Top 100 Best Companies to Work For list since 2017 and were proud to receive B Corporation accreditation in 2022. Learn more about us, our work, and our mission on our website: https://www.costellomedical.com/

About You

We are looking for collaborative, self‑motivated and enthusiastic individuals, with typically at least two years’ professional experience within an agency setting. Specifically, successful candidates will have experience in the following areas:

• Delivery of medical communications projects – either publications, medical affairs, or both
• Communicating directly with clients, including responding to different communication styles
• Day-to-day leadership of project teams, including delegating tasks and managing the time of others

Further essential requirements for the role are:

• A degree-level qualification in a scientific discipline (minimum 2.1). We welcome applications from candidates with a diverse range of specialisms, including but not limited to; biology, chemistry, pharmacy and medicine
• Exceptional attention to detail and high degree of written accuracy
• Excellent proficiency in written English and arithmetic
• Strong scientific writing skills with the ability to tailor writing style to different audiences
• Project management skills sufficient to enable timely project delivery
• Excellent data presentation skills, including the ability to use Excel, PowerPoint and Word effectively and efficiently, to produce a professional, high standard of work
• Sufficient technical and strategic knowledge to provide clients with recommendations on project content and approach
• The capacity to maintain exceptional customer service and quality of deliverables under multiple competing demands
• The proven ability to build robust and sustainable client relationships
• The ability to motivate colleagues and take a leading role in the delivery of project components

What We Offer

Alongside our award-winning company culture, where every team member is celebrated, respected, and has their voice heard, we are proud to offer a comprehensive benefits package that includes:

• A starting salary of £50,000 to £55,000 per annum, plus profit share bonuses paid twice per year. Please note that we have established salary bands to ensure a fair and consistent approach for all applicants, eliminating the need for individual negotiations
• 4% employer pension contributions
• 25 days’ annual leave, plus bank and public holidays
• Flexible working hours, with the flexibility to start as late as 10am, finish as early as 4:30pm and take up a break of up to 90 minutes
• The opportunity to work from home for up to 50% of your working time after passing probation
• An annual flexible benefits allowance of £1,000, which can be taken as cash, an additional pension contribution or used towards other benefits
• A holiday buy and sell scheme, allowing you to buy or sell up to 4 additional days each year
• A fully paid 4-week sabbatical after every five years of continuous service, which can be taken in one block, 2 x 2 week chunks or exchanged for a holiday top‑up
• Private Medical Insurance with comprehensive inpatient and outpatient cover on a medical history disregard basis
• A health cash plan covering everyday healthcare costs such as dental check‑ups, optical care, physiotherapy and more
• Paid study leave and funding for external qualifications
• Critical Illness Cover, Income Protection and Life Assurance, including 2x salary death‑in‑service cover
• Cycle‑to‑work, season ticket travel loan and electric vehicle salary sacrifice schemes
• Global travel insurance for leisure use
• Two paid volunteering days per year

Learn more about our full reward package and the other benefits of working for Costello Medical: https://www.costellomedical.com/careers/benefits-package-in-the-uk/

The Application Process

You are required to submit your CV and a cover letter via our online application form. In your cover letter, you must explain why you think you would be suited to the role and why you would like to join Costello Medical, with examples to support both. Your CV should clearly state the dates of all qualifications and grades achieved where applicable.

Then, our recruitment process includes a telephone interview with a member of the Talent Acquisition team, followed by an assessment for you to complete in your own time. If successful, you will be invited to an interview which will include a short presentation that you can prepare for in advance. Our standard recruitment process lasts around 4 weeks, however, this can be adapted if necessary.

As an equal opportunity employer, we are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive workforce and, throughout the recruitment process, there are a number of reasonable adjustments we can provide: https://www.costellomedical.com/reasonable-adjustments/

Please note that, whilst we embrace AI to innovate and improve processes, your role may involve working with confidential data that cannot be uploaded to AI. Therefore, it is important for us to assess your own skills and abilities, so we recommend that you do not rely solely on this technology to generate any application materials.

Visa Sponsorship

We can provide visa sponsorship for eligible candidates for our Senior Medical Writer role. You will be asked to provide details of your right to work in the UK within your application, however this will have no impact on the processing of your application.