The challenges of cosmetic chemists around the world

This is a guest editorial post by Rajat Narang

Cosmetic Chemist!!! A cosmetic chemist is an individual who specializes in a Degree with
majors in Cosmetic Science with subjects like Cosmetic Research, Cosmetic Technology,
Cosmetic Formulation Development, Herbal Cosmetics, Skincare, Hair care, Color Cosmetics,
Perfumery, Immunology & Toxicology, Product Development, Cosmetic Engineering,
Cosmetic Regulatory, Cosmetic raw materials and their processing, Cosmetic Quality Assurance
Techniques and so on…

If you see all the major cosmetic producing companies in the market including P&G, L’Oreal
Inc, Avon Inc, Coty Inc, Avon Inc, Johnson & Johnson group of companies and many more…the
people who are working on the bench to develop cosmetics products are not Cosmetics
Chemists, rather most of them are Chemical engineers, chemistry graduates or some other degree
individuals. If an accounts job is given to Accounting professional only, a Finance job to finance
guy only, medical job to a doctor only, then why not Cosmetics technical job to a cosmetic
chemist only??

Immigration of cosmetic chemists

This incident happened with this guy few days back, he is Masters and Bachelors degree in
Cosmetic Science with hard earned experience of few years within Cosmetic field. He has been
constantly checking many jobs for his career advancement in his specialized cosmetic field in
other countries. These jobs have been displayed for more than 2 months, sometimes even 3 to 4
months, this guy is absolutely suitable to the job, the recruiter between is saying that you qualify
for the job, but the Immigration Visa issues and country borders are so huge that finally he is
rejected on the basis that his immigration visa for work would be too complicated or maybe next
to impossible to do by any employer.

If you see the general trend today on job searching and networking global websites like
Careerbuilder, Simply Hired, Indeed , Monster, LinkedIn and few others too, they have plenty of
jobs open for cosmetic chemists or cosmetic formulators or cosmetics new product development
for couple of months already or time period even more, but they don’t have right people to fill
them. Finally, the outcome is, they hire Chemical engineers, pharmaceutics guys, chemistry
based or other individuals with experience within cosmetic field. These are those individuals
who understand the basic of Cosmetics, but they are not the individuals who have put 4-8 years
of their life just studying Cosmetic Science to get one good job within cosmetic field. Most of
these individuals employed today on cosmetic chemist job are individuals with related science
background who could get jobs in other industrial sectors too.

The pity is that the jobs are available, there is shortage of cosmetic individuals in all the
countries throughout globe, but still Cosmetic Chemists cannot get these well deserved jobs due
to Immigration, Visa or documents issues while getting hired in some other country.

Today FDA, COLIPA and all other Administrative and Regulatory bodies throughout the
globe are in the phase of revolution. They are putting certain restrictions on chemical ingredients
like Formaldehyde, Dibutyl Phthalate, Parabens, Pthalic anhydride and many others, but they are
not letting Companies do quick documents for Cosmetic Chemists, who, the chemists are the real people who can replace and analyse cosmetics products better.

Cosmetic chemists

A Cosmetic Chemist has studied only Cosmetics to the core, of course he will be a better
formulator once given a chance within Cosmetics field, but if you hire individual from a related
field, he will learn first and then he’ll apply. In layman’s language, for instance, there are 2
doctors, one specializes in bones and other is general physician. Now think, if this general
physician is made to do all the work of the bones specialist, he may be successful, but for that
he’ll have to learn, understand and then work on the success. If in case, the bone specialist would
have been called, he would have fixed the issue in half the time or maybe less as he specializes
only in bones.

Hiring cosmetic chemist specialists

My point above is that Cosmetics Chemists who have studied Cosmetic Science are very
limited in number all over the world. They have put years of study and experience just for
Cosmetic Science. Seeing this current revolutionary phase of advancement in Cosmetic Science,
all the Country Administrations and Homeland Security Offices should understand the need
of Cosmetic Chemists in the Cosmetics Industry and their shortage through out the world. The
Visa procedures should be relaxed for the Cosmetic Chemists and it should be made easy for
companies to hire them.

I guess there is a rule of the Administrative Bodies and Homeland security offices of the
countries that a company can hire foreign workers only in case you show that there are no local
workers available. For this, the companies have to put certain ads on recruitment websites for
20-30 days. If nobody is selected then they can hire foreign individual, but how??? Until the time
the administrative bodies won’t make the procedures simple after this time period, how will
a company hire somebody from outside. Hence, for this happening, important is to curb the
Immigration law of the countries seeing the need of Cosmetic Chemists in Cosmetic Industries
today.