BLOOMINGTON — "Hundreds and hundreds of jobs" are available and waiting to be filled at a Bloomington facility.
“It’s been significant. The growth of the site has just been tremendous,” Kristy Fallon, HR Director at Catalent in Bloomington, said.
Catalent plays a pivotal role in the COVID-19 vaccine supply chain. Publicly, it has been announced it manufactures both Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines.
“We had to ramp up quickly to bring on staff and get them trained and ready so when the vaccines were ready to be produced, we had efficient and effective staff that could make these lifesaving medications along with many, many other products that I can’t speak about,” Fallon said.
Pre-pandemic the biologics facility, Fallon said, had around 1,000 employees, but today that number has grown to more than 2,800.
She said now there are more spots to be filled. "I have hundreds and hundreds of jobs open at this time," Fallon added.
Passion, commitment and attention to detail are some of the basic qualities Fallon said the company looks for in an employee. She added the company is hiring across a variety of jobs from the production line to the lab.
“It important for employees that join us to understand the mission and connect to the mission of serving our patients and taking care of our patients every single day,” Fallon said.
It is the same mission that brought Indiana native and IU grad Anne Leonard to the Bloomington facility in August 2020.
“I knew there were big and exciting things going to be happening at the Catalent site here in Bloomington and I wanted to be a part of it,” Leonard said.
Catalent Bloomington’s Director of Quality said, “it’s been an intense time,” but also extremely rewarding one.
“I think that the site feels this enormous responsibility to the country to the world and it’s so cool to be a part of that.”
Safety she feels is a top priority every day at the Bloomington facility with mask usage, social distancing and the like.
“I’ve never worked on products that so many of the people I know personally are taking the products are coming out of the facility I’m working,” Leonard said.
Fallon said these jobs are career jobs and added the site also provides training.
“It is motivating and moving to come into the facility to know that somebody else with just as serious of a disease state may be treated with a medicine that’s coming out of our production lines,” Fallon said.
It is that passion and drive to help that translates out of the office too.
“My parents signed up for their vaccine in Florida they received Moderna and it brought tears to my eyes to know that my team, my employees in Bloomington, made that medication that potentially saved my family, but at minimum gave me the chance to hug my mom and dad again,” Fallon said. She continued, “And I’m thankful to my team locally in Bloomington and the Moderna team for what they did for my family every day.”
DeMentri asked Fallon: “When does this ongoing demand end? Does it end?” Fallon responded: “I don’t know if it’s going to end any time soon. We hear from our clients that our people make the facility.”
To learn more about Catalent and find open positions, click here.
