Career series: Elisabeth Stewart Bradley, Bristol Myers Squibb

Tell us about the course of your career.

I studied English literature and psychology at The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, and was set on earning a PhD and becoming a professor. There were no attorneys in my family and having a legal career had never crossed my mind, but in the final semester of my senior year, I took a business law class, and was fascinated.

I decided to become a paralegal to learn more about the law, and after graduation, I worked as a corporate paralegal for a large US law firm in Virginia.

I then applied to law school, where I focused on litigation, and honed my writing and oral argument skills. After a few years practicing general litigation in New York City, I worked on a domain name cybersquatting case.

I found the issues very interesting, and knew then that I wanted to become an IP expert. I learned more about IP by working on some great mergers and acquisitions transactions, and ended up going in-house with Cadbury, which was later acquired and spun off into the company now known as Mondelēz.

After eight years there, I wanted to gain experience in the biopharmaceuticals industry, to add knowledge of a challenging regulatory environment to the experience I had gained relating to consumer products.  I have been with Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) since 2011, where I head the global trademark, copyright, and brand protection department.

Outline a typical day in your role.

A typical day involves a great amount of variety. A large part of my role involves online brand protection, ie, taking down unauthorised uses of our products on websites, social media, and e-commerce sites. We make a lot of strategic decisions on how to use our resources to the greatest effect.

I support our department on many branding projects. We have a highly skilled but lean team of attorneys, paralegals, and professionals, and we are involved in the selection of generic and clinical trial names, as well as product names.

We are a global company, and we receive emails from our colleagues worldwide who seek advice on an array of IP topics, assistance with agreements and related issues.