Organic Chemist

What Does a Professional in this Career Do?

An Organic Chemist studies carbon-based compounds and chemicals in living organisms. May work to develop new products or chemical processes in medicine or in pharmaceutical, biotechnical, chemical, consumer product or petroleum industries.

Job Outlook

There were 28 Organic Chemist job postings in North Carolina in the past year and 1018 in the United States.

In combination with other careers in the Chemist industry, which includes the Organic Chemist career, the following graph shows the number of people employed for each year since 2015:

Salary

Many new Organic Chemist jobs have salaries estimated to be in the following ranges, based on the requirements and responsibilities listed in job postings from the past year.

National

The average estimated salary in the United States for this career, based on job postings in the past year, is $94,542.

State

The average estimated salary in North Carolina for this career, based on job postings in the past year, is $94,542.

Percentiles represent the percentage that is lower than the value. For example, 25% of estimated salaries for Organic Chemist postings in the United States in the past year were lower than $76,220.

Education and Experience

Posted Organic Chemist jobs typically require the following level of education. The numbers below are based on job postings in the United States from the past year. Not all job postings list education requirements.

Education Level	Percentage
Associate's Degree	2.36%
Bachelor's Degree	39.19%
Master's Degree	38.41%
Doctoral Degree	64.15%
Other	0.79%

Posted Organic Chemist jobs typically require the following number of years of experience. The numbers below are based on job postings in the United States from the past year. Not all job postings list experience requirements.

Years of Experience	Percentage
0 to 2 years	39.32%
3 to 5 years	38.35%
6 to 8 years	8.98%
9+ years	13.35%

Skills

Below are listings of the most common general and specialized skills Organic Chemist positions expect applicants to have as well as the most common skills that distinguish individuals from their peers. The percentage of job postings that specifically mention each skill is also listed.

Baseline Skills

A skill that is required across a broad range of occupations, including this one.

Research (52.36%)
Communication (26.92%)
Teaching (22.5%)
Innovation (19.35%)
Problem Solving (16.99%)
Writing (16.99%)
Presentations (13.65%)
Detail Oriented (12.48%)
Verbal Communication Skills (11.69%)
Troubleshooting (Problem Solving) (11.1%)

Defining Skills

A core skill for this occupation, it occurs frequently in job postings.

Chemistry (79.57%)
Organic Synthesis (29.98%)
Biochemistry (21.24%)
Catalysis (10.37%)
Organic Chemistry (82.22%)
Organometallic Chemistry (6.81%)

Necessary Skills

A skill that is requested frequently in this occupation but isn’t specific to it.

Liquid Chromatography Mass Spectrometry (12.8%)
Laboratory Experience (12.7%)
Application Programming Interface (API) (4.98%)
Medicinal Chemistry (14.02%)
Analytical Chemistry (10.16%)
Analytical Techniques (19.92%)
New Product Development (8.03%)
Process Chemistry (3.05%)
Chemical Process (7.62%)
High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (25.91%)
Drug Discovery (8.13%)
Scale (Map) (3.96%)
Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (38.21%)
Chemical Synthesis (14.94%)
Spectroscopy (7.42%)
Pharmaceuticals (11.48%)
Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (5.69%)
Data Analysis (9.96%)
Biology (15.04%)
Small Molecules (14.02%)
Process Development (8.33%)
Biotechnology (3.25%)
Organic Compounds (11.38%)
Chromatography (10.67%)
Mass Spectrometry (11.69%)
Research And Development (3.35%)
Lab Notebooks (6.71%)
Chemical Reactions (3.25%)

Distinguishing Skills

A skill that may distinguish a subset of the occupation.

ChemDraw (5.39%)
Physical Organic Chemistry (5.49%)
Biocatalysis (3.86%)
Flow Chemistry (3.25%)

Salary Boosting Skills

A professional who wishes to excel in this career path may consider developing the following highly valued skills. The percentage of job postings that specifically mention each skill is listed.

Biochemistry (40.43%)
Catalysis (19.73%)
Organic Synthesis (57.06%)

Alternative Job Titles

Sometimes employers post jobs with Organic Chemist skills but a different job title. Some common alternative job titles include:

Synthetic Organic Chemist
Chemist
Assistant Professor of Chemistry
Inorganic Chemist
Chemistry Scientist
Synthetic Chemist
Postdoctoral Fellow
Associate Professor of Chemistry
Principal Scientist

Similar Occupations

If you are interested in exploring occupations with similar skills, you may want to research the following job titles. Note that we only list occupations that have at least one corresponding NC State Online and Distance Education program.

Common Employers

Here are the employers that have posted the most Organic Chemist jobs in the past year along with how many they have posted.

United States

AbbVie (53)
Actalent (35)
Grand Canyon University (27)
Los Alamos National Laboratory (14)
Kelly Services (14)
Bristol-Myers Squibb (11)
Indiana University (10)
Neurocrine Biosciences (10)
Workforce (8)
Thermo Fisher Scientific (8)

North Carolina

North Carolina Central University (5)
GPAC (3)
Henkel (3)
AbbVie (2)
Zymeron Corporation (2)
Orion System (2)
Adecco (1)
Research Triangle Institute (1)
University of North Carolina (1)
Brothers Research Corp (1)

NC State Programs Relevant to this Career

If you are interested in preparing for a career in this field, the following NC State Online and Distance Education programs offer a great place to start!

Textile Chemistry Master's Degrees

All wages, job posting statistics, employment trend projections, and information about skill desirability on this page represents historical data and does not guarantee future conditions. Data is provided by and downloaded regularly from Lightcast. For more information about how Lightcast gathers data and what it represents, see Lightcast Data: Basic Overview on Lightcast's Knowledge Base website.

Science and Research