Jeremiah McDougal is a research development strategist on the UF Health Cancer Institute’s Research Development team, which provides skilled support for researchers in all aspects of research project and publication development.
Q: What is your hometown?
A: Trenton, Florida.
Q: Describe your educational and professional background.
A: My family’s real estate business has been serving Florida for upward of 50 years, so real estate had always been a natural career path for me. However, upon graduating high school in 2006, due to the rapidly changing economy, the real estate market was in a very challenging place, so I pivoted into the trades field. I feel that most often I recall acquired knowledge and skills based on relationships and professional positions that I’ve held over the years, including a variety of trades that were mostly centered around people and driven by customer service.
Q: How did you get into your current career path and how many years have you been in the role?
A: I joined UF in 2015 working for TAPS as a parking patroller and eventually a Campus Cab driver, with very little knowledge of working in higher education. I quickly learned about UF’s campus and started building a broad network. Over the past 11 years, I have worked mostly in administrative support roles at UF, for the Division of Acute Care Surgery, the Controller’s Administration and the UF Research – Strategic Research Development team.
Throughout my journey at UF, I have found myself in many interesting rooms with many interesting groups of people, especially through supporting roles to the CFO and the VP for UF Research’s offices. While working with UF Research, I provided administrative support to the Council for Research Associate Deans, which gave me a unique perspective on research operations and challenges across all UF colleges. Eventually, I started a new career path when I joined the UF Health Cancer Institute’s Research Development team as a research administrator in January 2024. I’m now a research development strategist. Looking back, the most difficult and challenging jobs often present the greatest opportunity for a positive impact on us and those who challenge us.  Â
Q: What is a typical day like in your job?
A: In my job there are rarely days that I would consider typical. My day can vary from sifting through funding opportunities, designing graphics and digital manuscripts for publication or grant submissions, building webpages, editing narratives, coordinating mock study and pilot funding reviews, creating presentations, building automations, incorporating AI language models, meeting with investigators, and reviewing translational discoveries, to moderating the occasional meeting or helping students hang their posters and providing AV support for UF Health Cancer Institute functions. Typically, wherever I am needed, there I will be. However, every day starts with a cup of coffee.
Q: What is the most rewarding part of working for the UF Health Cancer Institute?
A: There are many rewarding aspects of working for the UF Health Cancer Institute, including the tremendous support from leadership, collaborating as a team to identify problems and addressing them with original solutions, and seeing our efforts resulting in publications and awards. However, the most rewarding part is seeing how our accomplishments could go on to support our faculty, research programs, units and ultimately our Cancer Institute for future success and impact to our community.
Q: How do you keep your skills current and continue to learn and grow?
A: The Research Development team addresses new challenges every day. Sometimes, I feel that I need to be everywhere and know everything to hone my skills and do my job most efficiently. While many of our faculty have likely become accustomed to seeing me drop in at most UF Health Cancer Institute research program, working group and institute functions, a past leader once asked my team to set aside time, even 10 minutes a day, for creative thinking. While building on a lot of my skills depends on staying current on research activities and putting my head down to do the work, I stand by the benefit of taking time for a creative approach.
Q: Describe how you would spend your ideal day off from work.
A: When I am not in the office, I typically want to be outdoors. I like to spend my free time fishing, working with my hands, going to the beach, getting in the occasional round of golf or volunteering. My ideal day usually involves spending time with my wife and goofing off with our two little ones at home on our small farm in Trenton.
Q: How has Research Development evolved since you joined the team, and where do you see it heading in the future?
A: In the two-plus years that I’ve been a part of the Research Development team, I feel that our directive has become more definitive. We have expanded the services we offer to UF Health Cancer Institute members and gauged our approach by real outcomes. One of the biggest challenges tends to be making our members aware of the services we offer. While there are many internal-facing components to our team in support of the UF Health Cancer Institute, I feel that we are continuing to head toward a very customer service-focused approach to supporting our institute and members in all aspects of research and individual project development. We’re always looking for new ways to support the current and future needs of our investigators.
