2011 pharma leaders
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M
eet 2011s Emerging Pharma
LeadersCan these 30 trend-
setters build competitive scale
from scarcity?Pharm Execs 2011 roster of Emerg-
ing Leadersour fourth to dateis not
only a way to recognize a few individu-
als whove made a difference in their or-
ganizations. It also serves as a barometer
to track larger changes in the workplace:
how work is done; who does it; where,
and with what range of skills; and for
what outcome or objective. In acknowl-
edgment of our own 30th anniversary
as a publication, and with the support of
Pharm Execs Editorial Advisory Board
(EAB) and an aggressive Web-based rec-
ommendation process, weve selected
30 executives drawn from a range of
mission-critical functions, varied geog-
raphies, and diverse gender and cultural
characteristics. Such backgrounds were
unimaginable in the executive ranks
of the industry just a few years ago, a
fact that suggests Big Pharma today is
at least more reective of the broader
sociopolitical environment that has al-ways been crucial to its success.
The 30 proles written and com-
piled by our editorial team is reference
in itself to the trends and values that
will shape strategy in biopharmaceu-
ticals for the remainder of the decade.
That, in turn, will help determine the
ground rules for individual career
progress. Weve distilled some of the
more interesting insights as follows:
The real meaning of lean. As compa-
nies scale backthis years leaders are
aware that the pace of layoffs in Big
Pharma is exceeded only by the govern-
ment sectorthe response is not just to
do more with less. All agree that the
change is strategic, not temporary, and re-
lates squarely to the higher long-term risk
prole of the business. The optimal re-
sponse to the lean agenda is to contribute
to strengthening the efciency of business
practice and processes; sometimes this re-quires more resources, not less. Making
trust, engagement, and loyalty programs
really convincing to employees is another
necessary leadership attribute of a lean
organization, where the impact of a loss
of any productive worker is magnied.This is where overall corporate reputa-
tion can make a bottom-line difference.
Information is now borderless, posing
a signicant management challenge to
stronger employee engagement. Rapid
improvements in IT are forcing leaders to
be more transparent, but this requires in
turn a commitment to make information
veriable to employees and team mem-
bers. Tomorrows business leaders must
be able to certify and validate reams of
unsubstantiated information, and for this
role the prerequisite is to be seen as some-
one who is trusted.
The key emotional chord in todays
pharma workplace is to convey a sense
of urgency. Time and space for action
are compressing due to the impact of im-
provements in technology, accessibility of
information, the globalization of competi-
tion, and a changing demographic of themarket base. Complacency is a trait as-
sociated with older forms of organization
linked to hierarchical decision-making
and a command-and-control leadership
style, when the prudent response for
anyone with leadership aspirations was
to defer and deliberate. That old strategy
remains an optionold habits die hard,
particularly the bigger the organization
isbut fewer of those raised in the Inter-
net age of instant access to information
laced with opinion are likely to embrace it.
The talent pipeline is spouting in a dif-
ferent direction. Under previous gen-
erations, drug research and other good
ideas germinated in mature markets,
preferably the home ofce, with produc-
tion and secondary services devolved to
low-income countries. Looking forward,
that pattern may well be reversed, which
requires the ability to initiate, analyze,
and execute around a global approachthat can accommodate diverse cultures
and perspectives on doing business. Do
any of us realize that some Asian lan-
guages are lacking a denitive equivalent
to the simple word no?
The real driver of human resources is
the power of the personal connection.
The tendency in Big Pharma has been
to do precisely the opposite, turning the
HR function into an information pro-
cessing service that takes place mainly
online. Many of our 30 leaders urged
that management restore what is hu-
man about human resources, through
a renewed emphasis on counseling and
support for soft skills such as leader-
ship training, talent development, and
mentoring. One executive even noted
that his best source of ideas and talent
now comes from his own family, rather
than the work peer group. Companies
will have to foster new approaches to
ensure these connections are incentiv-
ized to foster creativity within the ranks.
Its preferable to all this collectiveand
capturableenergy being diverted to
networked outside communities, whose
numbers are multiplying and threatento make Big Pharma appear isolated,
lumbering, and irrelevantand certain-
ly not the place to take your new ideas.
The best innovations are often a conse-
quence of a workplace failure. A repeat-
ed theme in the interviews is that good
organizations impose no sanctions on
failure. Making mistakes is part of the
job, and what counts is a willingness
to reach beyond a presumed outcome
to try something new. Management willneed that approach to navigate through
changes that are becoming harder to ac-
count for in advance.
One thing has not changed: There are
few future leaders who cant citepassion
as a factor that got them to where they
are today. The lucrative pay in pharma is
one thing, but if you are not red up by
the potential that working in this space
has in improving the state of health for
millions of patients, then perhaps a careerin accounting is more appropriate.
William Looney, Editor-in-Chief
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Doug DrysdaleCEO, Alvogen
Doug Drysdale knew from a young agethat hed end up in pharma. When
I rst left high school I worked in
a hospital lab. Then I went to university, he
says. Coming out of there, it was hard to see
sometimes how you would commercialize a
life sciences degree and how you could actu-
ally make a career out of itwhats interest-
ing academically is sometimes difcult to turn
into a career. But the pharma industry immedi-
ately struck me as a way to do that.
Drysdale moved up the ranks at small startups but also
places such as Forest Laboratories and DuPont Merck before
eventually becoming CEO at Alvogen. Drysdale recognizes that
industry has changed and downsized since he began his career,
with companies commonly doing more with less. Thats inter-
esting because in some ways I think my career has followed that
kind of path, he says. I started out in Big Pharma and ended
up moving into more entrepreneurial roles and into generics.
Part of that has followed the lifecycle of the pharmaceutical in-
dustry. When I rst started out, pharma had so much money to
spend on R&D. Now times are denitely leaner and every com-
pany is searching for ways to get more out of the R&D pipeline
while spending less.The best way to handle this new environment, says Drysdale,
is to focus specically on areas with the most potential value,
then make swift decisions. In the US generics space, Drysdale
says, Only generics that are more complex, more high-tech, and
have fewer competitors have the real value.
Outside the US, he says, the value lies in tar-
geting emerging markets.
Once Drysdale and his team knowwhat to focus on, the next step is to ap-
proach innovation from what he calls
a 10-80-10 philosophy. We spend 10
percent of our time planning, 80 percent
of our time executing, and 10 percent of
our time reecting on what we could have
done differently, he says, whereas a lot of
companies spend 80 percent of their time
planning and 20 percent executing. They
are thinking too much and too hard about
what needs to be done; they get paralyzed by difcult situations.
The key to the 10-80-10 method is to foster the kind of
environment where employees feel condent making swift de-
cisions and taking risks. By taking a different approach and
making sure that employees feel there are no repercussions for
making mistakes, I think people are far more motivated and far
more likely to bring their ideas forward, says Drysdale.
But the creativity to come up with a great idea and having em-
ployees with the power to execute it are not the only key factors,
says Drysdale. Lets be up front: If Ive thought of something or
my colleagues have thought of something, the chances are that
two or three of my competitors have thought of it also, he says.
I dont think we can claim to have a monopoly on good ideas.But we can execute those ideas much faster than our competitors.
Having a good idea is not good enough. Its taking a good idea
and turning it into an action that moves you forwardand that
comes from speed and decisiveness.
Kimberly SablichVice President, Vaccines,Commercial
Strategy, GlaxoSmithKline
Kimberly Sablich, vice president
for vaccines commercial strategy
at GlaxoSmithKline, ascended
quickly in her pharma career, and she
credits it to growing up in a household
with a single working mother. With my
mother as a role model, I never questioned
whether I was going to have a career and
I was always sure I wanted to be in the
business world, like Mom, says Sablich.
As a witness to the great healthcare
debate of the Clinton era, Sablich wasdrawn into healthcare and ultimately
pharmaceutical marketing. Today, she
continues to dene herself as a market-
ing strategist who is now able to apply
her passion for marketing strategy to
a broader set of products and coach a
larger team in this area.
Since she began her
career in 1995, Sablich
admits that more has
changed in pharma than
has remained constant.
However, she would ad-
vocate that the basics of
solid marketing strategy
still hold. Now more
than ever, it is criticalto develop solid insights
about our market dy-
namics, customer needs, and competi-
tors, and to prioritize customer segments,
and develop an offering that meets or
exceeds customer expectations, says
Sablich, who believes that to prevail and
succeed in a new era
of competitive scarcity,
one must remember
that strategy develop-
ment also requires an
equal complement of
strong execution, exem-
plied by the removal
of barriers to efcient
decision-makingoneof which is having fewer
layers of management.
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Denny KraichelyAssociate Director, CMC Team Leader,
Portfolio Management & Technical
Integration, Johnson & Johnson
What appeals to me most
about the pharmaceuti-
cal industry is our focus
on the development of new medicines
to improve patients lives, says Den-
ny Kraichely, Johnson & Johnsons
associate director and CMC team
leader in portfolio management and
technical integration. It inspires me
that I am a part of a pharmaceutical
industry with so many examples ofchanging life-threatening diseases to
manageable chronic conditions.
At J&J, Kraichely is tasked with
leading multiple CMC teams spanning
from pre-new molecular entity (NME)
declaration through post-approval.
He serves as single point-of-contact
for all aspects of chemistry, manufac-
turing, and controls for several com-
pound development teams and sup-
ports the objectives of his companys
strategy to engage in multiple thera-
peutic areas. When he isnt reviewing
manuscripts for scientic journals and
trade publications, Kraichely is help-
ing to develop programs from scien-
tic conferences. I strongly feel that
sharing knowledge is a key enabler
that will allow our industry to con-
tinue to bring life-changing medicines
to the patients we serve.
Another guiding principle forKraichely is that a lean organization
depends heavily on communication,
pushing boundaries, and challeng-
ing the status quo while maintain-
ing a strong sense of condence and
self-awareness. The pharmaceutical
industry is perfectly positioned and
equipped with unprecedented tech-
nical knowledge to meet the needs
of patients around the world, adds
Kraichely. As an industry, we need
to continue to play an active role to
ensure that payer reimbursement chal-
lenges do not prevent patient access to
our life-changing medicines. Fighting
that battle internally to ensure good
science prevails is just as important as
dealing with outside vendors.
Leigh-Ann DurantAssociate General Counsel, Clinical Trials and Medical
Affairs, EMD Serono
Many of this years Emerging Pharma Leaders start-
ed out as physicians, sales reps, or pharmacists.
Leigh-Ann Durant took a different pathshe be-
came a lawyer. Durant debated between medical school and
law school for a while, and law school won. After becom-
ing involved in international law and relations during a year
abroad in Finland, and after clerking for the Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, Durant says pharma
crept into her career. I was hired by a major law rm that
had a number of pharmaceutical clients, she recalls. It was
really the perfect opportunity for me to marry my interest in
law with my interest in medicine and science. And so I was a
trial attorney doing pharmaceutical work, with a particular
focus on FDA and regulatory issues.
Now, Durant is at EMD Serono, where she serves as lead at-
torney for medical and clinical activities and is involved in legal
aspects of all the clinical trials the organization runs in the US.
And its excellent mentoring experiences, especially through
the Womens Bar Association (WBA), that have brought her
here, she says. For me, mentoring has been incredibly helpful,
in terms of not only providing me professional advice but alsobusiness and personal growth advice. I really had the benet
of having a generation of women lawyers above me who were
willing to reach down,
pull up rising youngleaders, and help them.
Those mentoring rela-
tionships were some of
the key formative re-
lationships in my per-
sonal and professional
development.
Now, with a team
of lawyers, paralegals,
and support staff who
look to Durant every
day at EMD Serono,
shes focused on paying
it forward. I prom-
ised myself that when I
made it, when I became this successful woman lawyer, I would
turn around, reach down, and pull up the next generation of
women lawyers behind me, and help them in the same way
that the generation before me helped me, she says. I make
a conscious effort to create an inclusive work environment, to
tap into the strengths of my team members, and to focus on the
precise types of skills each of them needs in order to move for-
ward. The strengths might be different between and amongstthe team members, but were stronger collectively than we are
in our individual parts.
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Heather BreschPresident, Mylan
Twenty years ago Heather Bresch accepted a dataentry position at Mylan, a small generics and spe-
cialty pharmaceutical producer headquartered in
Canonsburg, Pa. Today, she is president of the company.
As an advocate for access to affordable healthcare
and generics utilization, Bresch admits that her profes-
sional life has inuenced the causes that she cares about.
Mylans mission is to
provide the globes 7
billion people access
to high-quality, afford-
able medicine. Howev-
er, there are many parts
of the world where
universal access is far
from a reality, for in-
stance in sub-Saharan
Africa, she says. This
is in large part what is
behind Mylans drive
to develop generic anti-
retroviral medicines to
treat HIV/AIDS.
Bresch remembersa time when generic
utilization in the US
was at only around
35 percent; today it has more than doubled to over
75 percentand is still growing. She emphasizes the
importance of generics and their vital role in keeping
costs down and ensuring access to life-saving medicines.
While many of the changes to our industry have been
positive, as a company and as an industry we still have
to ght every day to retain our position and ensure that
consumers have access to low-cost, high-quality ge-
neric pharmaceuticals, says Bresch. This ght extends
across regulatory, legislative, and operational fronts. A
key focus of these efforts is achieving a healthy balance
between competition and innovation.
In a nutshell, Bresch believes that common sense,
good judgment, and a strong work ethic are required
of the next generation of leaders. However, she notes
that communication and mentoring talent are also
key qualities: I have placed an increasingly higher
value on communication as our company has glo-
balized, she says. Identifying and mentoring talent
is also very important to me. At Mylan, we have aunique and unconventional culture that requires peo-
ple to think differently and challenge the status quo.
Jennifer LeedsExecutive Director, Head of Antibacterial Discovery,
Novartis
Ialways really loved biology. But what probably got me
most interested in microbiology was my mom working
in a doctors ofce. I would just come in and watch the
urologists do all this testing, looking at pathogens. That was
my rst exposure to bacteria. I just really enjoy it.
Half a lifetime later, Jennifer Leeds, executive director and
head of antibacterial discovery, has put that passion to great
use over eight-and-a-half years at Novartis. Her current re-
sponsibilities place her in the lead of the entire antibacterial
discovery groupthe team responsible for everything from
target identication, to validations, screenings, lead discover-
ies, all the way up through writing INDs.
I think of myself as a gatherer, so I dont claim to be the
smartest person in every eld. I just like to bring people together.
Working for Big Pharma, she says, has its advantages, because
you have many resources available. Whats been successful for
me at Novartis, Leeds says about her leadership style, is main-
taining good relationships, treating people professionally, never
taking all the credit yourself, and being very transparent.
What is it about transparency that is so important when
being tasked with leading a diverse team of individuals? Id
rather have someone be very clear about what they know,
what they dont know, and how much they know about howto go about getting the information they dont have. I like to
see how people think critically about a project. And lastly, I
want to know of someones ability to work with others. They
need to be very team-oriented.
But leadership traits must be honed through years of experi-
ence; one doesnt simply acquire them, and one certainly never
stops trying to develop those skills. According to Leeds: Im
looking for mentors to
make sure Im able to do
my job successfully. Being
a mentor as well as having
mentors is equally impor-
tant. I dont think people
necessarily see how valu-
able that is unless theyre
in itbeing on both sides.
But everybody can learn,
everyones got different ex-
periences, and everyones
got something that they can
contribute to someone else.
Part of the path [of leader-
ship] is being willing to bethe mentor and nding the
mentors you need yourself.
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Craig LipsetHead of Clinical Innovation, Pfizer
As head of clinical innovation for Pzer Worldwide Re-search & Development, Craig Lipset runs a tight ship.
He works with senior scientists to dene the future for
clinical trials and ensure that the companys R&D initiatives are
connected and can leverage one another. As a large and decen-
tralized organization, Pzer runs the risk of having too many
projects linked to process and tactics, while ignoring a long-
term vision that can inuence the commercial rate of return.
According to Lipset, We are seeking to share and institution-
alize our work and the learnings. At the same time, we are
working at a local and a corporate level to ensure we have a
culture that supports and encourages innovation rather than
more bureaucracy.
Lipset admits he has seen no shortage of organizational
changes in the pharmaceutical industry; today, the R&D
function at Pzer is based on the premise that there are no
sacred cows. He disagrees with those who believe the in-
dustry is complacent, noting
to Pharm Exec that there is
a sense of urgency as never
before and a basic consen-sus in the C-suite that the
old ways of doing business
must change. Those that are
unwilling or unable to adapt
to this need for change may
want to explore opportunities
elsewhere, he says. Now is
the time for innovation.
Moreover, in his newly
created position, he has ob-
served a renewed appreciation for the role of the patient as
a participant in clinical research. I believe this is an exten-
sion of the new role of the patient as an engaged participant
in managing their overall health and wellness, says Lipset.
This is a time to stay focused on our companys vision to
improve health and well-being around the world.
Jane BrandmanInternational Marketing Leader,Merck
Mercks Jane Brandman was
working on the issue of man-
aged markets and reimburse-
ment before it was industrys cause cl-
bre. Not so long ago, reimbursement in
oncology, for example, wasnt even an
issueif it was approved, it was reim-
bursed, says Brandman.
While pursuing a pharmacy degreein Canada, Brandman says she became
interested in drug development, and was
selected for an internship at Ciba-Geigy
(now Novartis). After graduating, she
went back to Ciba to work as a pharma-
cist in the companys medical informa-tion department, and thats when she
started to recognize that pharmacoeco-
nomics and market access were going to
be key determinants in where the indus-
try headed.
A Rhone-Poulenc Rorer-sponsored
fellowship landed Brandman south of the
Canadian border at the University of Ari-
zona, picking up a Masters degree, and
then went to Pzer, working in a group
tasked with building outcomes research
tools for managed care organizations,
for use in evaluating drug portfolios and
assessing patient management. That job
led to a position working on Pzers in-
line products within its womens health
division, and later on Pzers arthritis di-
vision, both in the US and globally.
Things were sailing along, and then
several of Brandmans family members
got cancer. That instigated a change in
direction, and a new focus on oncol-
ogy. For me, this particular space wasso unique because if you were able to re-
ally work with key opinion leaders and
see the science through, you had a phe-
nomenal impact on patients lives, says
Brandman. Novartis oncology made an
offer, and Brandman came in to givethem some guidance on how to think
about market access and reimburse-
ment and pricing. With Gleevec near-
ing FDA approval, Brandman was able
to contribute to the franchise by making
sure the right information was being col-
lected to address the issue of reimburse-
ment. Finding herself in a marketing role
at Novartis was unexpected, but Brand-
mans background in science was crucial
to marketing efforts, where the science
level is so high, you really have to be onyour game, she says.
After rising to associate director at
Novartis, Brandman left for Merck to
drive lifecycle management for Zolinza,
an oncology drug (shes currently inter-
national marketing leader). She describes
her management style as collaborative:
I dont like micromanaging, she says.
I dont want to be in there telling people
how do things, or to do things my way.
It doesnt matter how things get done, solong as they get done, and get rewarded
when its deserved, she says.
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Vatche BartekianPresident and Founder,
Vantage BioTrials
For Vatche Bartekian, pharmaceu-
tical work is all in the family, and
has been for years. I had many
uncles, aunts, and cousins who were doc-
tors, pharmacists, and pharma profession-
als, including my own brothers, he says.
The pharmaceutical and health industry
has always appealed to me. Which is why,
in 2007, when Bartekian became presi-
dent and founder of his own Canadian
CROVantage BioTrialsthose trusted
family connections were one of the main
ingredients in the recipe for success. His
brother Viken is the companys VP of
business development, and his brother
Vahe is VP of clinical and compliance.
More than 13 years of industry ex-
perience, from an analyst position
in a clinical research lab to a role
in Big Pharma with Pzer Canada,
helped prepare Bartekian for leading
his own organization. He has also
worked in more than 15 therapeuticareas, including oncology, cardio-
vascular, ophthalmology, infectious
disease, and CNS. Bartekian says
that this diverse background has led
to relationships and networking op-
portunities that are the backbone of
Vantage BioTrials success. I have
been very fortunate to work with
highly skilled and talented individu-
als who have become good friends
and colleagues, he says. Most of
the business that Vantage BioTrials
currently acquires is through word-
of-mouth referrals. It is this kind of
relationship-building and engender-
ing the trust of our clients that has
seen us through the toughest eco-
nomic downturns in our industry.
Bartekian reects on the changes
he has seen in the industry: I start-
ed my career in 1998, when pharma
and the North American economy
was in the middle of signicant growth.
There were new regulations, mergers
and acquisitions, and a dramatic in-
crease in the use of CROs for clinicaldevelopment and basic R&D activities.
From 1997 to 2007, our industry expe-
rienced the biggest growth in the num-
ber of blockbuster drugs hitting the
market, he recalls. Fast-forward to
now and we have much more stringent
regulations, more scrutiny by regula-
tors, and a drastic change in industrys
outlook as generic competition has
forced Big Pharma to refocus on prod-
uct and process innovation, as patents
on the aforementioned blockbuster
drugs will soon be ending.
What do these changes mean for
Bartekians leadership skills and busi-
ness strategies? As the president of a
small, privately-owned CRO which
came into existence in 2007right
before the 2008 global economic crisis
hitmy team and I have been forced
to re-evaluate our game plan in orderto remain competitive, and refocus our
business to not only serve the traditional
Big Pharma and biotech sector, but also
diversify our client portfolio, he says.
Vantage BioTrials has done this, accord-
ing to Bartekian, by investing heavily in
obtaining and retaining highly quali-
ed and experienced team members.
Plus, he says, Our main competitive
edge has been our ability to offer all this
quality and experience at a signicantly
lower cost. In other words, smallness
counts as a differentiating factor in the
overall service proposition.
As a leader, Bartekian recognizes
that keeping a team engaged and moti-
vated during challenging times requires
a proactive approach. I achieve this
by encouraging innovation from the
team, he explains. I believe that
there is an entrepreneur in everyone
and I always encourage identica-
tion and improvement of processes inorder to re-energize an individuals
sense of contribution to the team.
Finally, Bartekian uses the high
standards the company sets in its re-
lationships with clients as a model
for relationships with his own em-
ployees. I strive to always exceed
my clients expectations and I ex-
pect no less from our employees by
asking them how they can improve
study timelines, increase all stake-
holders cooperation, and achievebetter cost savings by increasing
project efciencies.
It also helps that our business
is based on strong family-oriented
values, he adds. Working with
your own brothers helps you learn
how to treat each other with respect
and clearly communicate ideas to
move forward and progress together
through challenges.
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David RedfernChief Strategy Officer,
GlaxoSmithKline
At 44, David Redfern is already
something of a pharma industry
veteran. With 17 years experience
behind him, he now leads GlaxoSmith-
Klines M&A and corporate development
activities, has responsibility for its global
dermatology business, and is chairman
of ViiV Healthcarean HIV/AIDS joint
venture with Pzer that he was instru-
mental in establishing.
Redferns upward trajectory since
joining the industry has been impressive
from the outset. Qualifying initially as
a chartered accountant, he began his
career at PricewaterhouseCoopers (for-
merly Coopers & Lybrand, as it was
known then), working in Europe and
Africa. Back in London, while on sec-
ondment at Glaxo (a Coopers client), he
was bitten by the pharma bug; he took
a permanent post with the drugmaker
in 1994 and hasnt looked back.
Redferns progress at GSK leapt for-ward signicantly, however, with the
appointment of Andrew Witty as CEO
in November 2007. Quickly identifying
Redfern as a strong allyRedferns lean
Six Sigma thinking was in line with his
own ideas for reshaping the way GSKoperatedWitty appointed him chief
strategy ofcer when he reformulated
the management team in the months
leading up to his arrival in early 2008.
He is proud of the enormous prog-
ress the company has made since it
started to run its business a lot more
tightly following Wittys arrival. I
think today people would agree that
that vision was rightGSK is further
down the track than most in transform-
ing itself, he says. A lot of companies
are just going into their major patent
expiries. We are largely through the
major headwinds on that; were in a
slightly different place.
But he is quick to highlight that his
involvement in turning GSK around
if thats not too strong a phrasehas
been very much as part of a team, and,
not least, down to the good fortune of
having a boss he believes in. Pushed for
pearls of wisdom on what it takes to bea successful leader, Redfern afrms: I
put a lot of emphasis on the ability to
articulate a clear vision, to take people
on the journey with you, to map out
where youre going and make sure ev-
eryone knows why. The ability to com-
municate widely is really important.
For all his modesty, Redferns career
in pharma clearly remains a glittering
one. Going forward, according to his
GSK colleague, Claire Thomas (herself a
Pharm Exec Emerging Pharma Leader of
2010), the role of chief nancial ofcer is
very much in his grasp, and beyond that,she suggests, a future CEO position is a
distinct possibility.
Amar SethiVice President, Science & Technology,
Pacific Biomarkers
A
n academic background in clinical chem-
istry combined with a solid understanding
of a key therapeutic segmentlipid control
medicationsset the foundation for Pacic Bio-
markers vice president for science and technology
Dr. Amar Sethis career as a pathnder in drug de-
velopment. He cites his exposure to patients as a
hospital physician in the cardiology eld, which
adds considerably to his ability to understand how
progress from simple proof of concept to nal
market authorization will shape the experience of
patients in responding to a new treatmentnot to
mention the willingness of payers to consider it as
a real therapeutic advance.
Sethi speaks highly of personal connectionsand credits his career progression for it: A good
connection can mean that the right job nds you
instead of you having to seek the right job, he
says. Many of the best jobs are not even adver-
tised. Knowing people professionally, especially
connections of my more experienced counterparts,
helped move my career forward.
Sethi says his transition into pharma has oc-
curred in an era of limits and shortages accentu-
ated by recession and deep cuts in public spending
on drugs and healthcare in general. Ive observed
increasing M&A activity (large and small) with
the supposed aim of creating stronger nancial
institutions and to reduce the risk of nancial
default. Portfolios have been increased to hope-
fully average any risk associated with drug fail-
ure. Young leaders today will need to work with
more outside partners on functions that used to
be conducted entirely in-house. Awareness of the
external environment and the ability to sensitivelyassess the qualities of a potential partner are going
to be key skills for the industry in the future.
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Philippe SzaparySenior Director, Immunology,
Centocor
Inever thought Id end up in the
pharmaceutical industry, says
Philippe Szapary. Like many of
my peers in R&D, I was in academic
medicine. I was on the faculty at the
University of Pennsylvania in internal
medicine. I was taking care of patients,
teaching medical students and resi-
dents, and engaging in clinical research
and epidemiology. Then, says Szapary,
One thing led to another and I ended
up in R&D using many of the skills I
had developed in academia, now on a
much broader scale, and thus impacting
a lot more lives and people.
Now that hes on the industry side of
things, Szapary recognizes how much has
changed over the years, and how his lead-
ership philosophy has had to change ac-
cordingly. Ive had to focus much more
on the differences between must-haves
and nice-to-haves, he says. We have a
lot of work on our plates, and were really
faced with the issue of prioritization.
I nd prioritizing one of the biggest
challenges in industry, continues Sza-
pary. In medicine, they dont teach you
that. In the US healthcare system, every
patient gets the maximum amount of
care every time. So now, coming into this
resource-strained environment, you have
real tradeoffs to consider. We have fewer
and fewer dollars in the R&D budgets,
and we want to develop a certain amount
of potential products. I think those
who will be successful in the future are
those who will be able to prioritize and
manage these types of issues.Also important, says Szapary, is a co-
hesive team. Building and maintaining
high-functioning teams and recognizing
them for their effort is key to meeting our
goals. You need to listen to team mem-
bers and value their input and perspec-
tive while also focusing on their career
development. By not doing these things,
you run the risk of losing cohesion and
focus, and of diffusing the mission.
Optimism in the face of adversity
can be the secret to success in pharma,
says Szapary. When I was rst con-
templating going into medicine, physi-
cians tried to discourage me from en-
tering the eld because it had changed
so much. And if I had listened to the
naysayers then, I would not be where
I am today. I think there are still lots
of opportunities in the pharmaceutical
industry. Its a very rewarding industry
on a lot of levels. Youve just got to be
willing to adapt.
David SternEVP, Endocrinology, EMD Serono
Being responsible for all commercial operations in the US
for EMD Seronos endocrinology therapeutic areas
HIV, growth deciency, and infertilityhas taught Da-
vid Stern two things: 1) That failure is the rst step towards
success; and 2) When
the success comes, its
truly worth the effort.
Despite the leaner
mantra of the indus-
try, Stern says, This
is a great time to be in
pharma, because these
changes present op-
portunities. We cant
sit back and do things
the way we used to.
We as leaders have tobe willing to let people
try new things, make
mistakes, and failbecause failure breeds innovation.
This may sound like a risky leadership strategy, especially
when money is tight. But Stern has seen it work, from the per-
spective of a leader and of a rookie just getting his feet wet.
When I was a fairly junior marketer, I made a mistake. I ended
up spending a signicant amount of moneyabout a $1 mil-
lionon something that didnt work, he recalls. And rather
than yell at me, my boss at the time said, We just made an in-
vestment in you. A million-dollar investment. What did you do
wrong, why did you make the decision you did, and what did
you learn from it?
Once the success comes, says Stern, the rewards more
than pay for the trial-and-error method that got you there.
One of our products is an infertility drug. We help people
become parents. And when you get the letters from them,
when you see the pictures of their successes, that just serves
to energize me and my team.
The responsibility of emerging pharma leaders, says Stern,
is to change the publics perception of pharma and biotech
companies. And if we make decisions based on the needsof the patient and not the needs of Wall Street, I think our
industry will do a lot better.
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Alana
ClemensProduct Training Manager,
Diabetes,
Boehringer Ingelheim
For Alana Clemens, dia-
betes is more than just
something she focuses
on from nine to ve. As the
woman who trains the sales
team that focuses on Boeh-
ringer Ingelheims diabetes ini-tiatives, she admittedly knows
a great deal about the disease.
But shes also a patient. And
an advocate. I have a person-
al connection and passion for
the area of diabetes. I am ac-
tive in the diabetes community,
and that certainly contributes
to how I perform my job func-
tions, she says.
This year I participated
in the American Diabetes
Associations Step out to
Fight Diabetes walk with
my family. This is a cause
I am very passionate about
and would pursue even if I
didnt work in the diabetes
space, she continues. I
believe I am an example of
what can be accomplished
when work ethic is coupled
with personal passion.
Clemens aims to bring
this passion to her role as
a leader within her organi-
zation, and to pass it on toher team. A change agent
is someone who goes be-
yond embracing changeto
someone who is creating and
driving change, she says.
Our industry is appropri-
ately risk-averse. Change
agents are not always wel-
comeoften, change in-
creases conict. But when I
am successful, I feel reward-
ed by the outcome.
To foster positive change
in a challenging industry cli-
mate, Clemens is embracing
new technology. The way
people exchange informa-
tion is rapidly changing. I
knew that in order to train
people in a way that was ef-
fective, we would need to
raise the bar and explore
new methods of interacting
with technology, she says.
Which is why, as Boehringer
Ingelheim was preparing to
launch the rst in a franchiseof diabetes molecules, Clem-
ens created an online reposi-
tory of information that can
be exchanged and shared
among colleagues. Im very
proud of how our Diabetes
Portal has become a cross-
functional resource for our
sales organization, she says.
There are some crucial
tactics for succeeding in
the industry going forward,
says Clemens, both for her
team and for herself and
other industry leaders. The
most important factors, she
says, are clear, concise di-
rection; demonstrating con-
dence in your decisions;
being an excellent listener;
and fostering an environ-
ment which encourages cre-
ativity and collaboration.
Andreas JekleSenior Research Scientist,
NovaBay Pharmaceuticals
After pursuing a post-doctorate
degree in San Francisco, Dr. An-
dreas Jekle found the road chal-
lenging for a foreign-born scientist try-
ing to enter the pharmaceutical world.
Luckily, a fellow German helped him
land his rst job at Roche in 2003. Now,
as senior research scientist at NovaBay
Pharmaceuticals, Jekle is getting the
chance to combine drug development
work with my passion for basic science.
For a long time, I thought I would
pursue a career in academia. I didnt
have any exposure to pharma before I
joined Roche. However, I never regret-
ted the switch to industry. Research and
science are as good in industry as theyare in academiajust with different
goals. Flexibility is key; being able to
adapt quickly to other elds will go a
long way toward meeting your goals.
A good project leader listens to the
advice of his team and knows to build
consensus, says Jekle. And heres where
exibility comes in: Make clear early
on what your success criteria are and re-
visit them regularly. Project teams have
a tendency to drift off target. Dont stick
to your initial criteria if the environ-
ment changes, he adds.
Three critical assets to getting the
most out of a teamespecially in this
era of lean pharmaare being able to
listen, empowering your subordinates,
and being realistic. A lean organiza-
tion for me specically means hav-
ing to work with CROs. That requires
working with new people with different
backgrounds on a daily basis. If youhave to rely more and more on other
service providers, you have to make
sure that they live up to your expecta-
tions, says Jekle. This speaks to the era
of globalization all industries, not just
pharma, are in.
But whether working with your in-
house team or with outside partners,
it all comes down to setting goals. Ac-
cording to Jekle: When you set your
goals, have a good mixture of those
within reach and others that will be a
challenge. Same thing with your expec-
tations from your group; if youre not
realistic and expect unreasonable re-
sults, you lose trust and your group will
no longer work for you.
So how does Dr. Jekle handle the
challenges that come with the chang-
ing times? Embrace it, he says. You
cant stop it. But you can learn from it.
Experience is invaluable, especially if itis combined with an open mind to new
approaches.
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Lynn ShatkusInternational Marketing Training
Director, Abbott Laboratories
Lynn Shatkus is fortunate. Her cur-
rent role as international marketing
training director at Abbott Labo-
ratories seemed predetermined. I come
from a long line of training; my parents
were both teachers, Shatkus says. And
so I think it was sort of fate that Id end
up working in a training role.
Shatkus began her career in mar-
keting communications in the energyindustry and eventually migrated into
training roles with Blue Cross/Blue
Shield. After seven years there, the ex-
perience carried her to Abbott, where
she says the challenges now lie in the
globalized economy as well as the new
stakeholders continually coming to the
table. She perseveres by remaining resil-
ient through whatever comes her way.
The global economy is denitely
challenging everyone to innovate and
reinvent executions to meet new needs
for the healthcare industry. But training
is also going through a metamorphosis
as a result of globalization, so as a train-
ing professional that means executing
faster, in new ways, while still trying to
maintain the integrity of learning.
Coming on board at Abbott, Shatkus
knew from her previous experience that
leaning on your team members, as they
would lean on you, is integral. I have
high expectations of my team, she says.
Its my leadership style. I wouldnt ask
them to do anything I wouldnt do my-self. And coming through the ranks of
training, most of these positions I have
done myself, so I do have the perspec-
tive of having been in their shoes. So I
do feel that is helpful for any leader to
have that understanding of what [the
team members] are going through.
Shatkus has spent over seven years
at Abbott, including a stretch in Madrid,
Spain, which, she says, presented anoth-
er opportunity to develop her leader-
ship style. Culturally, being able to see
different perspectives, and being able to
immerse myself in that was a fantastic
personal experience. For me, with
this organization being exible and
open and guring out exactly what each
person needs in order to be successful
in their rolethats where I tie that in
with leadership. You cant do a one-
size-ts-all.
John StuartNational Sales Director, Genentech
Heck no, says John Stuart, when
asked if he always knew he would
work in healthcare or pharma. I
went to school knowing I would be a salesperson,
but never really articulated in my own mind what
kind of sales I wanted to be involved in. In fact,
when I interviewed with Genentech, I had no clue
who they were at the time.
Not exactly the path to destiny, true. But
once Stuart got his start as a sales rep for Abbot and was
promoted to senior sales rep within 18 months, the founda-
tion was in place. Of his time at Abbot, Stuart says, It gave
me the introduction to pharma and the industry, and it gave
me a clear perspective of what I did and didnt like. Stuart
was then able to take his newfound pharma knowledge into
a sales position at Genentech, and has now been with the
company 18 years in various positions.
Watching the industry change over that timebecoming
more regulated and more cost-conscious day by daycauses
Stuart to pause and reect. For many years Genentech was im-mune to some of these things for awhile we were insulated,
because we were delivering on the innovation, on breakthrough
drugs and technology, he recalls. Many salespeo-
ple, myself included, took things for grantedthat
this was a job that was stable, where I would earn a
great living and be able to provide for my family. And
then all of a sudden that gets shattered.
But Stuart isnt disheartened by the new, learn-
er industry. On one hand I think its a really
good thing. I dont think any of us are entitled to
anything. Every day weve got to go to work, and
weve got to have an impact, and weve got to have
value for the customer or patient, he says. What
weve seen by downsizing is that weve actually created more
engagement. It really forced us as a management team to ask
the critical question: What do we want to look like when
we grow up?
Spurred by downsizing, Stuart and his team at Genentech
have had to consciously foster an environment in which his
employees canand want tosucceed. Its not just em-
powering employees to own their territory and the decisions
they makethey also need to have responsibility, he says.
In 2008 I read an article about jazz musician Dizzy Gillespie.
He said that what makes a good jazz musician is that theyhave one foot in the past and one in the future. I believe the
same is true for pharma.
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Evan LippmanExecutive Director, Crestor,
AstraZeneca
For Evan Lippman, previously the
commercial leader for Nexium
and now leader of the Crestor
brand at AstraZeneca, the shifting tides
of pharma dont change the goals of his
team. Leadership is about solving com-
plex problems and delivering on busi-
ness objectives, he says. I cant think
of any other industry that enables you
to do that in a way that benets people
like pharma does. I dont know why you
wouldnt want to be a part of that.
The benets of being part of the in-
dustry werent innately apparent to
Lippman, however. He started his ca-
reer as an investment banker, serving
biotechnology and biopharmaceutical
companies. Challenges such as those
facing pharma today havent dissuaded
Lippman from jumping inin fact, its
just these sort of high-pressure situations
that drew him to the industry. Pharma
is very fast-changing, its dynamic, and it
presents a lot of complex problems that
dont always have one clear answer, heexplains. So youve got to be comfort-
able taking risks Pharma is about tak-
ing inordinate risk in order to benet a
large group of people. And the impact
you can have is tremendous.
Despite new challenges to pharma,
Lippman believes there are certain
leadership skills and obligations that
remain constant. Its about making
relevant and timely decisions, creat-
ing common purpose and intent, fo-
cusing on clarity, and creating space
for your team to excel, he says. The
basic foundation of our industry has
not changed. Innovative, novel medi-
cations that continue to impact patient
health are necessary. Its the tools that
we have at our disposal that are chang-
ing, as is the pace of information.
Going forward, says Lippman, its
less important for pharma to change,
and more important to be receptive
toand to embracechange.
I lead by trying to create a sense of
ownership, an entrepreneurial spirit
that helps people own their segment,
and that can lead to accountability in
decision making, says Lippman. And
when you have that, you can continue
to deploy very efcientlyI wont say
regardless of budgetbut even within
certain constraints. Because you can
still be innovative.
Rob EtheringtonSenior VP, Commercial, Actelion Pharmaceuticals
Rob Etherington has been with Actelion for 11 years,
and has seen the company grow from ve employees
to more than 300 in the US alone, and around 2,500
worldwide, in that time. In the past decade, revenues at Acte-
lion have grown from zero to nearly $1 billion in annual sales.
And Etherington has been there through it all.
But as a company grows, so does the responsibility of its
leaders. When Etherington joined Actelion
in 2000, he was its fth employee. The
leadership has had to evolve immensely,
he says. This has been a test in resilien-
cy. We didnt even know at the beginning
where our next dollar was coming from.
As Etherington marvels at how far his
career and his company have come, he
acknowledges the value of the path that
led him here. Though he had an MBA,
his rst taste of industry was as a sales
rep at Parke-Davis. Many of my fellowalumni were saying You went to busi-
ness school to be a rep? he recalls.
But Etherington maintains that the insight he gained as a
rep is the foundation for his success. Regardless of how you
come into this business, if you dont have a eld-based op-
portunity, youll have great difculty really understanding
how to drive success in pharma.
Having been part of Actelion from the ground up, Ether-
ington knows a thing or two about successand difculty.
In the past six months alone, FDA has changed all of our
labels, weve been embroiled in a court case with another
pharma company, and weve been dealing with an activist
shareholder who wants to shake up Acte-
lion in unfortunate ways.
Despite such challenges, Etherington
believes that good leadership means a con-
tagiously optimistic viewpoint and innova-
tive problem-solving skills. The people
you lead need to understand the vision of
whats possible. They need to believe that
by working together as a team, well be able
to conquer whatever challenges are in front
of us. And they need to know that leader-
ship has their back, will support them, andwill be there alongside them, helping them
solve the problem.
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Salvador GraussoExecutive Director, Global Pricing,
Merck
If you work on a team with Sal
Grausso, youve probably heard
the following phrase: Strategy
without execution is not strategic. As
executive director, global pricing, at
Merck, Grausso likes to keep himself
at the tip of the spear with respect to
market access and reimbursement; the
difcult and politically ticklish issue
of drug pricing requires not only good
ideas, but also implementation. Global
pricing demands transparency, being
objective, making rapid decisionsand
putting out lots of res, and that takes
an executive with the ability to pitch
consistently in the strike zone, he says.
Grausso started out as a pitcher, and
went to the University of Maryland to
play baseball. In high school, Grausso
was a star; after the rst practice at
the University of Maryland, however,
Grausso came home and cried in my
room, because I realized that I wasnot good at this game. It was a hum-
bling experience. Grausso recovered
of course, and as it happened, Johnson
& Johnson was offering an internship,
and even though it was advertised as
a full-time commitment, J&J worked
around Graussos baseball schedule, let-
ting him work 20 hours a week. During
the internship, which turned into a full-
time job with J&J Health Care Systems,
Grausso fell in love with the industry,
and he hasnt looked back. He worked
for Janssen as a sales rep for a year, andthen, while working on a Masters de-
gree in accounting, worked for two years
at Ernst & Young. Grausso says his ac-
counting background helps him to spot
the lines connecting different elements ofthe business together.
After Ernst & Young, Grausso went
to Pharmacia, and left that company
after it merged with Pzer. He joined
Schering-Plough after Pharmacia, and
stayed on with the company after its
merger with Merck. Grausso says the
Merck/Schering-Plough integration is
moving a little slower than hed like,
but theres a lot at stake. You have two
different processes, and a large group
of products, and in the world of pric-
ing, its very important to stabilize the
situation in terms of governance around
pricing, and the processes to approve
pricing. Aside from working on a doc-
torate in health technology assessments,
Grausso is excited to be at the forefront
of a changing industry, where govern-
ments and payers and patients are at the
center of the discussion. As the indus-
try evolves, says Grausso, market ac-
cess has to become a more mainstreampart of commercial operations.
As vice president of cardiorenal and met-
abolic marketing at Takeda Pharmaceu-
ticals North America, Nicole Mowad-
Nassar is responsible for the companys key
brandsActos, Uloric, and Edarbias well
as its diabetes pipeline and partnerships with
Orexigen and Affymax in the areas of obesity
and renal care, respectively. Diabetes, hyper-
tension, and obesity are conditions almost ev-
ery person can relate to in some way. Either
they are a patient themselves or have a loved
one or friend who is impacted, says Mowad-
Nassar, who is attracted to her sector of work
for these reasons. Marketing in this space
presents daily opportunities to educate and im-
prove healthcare in meaningful ways, not only
patient by patient, but with the potential tochange society overall.
For Mowad-Nassar, a lean organiza-
tion isnt a new concept, but its never been
more important to pharma. As an example,
she notes how Takedas entire organization
shared stories about their experiences as
employees and the company created a uni-
ed statement of culture that everyone could
embrace. We all share a common vision
to transform into a new Takeda, through
purposeful innovation powered by a for-
ward-looking culture to achieve sustainable
growth, she says. To do this will require
new thinking, an ability to anticipate, and
perhaps most critically, a contingency plan.
Meanwhile, what does this Emerging
Pharma Leader attribute to personal motiva-
tion? Her family. It is in my two sons that
I derive my source of pride and accomplish-
ment, Mowad-Nassar admits. The great-
est job title I ever got was Mom. I work hardto make sure they know they are my rst
priority. I learned that from my parents.
Nicole Mowad-NassarVP, Cardiorenal & Metabolic Marketing, Takeda Pharmaceuticals
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Byran LittonSenior Director of Sales,
Oncology Business Unit, Eli Lilly
Modern leadership is about a
couple of things: Its as sim-
ple as trust and lending a
vision to people; to have that singular vi-
sion that can really give people
the lens by which they look at
everything that comes to them.
To me thats a calming force
thats absolutely necessary.
In over 11 years, Byran
Litton, senior director of
sales, oncology business unit
at Eli Lilly, has relied on di-
verse experiences to shape
his leadership style. You can
only learn so much from
books, as he puts it. He calls
his current role a people
role. Its an awful lot of fun to make an
impact on an individual level, he says.
The backbone of good leadership is
that trust. Previously, we may have
been more focused on motivating and
inspiring, which is almost episodic. Its
delivered as a quick-burning fuel, butthen it burns out. But if theres real
trust in the organization then to me,
thats a more long-burning thing.
With all the regulatory and envi-
ronmental changes affect-
ing the industry, how does
Litton manage through the
chaos? Anyone that sits in
a position where theyre in-
uencing signicant parts of
an organization has to be a
change agent. I think thats
a prerequisite.
But one cannot do it all
by himself; he must rely on
the skill sets and experi-
ences of others. I think I
learned early on that some-
thing can be done, and done well, and
be nothing like I would have done it.
And that, for a lot of folks in leader-
ship positions, can be difcult, but for
me it works. I enjoy that work, when
you build the right group, he says. To
Litton, hiring individuals with varyingexperiences and skill sets that balance
one another is integral.
And so after over a decade at Lilly,
predominantly in the oncology space,
even if its been something closer to
a calling, as he puts it, how does Lit-
ton keep his own motivation going, let
alone his teams? I have been like a kid
in a candy shop with all the things that
have been given to me by the oncology
business unit at Lilly. Its been incred-
ibly fun. But the piece that I want to
have touched in some way is advancing
the care of patients, the elimination of
disease. Thats my anchor. As we say:
If youre not in oncology youre try-
ing to get in; and if youre already in
oncology, youre trying to get bigger.
For me, its something thats really un-
der my skin and I wouldnt have it any
other way.
Lars MerkDirector, CNS Marketing, Johnson & Johnson
According to Lars Merk, director of CNS marketing for
Johnson & Johnson, there are two separate effects of
the convergence of digital technologies and healthcare.
The rst is an explosion of newly available interactions that
leverage digital technologies. The second is the realization
that healthcare delivery is changing and technology is a cata-
lyst for greater efciency. What I enjoy most about my cur-
rent role is that my contributions can make an impact across
the organization and in some ways help shape the way our
entire industry effectuates meaningful change in healthcare,
says Merk. Our reality in this country, and in fact across the
globe, is that there are just not enough resources to deliver the
amount of healthcare that the citizens of the world demand.
Choices have to be made and that in turn gives the industry
an opportunity to move the needle forward in terms of im-
proving health outcomes from pharmaceuticals.
Personal connections are highly valued by Merk, who be-
lieves that they are really about shared workplace experienc-
es. In fact, he nds that of the people he connects most oftenwith, one attribute is most evidentthey all put their socks
on the same way he
does: To be truthful,
I have never asked any-
one how they put their
socks on, but these
people who I connect
with are, above all
else, peoplepeople
with ideas, with hopes
and dreams, who have
interests that are as
varied as the inhab-
itants in this world.
Connecting these as-
pirations and focusing
all that energy around
a clear business objective is a key characteristic of good lead-
ership. Passion is indeed a vocational asset.
Merk believes that leaders must embrace accountability
at every level of their organization. This accountability
is not implemented for liability, but rather to induce pride
among teams, he says. It creates action when things arenot right and creates celebration when they are.
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Steven BlumDirector, Health Economics,
Forest Laboratories
For Steven Blum, director of health eco-
nomics for Forest Laboratories, being
aware of budget impacts is fundamen-
tal to the job. Our role is to help support
and communicate the products value propo-
sition, he explains. Blum and his team do
this by keeping track of data and performing
various studies throughout a products life-
cycle, including retrospective studies, elec-
tronic medical records analyses, surveys, and
prospective studies looking at data alongside
clinical trials.
Though Blum now spends his time charting the prospec-
tive value of new drugs, three years ago he wore a different
hatsales and marketing. Transitioning over to the scien-
tic side and not having a scientic background, there was a
learning curve, Blum says.
Throughout his career, Blum says wearing many different
hats gave him the skills and perspective he needed to become
a successful leader. One of the things Ive always appreciated
was the fact that Ive had a variety of differ-
ent roles and have been exposed to different
parts of the business, all within one company.
And he believes that such opportunities are in-valuable to emerging leaders who are just now
putting down roots in the industry. Ive seen
others who have been reluctant to allow staff
to change roles, but thats counterintuitive, he
says. As a manager, Ive always felt that my
success is dependent upon the success of other
people. If they have certain career aspirations,
why would I want to impede them? Why not
nd a way thats a win-win for the organiza-
tion and the individual? In the end, that ben-
ets the corporation, because [a professionally
fullled] person can bring more to the table.
Blum also advocates mentoring as a key mark of good
leadership. In that spirit, what would Blum say to the new
leaders in the industry, who are inheriting such a politically
and nancially different world? Somehow pharma always
winds up being the bad guy. Health reform [and cost control]
is like squeezing a balloonyou squeeze in one area and it
expands in another. What you need to do is nd a way to let
some air out of the balloon, he explains.
Jessica MonroeDirector, State Government Affairs &
Policy, Johnson & Johnson
Jessica Monroe recalls a former boss
who would always ask, What is a
leader? He would then answer that
a leader says, I have a plan. Follow me.
Director of state government affairs and
policy for Johnson & Johnson, Monroe
tries to integrate this approach into her
own goals and objectives as she works
with governments, operating companies,
and other healthcare and pharmaceuti-
cal interests on a daily basis.
Monroe followed the road less trav-
eled by most of her pharma peers, when
she started a career in government and
then transitioned to pharmaceutical sales.
Her atypical journey led her from work
as a legislative aide for the Louisiana Sen-
ate all the way to Washington as a Con-
gressional staff assistant and then back toLouisiana to work in the ofce of Gover-
nor. Her start at Johnson & Johnson came
as an ofce-based representative in its op-
erating unit, Janssen Pharmaceuticals. In
2002, she arrived at her
current position. In the
years I have worked in
government affairs, I
have learned that many
voices are stronger than
one, and my interac-
tions with advocacy
groups and government
ofcials have shown me
that disparate groups
can share similar aspi-
rations of helping pa-
tients and their families,
says Monroe, who was
involved in the health-
care rebuild after hurricane Katrina.
In an environment of change, Monroe
believes it is important to maintain a posi-
tive outlook, think about how to have an
inuence, see what the obstacles at handmay be, and work around them. Those
of us in the industry must be prepared
to face the implications of policies that
impact our businesses. Everything from
marketing reform in
some states, to overall
healthcare reform has
led toand will con-
tinue tocreate chang-
es in how we all do
business, she says. I
have learned that even
within a lean organiza-
tion, there are still sig-nicant opportunities
to grow our businesses.
Being able to show an
ROI from traditionally
soft functions such as
public and government
affairs is also important. With the impact
of government on the industry destined
to grow in the future, demonstrating this
is likely to be less difcultand emerging
leaders of tomorrow will need to embraceawareness of the external environment as
a key skill.
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Charlotte ChuiHead of Strategic Planning, Business
Development and Licensing, Greater
China, Novartis
Iwas rather nave and thought that
science could solve anything, says
Charlotte Chui of her early years
studying the discipline (her undergradu-
ate major at Harvard was biochemical
sciences). When I realized that wasnt
the case, I took a bit of a detour.
Fortunately for scienceand phar-
ma, in particularthat detour (into the
nance industry) wasnt permanent. In
2007, Chui joined Novartiss global
strategy team in Basel, Switzerland. A
great move, she calls it. It gave me a
chance to really understand top man-agement, to look at what they consider
when they make a decision. The ob-
servational approach paid off: just over
a year ago Chui was appointed No-
vartis head of strategic planning and
business development and licensing forGreater China.
Once in China, Chui quickly became
an integral part of the team, relishing
the opportunities and challenges of this
dynamic, growing market. She took a
leading role in realigning the companys
operation from a fairly centralized model
to a more exible, decentralized one,
coordinating projects that addressed re-
gionalization, key account management,
novel product launch mechanisms, and
new channel development.
Before the realignment, Chui says
that Novartis China was hearing a lot
of complaints from the front line. The
organization had clearly outgrown the
way it had been working before in the
country. She worked to push decision-
making to the front line and make the
organization more customer-centric.
The process was complicated, involv-
ing the revamping of a lot of our gov-
ernance, a lot of our systems. But thebenets are now visible: Were much
more aware of what the customers are
thinking, we have much better feedback
from the market, we have much faster
decision-making, and we can identify
opportunities and act much faster.
Also crucial to Novartis recent
strategy in China has been Chuis tire-
less support and development of new
talent. Working with colleagues from
all divisions, she has sought to develop
leaders by helping them think morestrategically and communicate their
knowledge in a more impactful way. I
see a lot of very energetic talent here
that is probably younger than in other
countries, and theres a huge opportu-
nity to develop it, says Chui. But its
very easy for staff to get distracted
theres a million other opportunities in
Chinaso its important to keep the
information lines very open.
Effective delegation is key to Chuisleadership style. What I see in a lot of
managers, new managers especially, is a
feeling that, I can do things better and
faster if I do it myself. I think thats re-
ally a mistake, she says. For me, if you
can establish rapport and trust, then itsa great opportunity to let go a little bit,
to let someone else take ownership and
develop their skills. Of course, you also
have to follow up, support them, and
give them feedback.
For all its buoyancy, Chui adds,
however, that the Chinese market isnt
all about the rapid growing of talent
and resources. Some people think that
somehow the sales magically happen,
she says. Indeed, theres as much a need
for lean in China as there is in the
West. Characteristically, though, Chui
has her own views on what lean should
mean. I dont think its just about the
bottom line, she says. To see lean
simply as a way to improve the mar-
gins is very short-sighted. For Chui,
the most important objective is always
customer satisfaction. If that is failing,
it doesnt matter how much you watch
the bottom line, youre dead in the wa-
ter, she says. Lean is about changingthe mentality, changing the way we
work, being very innovative, and be-
ing open to ideas from the front line.
This may not be as easy to measure as,
say, procurement savings, but it really
makes a difference.
As well as remaining committed to
her work with Novartisthe company
has very big ambitions here; in the next
few years I would love to see us as the
leader in ChinaChuis role is also
meaningful on a personal level. As aChinese-American, she grew up in the
US, but her parents worked hard to keep
Chinese culture alive in the household.
My mother would cook Chinese food at
home, we would speak Mandarin, and
my parents would read poems to me in
Chinese, she says. None of that I really
appreciated when I was growing up, but
when I started working here it all helped
me integrate much faster and much bet-
ter. So, if coming to work in China wasnot exactly coming home, it certainly
doesnt feel too far away.
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Soma GuptaSenior Director & Commercial Team
Leader, Oncology, Pfizer
As senior director and team leader
in commercial development for
Pzer Oncology, Soma Gupta
handles commercial oversight of Pzer
Oncologys newly emerging hemato-
logical malignancy assets and its early
development portfolio. As a Pharm.D
by training, Gupta says she thrives on
the challenge of working in specialty
categories where the unmet medical
need is exceptionally high and the prod-
ucts delivered have a meaningful impact.
Working on the commercial perspective
for early and launch assets in oncology,
where the science and treatment para-
digm move so quickly, is particularly
interesting since identifying the mean-
ingful improvements early can make a
world of difference in the therapy you
ultimately deliver, notes Gupta.
To succeed as a leader,
Gupta believes that techni-
cal prociency is absolute-
ly necessary. According tothe pharma veteran, you
must know the nuts and
bolts of your eld to earn
the respect of a team and
you must also know people.
Knowledge helps establish
credibility, but its emo-
tional intelligence that will
allow you to motivate and
drive for results in large,
cross-functional teams, she says.
In order to adapt to tough times,
Gupta stresses that leaders need to
know what is most essential, and what
is not. They need to embrace a not-one-
size-ts-all style of leadership. In the
simplest terms, the goal should remain
to understand what motivates people
and to leverage that to drive each in-
dividuals aspirations in line with the
business need, says Gupta. In an era
where teams are increasingly virtual,
getting the most out of every face-time
opportunity remains critical to making
sure leaders keep the people compo-
nent of people management front and
center. Not everything motivates the en-
tire team in the same precise way; now
more than ever, we need to spend the
time to recognize that.
Steve ErtelSenior Vice President, Corporate Development,
Acceleron Pharmaceuticals
When Steve Ertel graduated from Duke University
with a degree in biomedical engineering, he was
one of only a handful of graduates in his major that
decided to forgo medical or graduate school. Instead, he was
ready to take his education
and training to market.
The rst job Ertel landed
out of college was with a ven-
ture capital rm, which rep-
resented a combination of in-
terestsnance and business,
applied to biology and medi-
cineand supplied him with
a rsthand look at how inves-
tors fund biotech startups, and
what they look for. A couple of
years later, Ertel went to work
at Vivus, a biopharma focused
at the time on erectile dysfunc-tion drugs. When I was hired
[at Vivus], I was employee
number 17, says Ertel. Working for a small company means
wearing lots of hats, and gaining the kind of broad experience
that is crucial in making good decisions, he says. At a smaller
company, individuals can play a different role in affecting the
strategic outcome of a company, since company SOPs arent
yet written in stone, and new ideas are readily pursued. At small
companies, you can feel your contributions and see them over
time, and they have a really lasting directional impact on where
your company is going. I nd that very rewarding, he adds.
Today, Ertel is senior vice president, corporate develop-
ment for Acceleron Pharma, a relatively small biotherapeutics
company. Ive worked my way back now, after a number of
years at top-tier biotechs, to try to take all of the experience
and learnings from those larger companies, and apply them to
earlier stage biotech companies, he says.
In dening his management style, Ertel emphasizes the im-
portance of a broad understanding of the issues at play, prior
to forming an opinion. Once you have an understanding of
all the issues, you can focus on one or two key issues that ulti-
mately drive the decision. Like most everything in biotech and
drug development, the complexity and multifactorial nature of
the issues can sometimes be confounding. If you can pair downthe complexity to one or two issues, then you have a scope of
the challenge you face thats manageable, says Ertel.
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Mark IwikiCEO, Sunovion Pharmaceuticals
In the short time that elapsed fromreceiving Mark Iwickis Emerging
Pharma Leader nomination to speak-
ing with the man himself, he had been
promoted from COO of Sunovion Phar-
maceuticals (Marlborough, Mass.) to the
companys CEO (effective late June).
The speed with which this career hike
took place is in keeping with Iwickis
progress at Sunovion (formerly Sepracor).
Joining the CNS and respiratory treat-
ment company as executive vice president
and chief commercial ofcer in 2007, he
quickly revamped its commercial model
and masterminded a move to single-
territory ownership. The success of this
strategy caught the attention of Dainip-
pon Sumitomo Pharma (DSP), a Japanese
company seeking to expand its presence
in the US. DSP acquired Sepracor in Octo-
ber 2009 and Iwicki became its president
and chief operating ofcer in early 2010.
By late 2010, he was successfully leading
the integration of the two companies.His recent rise may have been mete-
oric, but Iwicki is no ash in the pan. At
45, he has 22 years industry experience,
starting out as a
rep with Merck
Sharp & Dohme
in 1989. Fromthere he went on
to the edgling
Astra Merck
where he helped
to establish the
health econom-
ics department and also worked alongside
future AstraZeneca CEO David Bren-
nanand then to Novartis, where he led
the cardiovascular business unit.
Being a sales rep was probably the
greatest starting place, Iwicki says.
You learn so much about customer
contact and what our business is really
all about. And the early roles I had at
management level really helped me get
a broad perspective of the industry and
how an organization works.
Indeed, Iwicki credits the variety of
his early experiences with shaping his
current management style, which col-
leagues say is open, warm, encouraging,
and personal. Im a real walk-aroundkind of manager, he explains. Each
morning you can nd me on the differ-
ent oors talking to people, sometimes
just listening, sometimes rolling up my
sleeves to work on a problem with them.
I want the workplace to be a learning en-
vironment, very open, very collaborative.Being prepared to learn continuously is
the most important attribute for a leader,
Iwicki believes. Its easy to get compla-
cent as you become more senior, thinking
that youve seen it all and know it all. Its
important to have an open mind, to real-
ize that the real power of any organization
comes from a group of people.
Fostering a sense of inclusiveness and
encouragement is important to Iwicki
outside the ofce too. Helping and inspir-
ing children, for example, is high on his
personal agenda. A father of four, he cur-
rently helps to coach his childrens soccer
and hockey teams, as well as serves as
the assistant coach of three more youth
teams. I feel like I need to give back to
the community, he says. I see if I can
lend a hand, if I can be a role model for
the community in one way or another.
He adds: It may sound a little bit
corny, but I love making a difference. I
love this industry; its one of the few in-dustries where you can do goodgood
for patients, good for doctors, good for so-
ciety, and for yourself and for your family.
Stuart SowderVice President, External Medical Communications, Pfizer
With three advanced degrees under his belt, Dr. Stuart
Sowder, PharmD., JD, MBA, credits mother neces-
sity as a major role in his drive for obtaining the tool
set that he needed to succeed. After spending eight years working
in healthcare (retail and hospital pharmacy) and obtaining his
law degree, Sowder, who is vice president, external medical com-
munications at Pzer, decided that entering the pharmaceutical
industry provided many exciting options for a lifelong career.
For the past ve years, he has been leading Pzers exter-
nal medical communications team, which includes functions
that work with healthcare providers and patients every day.
As part of his dening role, Sowder manages global medical
information and publications to Pzers transparency efforts
such as clinical trial disclosure and transparency in grants.These days, he notes that pharma is focused on doing
more with less to keep pace with the complex nature of in
dustrys work. Responsibility is being pushed further down
in the organization. And leaders must take notice: I think
that today, more than ever, we must have a highly empowered
organization to be suc-
cessful, says Sowder.
We must have talent-
ed people within that
organization, who are
accountable for deliv-
ering results in their re-
spective areas with lit-
tle practical oversight
and guidance. Leaders
must trust that people
in their organization
have the capacity andintegrity to deliver re-
sults appropriately
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