2022 - A Year of Accelerated Learning

I joined Moderna in March of this year.? In my 9 months here, I have personally learned more than in the previous decade of my career.? The speed at which we operate and the commitment to building a differentiated culture of high performance have pushed me to think differently, question convention, and break my old paradigms.? I’m surrounded by some of the most intelligent and committed people I’ve ever known, and I feel like just showing up to work causes me to learn through osmosis.??My colleagues and I are all unified by a single mission - to deliver on the promise of mRNA science for patients around the world.? The direct and central role learning and leadership development play in this mission is tangible – and also comes with a great deal of accountability.? This sense of ownership, pride, and responsibility have also enabled my own personal growth and evolution – as a professional and as a person.?

The Moderna mindsets are the code to our culture and have also served to accelerate my learning journey this year.??They act as a north star to how we want to operate, make decisions, lead, execute and evolve our organization while also challenging each individual to stretch, grow and push for optimized performance.??The mindsets, when combined with a world-changing mission, a visionary leadership team, and a cohort of exceptionally talented colleagues, is a recipe for engagement and growth.??For many years, I have talked, studied, and even taught the relationship between learning and engagement.??This year I have felt it!!? Bottom line, 2022 has been a turbo-charged learning year and one of the most exciting and engaging of my career.

My learning journey at Moderna has also been a function of my diverse work and experiences. ?Coming into Moderna, I’ve had the privilege to build on the accomplishments of my predecessor – Andrew Dobos . ??It’s been a highlight to collaborate with him and to work together to evolve Moderna University and the role it plays in the lives of our people and patients.? Our vision is to establish the university as a beacon of education for our people and ecosystem and to elevate the role learning plays in our business, strategy, culture, science, and lives.??This year, we have seen tremendous progress as we grow the university and I want to take a few minutes to consciously call out the many collaborators – internal and external – that have contributed to this progress and culture of accelerated growth.

Moderna University is led by a group of College Deans.?They are the ambassadors of our institution, architects of our curriculum, and role models of the learning and growth culture we are building.? So, I’ll start off by thanking Phil White (CMC Science), Melissa Moore (R&D), Patricia Gauthier (External Engagement), Dave Johnson (Digital) and Scott Nickerson (Leadership, Culture, and Management) for their commitment to the university, vision for upskilling, and role modeling of our learning culture.? I have learned a lot from each one of you and have been impressed by your commitment to your discipline and to building the next generation of leaders in your space.

Next, I’d like to recognize my colleagues on the HR Leadership Team – Laurel Ostrom , Amanda Sorrento , Arnoud Savi , Hem Patel, April Eldred , Amy Virgilio , and Alissa Parmelee .? And to the amazing Celeste Kruse – thanks for your collaboration across the portfolio and all the change, communications, project and operations work you do to help our learners have the right experience.?? Lisa Whipkey - you are the glue keeping this team together. I appreciate your advice, feedback, and good nature - all of which has been a huge part of my overall learning journey this year.

Learning and Development is a team sport and needs to fit well into the overall people strategy.? Working with my partners in HR this year has been an absolute thrill and one of the most engaging of my career.? Unified by a common vision, they stretch and challenge me to be better at what I do and to collaborate together to execute collectively on an ambitious people agenda.? L&D is most effective and delivers its highest impact when it's seamlessly integrated into the overall vision for people, culture, strategy, talent, and skill.? Working with this team of pros, I feel like we are getting closer to that ideal than I have ever experienced before in my career.? It's messy and non-linear, but rewarding and exciting at the same time.

And to our HR leader – Tracey Franklin - thank you for being a learning champion.? Your vision for our differentiated culture of high performance is inspiring and provides the fuel for the work we do every day.??A big part of my learning journey this year has been driven by your coaching, role modeling, and care.? You are a powerhouse leader and are driving us in new directions that stretch our capabilities and build our skills.?That’s a learning culture in action.

Next, I’d like to call out some of the specific advancements we have made this year in Moderna University and the team leadership behind them.?

• After three years of virtual delivery, we have brought our Moderna One onboarding experience back to in-person, based on the belief that our culture thrives when we connect with each other, immerse into our business and ways of working, and build our collaborative networks.?Thanks to Will Gombos , Crystal Tania , Katarzyna Dopierala and many more for their commitment and persistence to delivering on this vision.
• Digitizing everywhere means we are constantly looking for opportunities to use the power of AI to make our business smarter, more efficient, and more resilient.? Thanks to David Porter , Andrew Giessel , and many others for driving the AI Academy and helping us upskill in this key strategic area.
• Cyber and Physical security are all about protecting what we’ve built so we can continue to serve our people, patients, and planet.? Thanks to Amit Aggarwal , Subrata Baguli , Brad Taylor , David Porter, Maggie Buck , Dean Geribo and many others for their work on our cyber academy and our security learning series.
• Great companies develop their executives and help them become the best version of themselves.? Thanks to Kaitlin Fairweather for her tireless work on building the Executive Academy and moving forward our ambitious plan to grow the best and most inspirational leaders in biotech.
• Keeping everything running is an essential success factor to realize the vision of the university.? Thanks to Camilla Fields for building our operational excellence and delivery systems.? And to our partners in travel, comms, digital, procurement, legal, finance – Keith Daly , Katherine O’Malley , Jill van der Poel , Colleen Hussey , Mike Kurtz , Carol Phillips , Jennifer Steinke , Matt Laidley , and Jessica Foster
• Having a digital backbone for learning is critical to creating the right infrastructure. Thanks to Ruchi Arora , Keke Wu , Lia Rice , Chris Policastro , Raj Jogam , Giraldo Hierro , and many others who work on the tech stack to enable a high impact digital learning experience.
• Building our campus, culture hubs, and physical learning spaces is another part of our vision for Moderna University.? Thanks to Kristine Royal , Michael Wythe , Sarah Briggs , Roland Rocafort , Bankim Patel , Anthony Meenaghan, Frank Minniti , and many others for helping us shape the places and spaces for learning and culture to thrive.
• For driving innovation in microlearning, measurement, and instructional design and for working to architect the learning framework for our external engagement college, special thanks go to Patrick Kelley for his partnership and collaboration.
• Delivering programs and learning experiences around the globe is a team sport.? Thanks to Aleksandra Nawrot-Dabal , Anna Owczarska , Ivana Plechaty , Lisa Kinsella , Clara Fernandez de Castro , Chelsea Bledsoe , Cara Kwok and many others for being our international feet on the ground.
• And to running our overall operation, managing our complex portfolio, driving our strategy – my sincere appreciation and gratitude go to my partner – Nkiruka Ogbuchiekwe .? I have learned so much since Nkiruka joined the team and deeply appreciate her skill, capability, leadership, and friendship.

And we couldn’t do all this work without our external partners.? You are essential to the mission and deliver such important impact and outcomes to the overall university experience.? Our partners include world-class visionaries, consultants, coaches, writers, assessors, interviewers, thought leaders, speakers, facilitators, designers, technologists, teachers, and operators. ?All our partners form an integral part of the extended Moderna University experience and family– we see you, appreciate you, and are always learning from you.

When you are learning and growing, you are alive.? It’s the primary source of human engagement, performance, and well-being.? As I hope I’ve described in this note, 2022 has been a year of significant change, growth and learning for me personally.? It’s been driven by the inspiring mission Moderna has to continue to deliver on the promise of mRNA medicine, the colleagues and partners I get to collaborate with every day, the leadership I see when I look up, and the ongoing build of our Moderna University.?

We aspire to become a beacon of education for our people, our ecosystem and for the world.? I sign off for the year with gratitude and appreciation for this once in a lifetime opportunity.? And lastly, I look forward to working with this incredible network of collaborators to activate our learning vision for ‘23