Career Choices, Transitions and Timing

“When did you know it was time to change roles during your career?” This question, posed by one of our summer interns last year, was interesting. I had to acknowledge that for the first 20+ years of my career, that situation never arose. For a variety of reasons, my transitions were occurring with a frequency and in directions that avoided the need for that consideration. In fairness, I suppose I am thankful I was spared that dilemma, and it did accelerate my learning. But this question did cause me to reflect on what drove those opportunities and my decisions. I’ve worked across eleven different areas/roles in the business spanning from the earliest stages of discovery through global commercialization.

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I should note that when I joined the industry in the late eighties, the pharmaceutical industry was undergoing major changes including the nature of the science being performed in those companies. Up to that point in time, most drugs in development and on the market had been generated through natural product screening, and heavy use of animal models. The biotechnology revolution was in motion but having limited impact on the creation of new therapeutics. Our understanding of disease, biological targets and pathways were limited, and the analytical tools of the era were a pale shadow of what we enjoy today. In truth, it seems almost miraculous to consider some of the new medicines that were created during that time. We owe a lot to the brilliant scientists and their hard work during prior years for those innovations.

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Yet the newer science was moving into the mainstream – more ready manipulation of genetic organisms and systems for drug discovery, many new analytical tools, expansion of structural biology approaches, the early days of truly impactful computational technologies, and more. As someone who was a relative newcomer to the industry, I just saw this explosion in capability as interesting new tools for the toolbox. But for many of my more experienced colleagues, there was tension between the old but proven approaches versus newer and perhaps not so trusted approaches. Hardly surprising – after all those previous approaches had created numerous impactful medicines. But this tension led at times to a mismatch of capabilities and approaches in drug discovery with variable outcomes.

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As a relative newcomer, it was easy to see these problems (or at least they seemed obvious) but I realize now that I was not burdened with the history underpinning those challenges. I’ve learned over the years that experience cuts both ways – a tremendous resource but also a potential source of blind spots. I was told early on in my career that “show me someone’s greatest strength and I’ll show you their greatest weakness.” At the time I was told that statement, I was highly skeptical. Today with the benefit of experience, I see how strengths can be overly leveraged, gaps conveniently masked or ignored for a time in the face of those strengths, etc. Those strengths can become a hammer in search of a nail.

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Why Are System Problems So Hard to Solve?

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I have observed that there are many smart people in industry who can identify system challenges as they arise, a smaller set of individuals are willing to propose potential solutions and an even smaller fraction who feel it is their responsibility to try to fix the situation. These system problems are oftentimes complex with deep historical roots and no quick fixes in sight. Hardly surprising that many will avoid being dragged into those settings.

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For better or worse, I was one of those ‘oddballs’ who felt I needed to be part of the solution. The messy, oftentimes chaotic, situations did not deter me – in fairness, at times I was aided by a mixture of naivety and stubbornness. Plus, the ability to gather some like-minded hardheads who were equally energized to make a difference. While I might be annoyed by the mess at hand, I enjoyed the freedom that came with exploring broad solutions plus I noted the unleashing of energy from the scientists involved. Over the years, I’ve learned that the key to success is to identify root cause(s) as opposed to symptoms and point yourself and the team at those issues.

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How I Ended Up in Management

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Lilly had hired me to start a program in microvascular complications of diabetes. But given that I had a mixed chemistry/biology background (something quite unusual in those days but normal at present), I was drawn into collaborations across virology, cardiovascular, cancer, inflammation, neuroscience and even animal health. Interesting experiences though I suspect my management back in the Diabetes world probably wondered what was going on with their new hire.

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As a result of those broader experiences though, I started to see some issues with the way new chemical matter was being identified, particularly with broad screening efforts. In way of background, keep in mind that those efforts across the industry had evolved from natural product screening designed to identify new antibacterial and antifungal drugs. Now, we were looking to apply similar approaches to targets and assay formats, even cell-based assays. The results were not always great. Data inconsistencies were impacting a couple of my projects, but as I started to dig into what was going on I began to see patterns emerging. I was sufficiently intrigued (perhaps a bit annoyed – I have noted I’m a bit stubborn in these situations) to determine what was going on and how to address the problems. Some key insights from outside partners, particularly a collaboration with Sphinx Pharmaceuticals in North Carolina were helpful as well. The usual suspects of assay validation, quality control of reagents, choice of anti-target and other secondary tests and selection of chemical diversity being studied emerged. More importantly, these challenges had solutions – super exciting!

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So, I shared my findings with the current leader of Lilly Research Laboratories expecting at best to be thanked for my information and sent on my merry way. Imagine my shock when he instead asked me to become the leader for that group and to implement the solutions I had proposed. I subsequently learned that he was very frustrated by many people complaining about the situation but apparently a lack of energy around solutions.

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“No one seems to know what is going on over there, let alone what to do about it. Why don’t you go over there and fix it for us.”

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As I’ve noted in later years, the thought that I had not so cleverly auditioned for a role that I didn’t want began to sink in. Up to this point in time, I had totally rejected the concept of going into management. I was a lab head doing science and that was my career goal. I loved the challenge of scientific projects and the collaborations they brought with them. Leaving behind my Diabetes program that was on the verge of declaring our first clinical candidate to dive into this ‘adventure’ was not my idea of a fun time.

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So, I tried to gracefully decline noting that there were many individuals more experienced than myself who would likely do a wonderful job and so on. He reminded me that others seemed to either want to ignore the problem or work around it, but I had both the interest and the energy to propose solutions. He asked, “If you don’t do this, who will?” Uggghhh – dagger through my logic.

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So, I took the role, perhaps being ready for the technical challenges but having no idea how to move from a supervisor of several scientists to a leader of a group of forty-five. All IQ but no EQ. Throw in the fact that this team was demoralized due to being blamed for the poor outcomes and here comes this new person asking them to break with the past and try quite different solutions. Not easy for any of us but I had a few early adopters of change along with a large reserve of skeptics. It turned out there were a lot of talented scientists in that group (contrary to what I had been told by other leaders), but they were frustrated by lack of receptivity to their ideas and unwillingness to invest in innovative technologies. I at least had the good sense to hear them out and make those investments – perhaps one of the few things I got right.

Ultimately, this team turned the tables and became industry leaders in their space. It would be easy to take the credit for this turnaround but in truth, the scientists themselves were the heroes here. But I did learn some valuable lessons from this experience.

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1)????? Be a problem solver, even if it isn’t your problem. Don’t expect someone else to fix it and if you are the right person for the job, jump in and try to make a difference.

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2)????? Investing in talent is the best investment. This role gave me the first glimmers of what it would be like to be intentional in growing people. To see potential and deliberately give individuals an opportunity to reach that peak. To challenge them to get out of their comfort zone and become leaders themselves.

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3)????? Transitions oftentimes come in unexpected ways and usually with highly inconvenient timing. Your choice in those moments is to make the leap or hesitate. Don’t let timing and the unexpected nature of the opportunity get in the way of moving forward.

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4)????? Many situations in life are bracketed by the three failures: Failure to See, Failure to Act and Failure to Complete. Be someone who can see challenges through to the end and make that impact sustainable.

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Of course, one of the outcomes of my early foray into leadership was that I got a reputation as someone who wasn’t afraid of demanding situations. So, a few more ‘fixer uppers’ of increasing complexity came my way. In some cases, the choices became harder and the match of my vision for my career journey versus what the organization wanted/needed became more strained.

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Moving Totally Outside of My Comfort Zone

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A few years, I had the wonderful opportunity to become of the three leaders who founded our biotherapeutics effort. This was at a time when a large amount of new biological insights was being generated by the Human Genome Project and the maturation of technologies around antibodies and other biotherapeutics gave new hope on the translation of those new discoveries. We ended up hiring over one hundred new scientists over the course of 18 months and turbocharge of people and resources were beginning to create molecules, some of which ultimately became Lilly drugs. In parallel, I was really attached to the talent of the team and was trying to apply my learnings about talent development at a larger scale.

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However, three years into that journey, I was being asked to leave Discovery Research and the team that I had poured my heart and soul into and take on the leadership of our Global Project Management organization. The problem statement was one of a rapidly growing portfolio and a realization that former approaches were insufficient to move these important projects forward. The pipeline was not static, but we had some major logjams. Throw in the fact that senior leadership was not happy at all with the situation at that time and you get a sense of my dilemma.

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My dilemma was essentially three-fold. First, I was being asked to pivot away from a team and the science they were doing that was the best career experience I had to date. Second, I felt tremendous responsibility towards those scientists and felt like I was being asked to abandon them after a short time. Third, while I was familiar (or so I thought) with what it took to move molecules to become medicines, I had the self-awareness that I really didn’t know the details, including having incomplete connections with key stakeholders.

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Of course, there was also the noise from other leaders was that we had the wrong people in that team and moving them out and other individuals in would solve our issues. Plus, expectations were high for a fast turnaround. But perhaps the worst aspect of this role is that for the first time in my leadership journey, I was now going to be truly dependent on the expertise of others and not even feeling like I knew who I could count on for advice. But I already had concerns about how we were going to develop our new molecules flowing out of discovery and was trying to see what could be done. So, another poking my nose into someplace only to get captured by an opportunity.

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Some of the root causes of the then present situation was the attempt to extrapolate the heavyweight team mindset more broadly across the portfolio and a reluctance to change approaches in the face of a rapidly growing pipeline and greater global focus. The original heavyweight team concept adopted in the early nineties for two key programs led to the delivery of successful medicines in psychiatry and osteoporosis. With laser like focus on a single program, dedicated co-located cross functional resources, experienced leadership, considerable autonomy over actions and high-level executive sponsorship, these examples became a model for future projects.

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Expansion of this model to more than 10+ late-stage programs led to the competition for talent and resources and their autonomous decision-making power created conflicts. While the concept of having this competitive team environment drives a sense of urgency, the inevitable result was a set of programs bogging each other down around key pinch points in development. Couple that with a system that did not allow for effective cross functional partnership at the portfolio level.

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Ultimately, while reinvigorating the group with new talent and providing better support for existing team members was important, the most important change was the establishment of a team of cross functional leaders who could work together and with the project teams. Rather than simply creating a governance body and attempting to leverage some degree of prioritization, this was more of a roll up your sleeves, start diagnosing the issues and creating short- and longer-term solutions for those problems. Early efforts were viewed with suspicion by the teams and their executive stakeholders but as they saw the traffic jam clearing up and future traffic jams being avoided, there was greater acceptance of the approach.

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As for myself, I tell people that this was the most crucial role I’ve ever experienced during my career. In addition to gaining valuable experience on integrated drug development all the way through global commercialization, I learned to leverage partners and become a good partner at an enterprise level. More importantly, I found my lack of subject matter expertise and the need to totally rely on others was oddly liberating. In truth, it fundamentally changed the way I thought about my leadership. How ironic that the role I was the most tempted to turn down became the most pivotal experience of my career.

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Little did I know at the time that this transition would move me away from the discovery world for 18 years, but it did create great learning opportunities across product and clinical development.

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Some key learnings of these experiences (and others) are as follows:

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1)????? Don’t be afraid of getting out of your comfort zone. Too often, I see individuals who are interested in pursuing opportunities but then rationalize that those choices are the wrong ones, wrong timing, etc.

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2)????? Make your own magic happen. Don’t expect others to pave a path for you or tell you the right choices to make. Own your future.

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3)????? Play offense as opposed to defense. Playing it safe will suboptimize your journey. Challenge yourself to excel and don’t be afraid to be uncomfortable. Discomfort and making mistakes/learning from them is part of the process.

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4)????? Become intentional on how you use your time and energy but don’t get stuck with analysis paralysis. Life rarely goes A -> B -> C. Instead, you will see A -> X -> H. Become the person who says yes to new opportunities.

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5)????? Your best learning occurs when you do your own homework and are prepared to get your hands dirty in doing the work. It is fair to leverage the insights and capabilities from others but don’t make that a substitute for doing the work yourself.

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6)????? Bringing in an outside leader or leaders can jumpstart teams into new directions. You are not beholden to former solutions and as a newcomer you can challenge the status quo.

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Best wishes to all as you consider your own adventure!