If you have been following the PHUSE Education video podcasts, you’ll have already learnt about four of the six skills that heads of statistical programming functions need, to be successful. In case you missed them, head to our PHUSE Education Job Skills section.
Another fundamental skill that programming heads need is how to cultivate innovation, particularly in an innovative industry such as the pharmaceutical industry, and in times of accelerated digital disruption.
In our latest PHUSE video podcast, Amy Gillespie (Merck & Co.) and Andy York (UCB) talk about innovation, how they acquired this skill and how they ensure a culture of innovation within their teams. Both Amy and Andy look back to more than 25 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry and share their insights into this interesting topic.
Watch Cultivates Innovation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yvb_9GN4bQ0
Companies like Google, Amazon and Apple are well known for their great innovation culture. Many of their (digital) products have been huge successes and some of them have proven to be true market disrupters. It is this innovative out-of-the-box thinking, as Andy calls it, which makes these companies so successful. Now, in times of digital transformation, statistical programming functions are fishing in the same pool of data science talent. As a leader of such an organisation, Amy is convinced that one needs to continuously look forward and to position their teams for future success and attracting talent.
Of course, the pharmaceutical industry needs to be innovative by design. Development of new drugs needs to start with innovation, regardless of whether the drug is based on a new medical compound or a new mode of action. But what does innovation look like in a statistical programming function and how can a leader create a culture of innovation?
As a functional leader, you need to understand your team and to know their technical capabilities and innovation potential. You need to be able to clearly communicate a vision so that your teams can build the innovative stepping stones to deliver on this vision. As a leader, there are many options to create an innovative culture. You could, for example, follow Amy’s example and create cross-functional and diverse-skilled innovation teams who solve various business problems. Frequent and planned leadership rotations is another good example to ensure that teams benefit from fresh ideas. Or, simply listen to your various project teams and discover how they solved problems.
If you want to dive deeper into the topic of cultivating innovation, there are several great resources available:
A true eye-opener is the thought-provoking HBR article The Hard Truth About Innovative Cultures, written by Gary P. Pisano.
Although more than 16 years old, every single word in the great TED talk about The era of open innovation by Charles Leadbeater is still up to date.
The book How Google Works by Eric Schmidt provides intimate insights into one of the most innovative companies.
Our PHUSE Education team is continually pooling educational material to help our community to explore these vital job skills further.
