Alloutcoach

What happens when you add the role and duty of "inspiring people" to your title of a leader whether or not it is in your job description? It becomes a secret ingredient to your team's success, your legacy, high team engagement, recognition and awards. Larry Freedman, an award winning pharma executive is the type of inspirational leader I had the fortune of working with at a global pharma company, AstraZeneca, who personifies success. He has authored a new article called "The Sequence of Success" based on his determination to make inspiring others his duty. In our introspective reflection of his career and philosophy, he explains how he led "two levels deep" to turn around a slow launch of a global cardiovascular product and earn the company's most prestigious CEO Award to go on to become one of the most decorated award winning leaders in his organization and discusses many other pressing management topics of today.

3:19 - Q1: Key Factors to Career Success?

3:37 - 1. Perform 2. Network outside of your function to let others know you 3. Think strategically about your skills and even 2 jobs ahead. 4. Be grateful

5:53 - Q2: What are your leadership lessons and sequence in which we should follow them?

7:29 - Difference between Holding Someone Accountable and Inspiring their Accountability.

7:47 - Vulnerability, Humility, and Authenticity creates Trust and Followership.

8:13 - Candid Feedback without a relationship = criticism

8:26 - One person with passion is better than 40 that are merely interested

8:36 - The Last Leadership Lesson is Leave People better than you found them.

9:10 - Q3: How were you able to shorten the perceived distance between you and your team members as a second-level leader?

9:30 - Visibility and relationships that were two levels deep.

11:59 - Q4: How did you reward technical performance vs behaviors and culture to inspire accountability?

15:32 - Q5: Is sales a transfer of emotion?

17:13 - Q6: What are some of the specific approaches you have to increase engagement among new employees entering the work force today?

17:32 - Authenticity, Consistency, and described the Frequency to be in front of people. We focused on culture and took the results of the bi-annual culture survey very seriously. We dissected results to find the strengths and weaknesses. Diversity and Inclusion grants a competitive advantage. A Speak Up Culture.

18:48 - A speak up culture is not only not being afraid to state your opinion but being encouraged to.

19:17 - Two reasons why people don't speak up, 1) they are afraid of reprisal / retaliation from senior management or difference of opinion; 2) they are afraid even if they speak up nothing will change anyways. I consistently explained why I supported a particular suggestion or complaint or did not and earned trust over time.

21:44 - Q7: Do you feel it was the relationships you prioritized early that helped you overcome adversity?

21:58 - I felt a tremendous responsibility to my team whether my team was 5 or 50 or 500. The belief system is the same. When you lead you have the opportunity to make a difference in people's lives.

22:42 - People feel when there is care and concern beyond what they can do and who they are as people. That taps into their discretionary effort!

23:39 - Q8: Success is a sequence and also a cycle. How do you continue to have the Leadership foundation when Recognition at all costs is so tempting?

24:19 - How do you continue along that path of the Leadership Foundation when Recognition alone is so tempting now?

26:58 - Q9: What is the most common or favorite compliment you usually receive?

28:33 - Q10: What is the next project in which you are stretching yourself and lifting others?

30:37 - Q11: What is the next project in which you are stretching yourself and lifting others?

As a long-time fan and supporter of the author of the best-selling book "Predicting the Turn", Dave Knox, I enjoyed the opportunity to sit down with Dave to discuss the journey of businesses that incorporate a culture of innovation in a systematic manner and the results that follow. Dave Knox is a brand builder, venture investor, international keynote speaker, digital innovator, business coach, and award winning author. He was the leading digital voice and advocate at Procter and Gamble, Chief Marketing Officer at Rockfish, a leading digital marketing agency, after which he had built a non-profit start-up business / accelerator "The Brandery" which transformed 85 startups. Here are some of the highlights from our conversation: 02:50 - How did you develop the instinct of observation of innovation early in your career? 3:04 - Why Dave pursued "Brand Building" 4:47 - Views on Entreprenurship 7:10 - The concept behind "The Brandery" authentic to the city of brands, Cincinnati 7:46 - Why Brands are often misunderstood 9:14 - Examples of startups "The Brandery" helped transform 10:32 - The end result of "The Brandery" was receiving an endowment that today is funding the next generation of entrepreneurs. It allows businesses in Cincinnati to receive grants to grow their organizations and keep them going. 11:32 - Q: At what point do you stop making observations and start implementing and making decisions as a startup? 11:47 - Dave Knox's "Continuous Beta" concept 12:51 - Dave's Innovation Matrix from his book - Core Innovation, Adjacent Innovation, and Transformational Innovation. 13:03 - Devote 70% to Core Innovation, 20% to Adjacent Innovation, 10% to Transformational Innovation 13:43 - Q: What is the formula to innovation that leads to companies taking out their competitors completely in the brutal business environment today? 14:07 - Uber's extension of its Total Addressable Market (TAM) size 15:46 - Innovation Case Studies from Dave's book 16:05 - Spotify's transition from music streaming alone to "share of ear" audio company and Under Armour's journey in consumer data 20:19 - Q: What is the subtle difference between adjacent and transformational innovation according to your definition? Procter & Gamble and Tesla examples 25:02 - Q: Are there certain Innovation strategies that are more successful than others according to your research? Contrast in innovation approaches between Venture Capitalists and Corporations 26:17 - Why you should consider a combination of approaches to innovation: 1) direct or strategic investments; 2) being an LP into other venture funds; 3) partnerships / individuals helping you engage with the ecosystem 27:26 Q: Metrics - How do you inspire and evaluate the quality of innovation that benefits society? 27:49 - Ben Franklin anecdote on editing a marketing billboard 31:42 - Coca-Cola acquiring insight into new selling operations from Dirty Lemon case study 34:49 - Q: What does "predicting the turn" mean to you in light of the pandemic and the last two years? How has its definition become relevant or changed? 35:44 - Alcohol Industry's transformation and new laws after the pandemic 38:01 - Evolution of Autonomous Cars Technology, future use cases and predictions 46:13 - Views of the role of technology on social responsibility 

I recently had a truly unique  opportunity to discuss a complex yet rapidly evolving topic of how to use and update our social media and digital communication policies with social and healthcare responsibility while improving our impact on the quality and timeliness of medical decisions! Darshan Kulkarni, PharmD,  MS, Esq is a dynamic expert educator in this field who owns his private law firm, is a life sciences  counselor, speaker, author, board member, and host of the DarshanTalks podcast who shared his perspectives on the latest developments in this field. Below are the highlights from our discussion.

6:20 Pharma and device social media / digital communication policies are highly variable across small and mature companies. Some smaller teams are building them from scratch, yet others are not updating them either deliberately, not prioritizing them, or are not addressing off-label discussions and their impact. 7:52 There have been several court cases that have admonished the FDA for being overly aggressive with its enforcement. The FDA released a 60-page memo in which it acknowledged that it does not know what to do with off-label discussions in social media or via multiple digital channels.8:30 In 1998 there were 195 or so warning letters from the FDA's DDMAC division and last year there were only 6. The FDA is trying to get its bearings on what is happening. Many companies have not updated their HCP engagement policies. The Pharma organization updated its policy in mid-January. There are discussions around "space limited" engagements. On social media, you have to decide whether or not your will have social media pages that are product based, company based, or claims-based. 11:44 What are any differences in risk and liability of a Medical vs Sales organization in pharma today? The DOJ had several court cases in the early 2000s that said either you have a Medical Affairs department that is absolutely separate or you both abide by commercial speech standards, not Amendment 1. For decades, the FDA regulated based on approvals, so if the requirement based on the standard of "truthful not misleading" is thrown out it may upend the entire regulatory schema that existed. So the court responded that the 1st amendment has been changing since the 1980's but the FDA has not updated it. 16:03 The FDA is convening a Task Force to address 1st Amendment application concern in pharma. 17:22 Most pharma companies are still operating under a clear distinction between Medical and Sales from early 2000s but this will likely change in the next 2-5 years. 17:40 Q: What are some types of social media activities that are safe vs others that are more scrutinized? 21:48 CDRH in Medical Devices has significantly less resources than CDR's OPDP in pharma, and this is why the regulations in medical devices are much more loosely defined. 25:05 Has the line of "misleading" changed over the last few years? How can we balance the misleading medical information used by patients themselves? 27:05 Confident and Reliable Scientific Evidence (CRS) FDAMA114 - lowest level of truthful not misleading information. The second is Substantial Scientific Evidence (SSE) which is rarely if ever used. The third level of information used for claims is Substantial Evidence, classically referred to as two randomized controlled studies (RCTs) needed for drug approval. The New Patient Focused Drug Development FDA guidance is now advocating for pharma to communicate with patients. EMA has lay summaries to communicate clinical trial results in a language accessible to the general public. Many ICMJE journals now require for trial sponsors to provide a lay summary for patients prior to consideration of publication. 41:20 How are the current latest regulations impacting how transparent we can or have to be in reporting clinical trials? There are 7 levels of clinical trial transparency (discussed in detail). 

A big part of the reason my latest podcast guest, Rohit Sood, has become a successful and recognized leader, mentor and growth advisor in the pharma industry, is because he has been able to build successful teams. This is how his colleagues describe his unique success story as a recognized pharmaceutical industry scholar, Rutgers Business School lecturer, expert in organizational change, investor, and senior executive in life sciences who currently serves as Executive Vice President of Global Commercialization at EVERSANA. Rohit prefers to make deep and deliberate connections in business and he shares some truly unique, practical case studies and solutions on performance metrics, hiring, team dynamics, mentorship, growth mindset, and execution in this episode. 3:10 - Q: What were some of the strongest teams you worked with or led in your career that you still remember today? 6:47 - Q: What are the principles to building a strong team? 9:32 - Q: How do you design a structure around a team with a strong culture and vision? 13:45 - Q: Why do teams with best products and best performers fail? 19:27 – We discuss a story of a state tennis champion three years back to back who plays on a high school basketball team as a bench player the entire season, wins a state championship, and later admits openly to his teammates that winning as a bench player was his biggest accomplishment to date because he was a member of a team even though he had won individual tennis state championships. Rohit: we all have certain role players on our teams. You do not have to be at the center of every play or decision of your team. One of my favorite interview questions - tell me about a time when you were a role player - what was your contribution to the success of failure, and reason? 21:12 - Q: Performance metrics - Do you think performance metrics can be designed to promote collaboration as well as healthy competition? The Net Promoter Scores at Eversana are very high. Team Collaboration will be one of our metrics we will be tracking at Eversana that will be a part of the variable compensation of our employees! We will capture these metrics by gathering feedback from various brand teams across different functions. Did you feel included? Did you know what decisions were being made? We have also implemented frameworks around processes and operations. Our philosophy is that leaders have to be consistent. And consistency does not just happen. There have to be operations and processes in place that allow for consistency in execution. In summary, we are focused on 3 KPIs - 1) internal behaviors that ensure a collaborative culture; 2) behaviors that stimulate our clients and stakeholders' satisfaction of the quality of our products through their feedback; and 3) operations and processes to ensure consistency. 25:56 - Metrics also impact how you think about your goals for the year. We have three tiers of goals at Eversana. The first goals are tied to organizational performance. The second are corporate citizenship goals - make sure to do something in your role that impacts work outside of your day job! The third level of performance goals are related to individual interests. 33:06 - Aspirational idea of 1 single global metric - earnings per share. If not met, individual metrics come into play - hierarchy / tiered approach. 36:45 - Q: How do you recalibrate teams after successes or failures? 38:39 - Case study of a recent team member's problem with a deadline 41:28 – Q: Do you think the sense of belonging is what helps the best teams to succeed specifically? 45:24 - Q: How do you manage transitioning from team to team as often as we do today? 49:43 - Q: Should everyone start a team of their own regardless of their role or experience? 58:54 - Key Final Messages from Rohit!

3:17 Q1: What were some of the episodes or who were some of the people that determined your career path?

4:50 I was blessed throughout life to have someone always see something in me.

5:52 - Johnny had previously gone to a predominantly black school where he served as President, but during school de-segregation he had to go to a predominantly white local school where he was now a minority. He tells the story of this transition during which he no longer went to the new school but one gentleman, his first mentor, followed him throughout high school and picked him up in the mornings to force him to go to school.

9:02 - Story of his first work experience @Gen Mills as an ambitious young employee who was quickly taught a lesson of respect and human resource optimization by his management 

11:54 - Why Johnny almost left Procter & Gamble (P&G) where he would spend over 32 years

16:44 - I've seen so many people leave organizations because they were not clear about what was expected of them, nor did they know how to communicate to their leaders what they wanted and needed in order to succeed.

19:16 - How do you recognize talent early to hire the right employee in the first place?

20:51 - 1. Get a broad base of good talent. 2. Behavioral interviewing - try to get the candidate to talk about themselves, their likes. Ask if they have not just the technical skills which they can learn cognitively but also the emotional intelligence skills and the resilience.

24:12 - When did you first observe that you knew how to observe and recognize people?

28:37 - Q: After you hire the right person, how do you inspire them to collaborate with each other?

34:26 - Q: How do you approach measuring performance / metrics?

45:17 - Diversity and Inclusion - In the House vs Out of the House Example. Diversity is one of the most powerful tools we have in the workplace.

46:11 - About 20% of the workplace feels like they are not included or shut down. It's not that they do not know information or do not have the skills. They have simply been invited to the dance, but nobody is asking them to dance.

48:14 - What are some stories of conflicts you have managed that have stayed in your memory?

53:26 - How important is the timing of resolving a particular conflict?

56:40 - What are the key success factors of making the right or best decision?

1:01:07 - Q: What are the best accomplishments across different environments as you moved from working in manufacturing, Sales, HR to working for the state government?

1:05:44 - My passion is helping others navigate through their workplace life cycle more easily. You go through a cycle in life that consists of three stages during which you are raw, you are cooked, or you are burned, and start all over again! 

1:07:39 - What's the next project you are pursuing to reinvent yourself? 

Listen to this global overview of the digital wearable landscape in this educational discussion I truly enjoyed with Joao Bocas, a global Top 100 Digital Health Influencer, Keynote Speaker, and Consultant, CEO of Digital Salutem, a company that enables healthcare companies to brand and market their digital health and wearable solutions as well as to implement digital transformation on an organizational level rapidly using world class technology. Connect with Digital Salutem, and Joao Bocas on Twitter and LinkedIn and follow his YouTube Healthcare Channel called "Digital Health and Wearable Series"!  

1.17 Did sports inspire you to pursue starting a business in wellness, fitness, and healthcare wearables? 

4.06 How do those who are not experts in digital wearables separate the signals from the noise among the growing availability of such devices? 

5.28 What are some of the new products among consumer health or medical device wearables that pique your interest?  

8:11 - About half of the consumers stop using wearables after 6 months. No engagement means no data, and no data means no value. 8:56 - How do you validate the accuracy of the data of the wearables as well as the privacy? 

12:36 - What are the types of companies or wearable brands you consult the most? 

14:09 - Has it become easier to bring a wearable device to the market? 

16:09 - What are the key factors that play a role in adoption and utilization of wearables?

19:34 - COVID highlighted the potential for wearables and what can be done with digital health. A few months ago, we could not go to the hospital or go to the doctor because of the pandemic. So how do you monitor your patient's conditions, and what is important to act on urgently to make clinical or treatment decisions, the answer to all of which is in healthcare wearables.  

21:23 - What tips do you suggest for businesses wishing to enter the market to differentiate their wearables? 

23:24 - Can you share a glimpse of your organization at Digital Salutem and what services you offer? 

26:11 - What are some best practices and metrics of how wearables have improved patient outcomes? There are medical devices now that tell diabetic patients how much insulin they need at a given time. There are types of wearables that provide you with 8-9 different datasets, and the busy provider usually selects 2-3 datasets. So wearables generate an abundance of data which is a challenge for clinicians to identify particular trends quickly to make important decisions. And if providers are successful in quickly filtering the data as rapidly as possible to identify an arrhythmia among all the data available, wearables can bring a lot of value in my opinion

29:11 - Do you believe wearables can bridge our fragmented system of healthcare? 

30:54 - Slovenia is a small country, but it is the most digital economy in the world. All of the electronic health records are in one place in Slovenia. Three years prior, the country prioritized and planned ahead, and decided that in three years they would gather all electronic health records in one location. Finland and Denmark are two other countries that plan ahead, execute well, and are more open-minded in exploring innovative approaches to healthcare. I must say that these are smaller countries where implementing such technology may be simpler however the process of execution is the same so let's not make excuses if we live in larger countries with 300 million people, for example. Slovenia, Finland, and Denmark are three countries that incentivize and support innovation. Yet, because we are so fragmented in our healthcare system in the U.K. we are far behind in consolidating our healthcare patient records.

This is a recording of the type of critical, candid, yet fun conversation that is also a hands-on expert lesson on how to think creatively with purpose in a distracted world with one of the brightest and creative individuals I have met. I sat down with Jonah Sachs, a true original thinker, marketing executive, speaker, philanthropist, and author of "Unsafe Thinking" and “Winning the Story Wars” who shared his personal perspectives on unlocking creativity with social responsibility and purpose to spread the ideas that matter! Highlights: 04:19 – What inspired you to write “Unsafe Thinking”? Jonah: This book describes my personal journey to answer how I along with my ad agency could re-learn to break the rules once again which is how we had originally become successful. 7:08 – What are some of the ideas that matter to you today? Jonah: I have now moved from marketing to philanthropy and am very concerned as a father about the state of our climate and the ecological crisis we are about to face. 9:19 – Do you have to have a clear vision in order to spread the ideas that matter? 10:04 – Jonah: Scene from “The Matrix” where Neo is tied up and Agents Smith 11:12 – There is a story in your book “Unsafe Thinking” about an expedition to discover the new source of the Nile river that captivated me. What are some of the lessons from it you wanted to convey to the readers? Jonah: In 2005, one adventurer, Cam McLeay and his team navigated the Nile all the way from the mouth to what they call its new source, farther than anyone had ever done. They were expert navigators and included an expert aviator and were able to make their boats fly by attaching wings to their boat to fly over the top of the waterfall. It took one small innovation at a time at every challenge to accomplish this feat. 13:32 – Jonah: Use Fear as Fuel - Mahatma Gandhi case study of learning to embrace and manage his fears. 16:50 – Tim Grover, Michael Jordan’s personal coach of many years, and the author of “W1NNING” states that fear teaches you how to win, while doubt merely teaches you what to do in order not to lose. 18:35 – What kind of feedback have you received while touring for your book “Unsafe Thinking” for 2 years globally? Jonah: The most common response is “I would love to take risks but my boss or my company or my clients just will not let me “. We live in a world that constantly rewards conformism so an important lesson I have learned is to be an explorer, not an expert. 21:45 – Jonah: Study of 20,000 so-called recognized “experts” by Philip Tetlock at Berkeley 23:42 – Dr. Barry Marshall’s unconventional approach that led to the cure of ulcers and his Nobel prize. 27:37 – Yuval Harrari, a globally renowned lecturer, writer, and history professor from Oxford, says that “our history began when we created Gods and our history will end when we become Gods”. 28:45 – Jonah: Harrari has another fantastic quote – “The Scientific Revolution was kicked off when we started being more interested in what we did not know than in what we know.” 29:33 – Question from the LinkedIn Live Audience: What are your thoughts on tactics for convincing the expert that maybe the newbies/outsiders’ ideas are better? Jonah: Shared information bias is a situation in which teams of people gravitate towards what most agree upon. 32:36 – How can we utilize technology in a way to make the ideas that matter go global? Jonah: We consulted Tristan Harris on the famous Netflix movie called “Social Dilemma”, which talks about how we are being manipulated by social media. But distraction may also be a big part of our creativity. 36:35 – Your ideas and dedication to social responsibility is inspiring. As Andy Warhol said, “the idea is not to live forever but to leave ideas that will”. Jonah: Any piece of advice taken to the extremes will lead you to the safe thinking cycle. Listen to the experts, take it all in, and live a varied life of unexpected moments of discovery!