You're basically creating miracles that fit in the palm of your hand and you're helping reimagine life for patients.
20 YEARS IN PERSPECTIVE:
Givers are not good takers.
I don't think of the 2000s as twenty years ago, I still think of the 80s, or the 70s as twenty years ago.
I started in Singapore, then went back to the US and lived and worked in New Jersey and Chicago, then Munich, London and back in the US. I was fortunate enough to have those opportunities with the same company, so I have actually been with one company since I left INSEAD.
The biggest challenge is, I'll call it kind of “recognizing my own power” and what I can contribute versus being told or accepting my situation. I think the biggest challenge for a lot of women in leadership, from a career standpoint, is stretching without hesitation for those bigger roles.
For the last several years I've made mentoring both within the company, as well as outside the company a priority for me.
Being able to talk about yourself is something that I'm not comfortable doing, but I've had to do it, so I've learned to do it.
Carving out a half a day or even an hour to go do something that I want to do, it doesn't come easily, it does not come easily at all.
ON TOPIC: Pharma, healthcare, lifespan, longevity
My biggest frustration with how the industry is viewed is the cost of drugs in the overall healthcare system is maybe 10% of the total cost of health care. Yet, where we try to push for savings is on the cost of drugs, which doesn't fundamentally solve the problem of access to care and cost of care.
The frustration is, we're not picking the right battles to fight to change the health care system model. But that doesn't change the fact that what we do every day as an industry is work on products that hopefully just provide more for patients.
The process that works is, in the early stages of development you pick certain disease areas that you feel like have a strong unmet need and you try to find targets to battle that disease.
What we're seeing now in the industry, which is different from before is, the FDA is much more open to looking at real-world evidence and shorter-term studies to give access to products for patients compared to before.
So even the regulatory pathways are trying to allow for faster innovation than what we had before.
It is a very competitive industry, even in spaces like oncology, because 10 - 15 years ago you might have had 1 option, now you have multiple options, which is great for the patient, because now you can have your choice of products whether it's better side effect profile, even potentially better efficacy, and companies will continue to invest in it.
Luckily in developed countries you do see an increase in lifespan, but you still have a lack of access to care in a lot of, whether it's sub-Saharan Africa, even India.
What I'm hopeful for is that we will have more longevity. What I'm worried about is that we don't appreciate that and we don't take advantage of that extra time that we will hopefully all have right and about what we're going to do with that time.
I'd rather see us be able to enjoy that extra time rather than just continue to work our asses off during that time.
ON TOPIC: corporate life, cultural differences
“Do not schedule a meeting during lunchtime, because nobody will come to your meeting and they will be pissed off at you.”
All THINGS INSEAD AND GIVING BACK
Milena: So you're not buying an Amphi.
Guest: I'm not buying an Amphi, no.
I feel like I'm doing some small part to ensure that the future is more positive for some of those individuals.