He made Eli Lilly the most valuable drug company by market cap.

His company was acquired by Lilly and within 8 years he became Lilly's CSO.

He took brave bets in areas no one was willing to go for patients—and he won.

8 principles from Dan Skovronsky's leadership playbook: 1. Work on something really hard for a long time.

Dan Skovronsky was at home when he got a call from Lilly's statisticians informing him that their drug was effective.

Donanemab could slow the progression of Alzheimer’s by 35%.

He 5X'ed AstraZeneca's productivity from pre-clinical to phase III completion and transformed the company's R&D strategy, culture and approach to innovation.

I spent hours researching Mene Pangalos.

10 key principles from his leadership playbook: 1. We Don't Do Backups Anymore!

"When I joined in 2010 I tried to get everyone bought into reasons why we needed to change and learn from what we had done before.

So, we looked at all of the projects that were run from 2005-2010. We were spending about $5B a year on R&D.

"Drug discovery is an insanely complicated activity; what makes a great leader in our industry is the ability to hold a team together for a very long time."—Joshua Boger, Founder of Vertex

11 Strategies for Motivating and Holding a Biotech Team Together for a Long Time: 🧵 1. Don't Tell a Star What to Do.

A biotech team is a bunch of brilliant PhDs, postdocs, and scientists.

These folks are hustlers by nature, but you have to press the right buttons.

299 biotech companies went public between 1979 and 1996 in the US.

Of the top executives of those companies, 81 came from Baxter International.

Henri Termeer was one of them.

How did Baxter's culture breed exceptional biotech leaders? 🧵 1. Sink or swim.

Imagine that you’re a bright 28-year-old MBA graduate working for a top medical supply firm.

Suddenly, on a Friday morning, you're told you’ll be running a division in another country on Monday—with a flight booked for this evening.

10 Fundraising Tips for Biotech Founders/CEOs. 🧬 💰

(a mega 🧵) 1. Be an FBI Interrogator.

I often hear, "I've spoken to x investors. They said they want to see more data/proof".

And I go, "What data/proof do they want to see specifically? Did you ask them? Did they tell you?"

7 Must-Read Books for the Bench Scientist Turning Biotech Leader/CEO: 📚 🧬

1. From Breakthrough to Blockbuster This is a fantastic book on the business of biotech: the players, the interactions, the agendas, the numbers, the challenges.

• backed with data
• beautifully written
• published less than a year ago

Here are 10 key insights from the book:

https://twitter.com/angelosgeo/status/1631699915553243157

Great biotech teams have conflict.

And every conflict is a chance to strengthen and unite the team.

My 5-step "multidisciplinary" framework for turning conflict into trust: Before we dive in...

You guys are a bunch of stars who:

• are ALL experts in your fields
• speak different languages
• work in a non-academic environment probably for the first time
• left academia/research because you're hungry for impact

Of course, you'll have conflict!

Whether you are a startup team of 3 or a Google team of 100K…

Each one of the 3 or 100K sees something that the other 2 or 99999 don’t see.

Each one has some sort of micro-information that is not available to the others. Each one can see a part of the elephant, but not the elephant.

Biotwitter, I've discovered a hidden gem!

The business of biotech: the players, the numbers, the challenges.

10 key insights for biotech leaders: 1. Molecules + Money = Medicines

The scientists need the financiers; the financiers need the scientists.

It's a marriage, a 100% symbiotic relationship.

To create new medicines, both sides must be able to see the world through each other's eyes and work well together.

Drug development is a game where you can do everything right and still lose...

If you find this hard to accept, read on. 🧵 As I was reading Science Lessons by Amgen's former CEO, Gordon Binder, I got stuck on this paragraph above...

I thought:

"Is there a way to win in this game even if you lose the game?"

It felt like a good question to ask...

Bench scientist to biotech CEO is a brutal transition.

6 key mindset shifts for the biotech leaders of tomorrow: 1. From scientist to politician

The biotech industry has some unique challenges:

• long lifecycles
• capital intensity
• high risk
• pharma alliances
• regulatory scrutiny

To navigate these challenges you need to build strong communication, sales and networking skills.

George Church on the founder-led biotech movement:

"The student/postdoc is more motivated, more knowledgeable, and more capable of getting a technology out into the public, where it can do some good... 1/4 Whether they need to be CEO or not is not always clear, it is often a personal decision, but the more control they have, the more likely that their technology will stay on track and not go off the rails.

Everyone in biotech should read this book.

8 insights for those who want to succeed and have an impact in this beautifully unique business: 1. Ambition + Purpose > Skill.

Bob Duggan, the man who took over Pharmacyclics from its founder and Stanford professor Richard Miller, was neither a scientist nor a doctor.

He was a college dropout!

These 10 biotech founders have raised more than $350 million in VC funding.

Here's their top fundraising advice to rising founders: 1. Tell a story that speaks to a unique opportunity.

Investors look for opportunities where they can see the value where no one can.

If they think that you're one of the 100 people doing the same thing, how do they know that *you* will be the winner?

I spent over 100 hours researching and reflecting on 70+ interviews with biotech founders.

7 principles these founders all agree on: 1. Fall in Love with the Problem, not your Technology.

Building in healthcare is not about how you can use your technology to help the patient.

It's about using whatever technology you have to use to solve the patient's problem.

Gmail was a startup within Google.

And its creator, Google's #23 employee Paul Buchheit, a real founder.

Gmail received a lot of resistance from Googlers in the early days.

Here's the story and 7 Lessons from Gmail's founder: 🧵 When Buchheit had this idea about Gmail back in 2001, everyone at Google was obsessed with search.

The idea of doing something like email was strange.

"Gmail was controversial internally", in Buchheit's words.

These investors rejected Steve Jobs.

But they all "funded" him as a group paradoxically...

If you're a founder, read this.

These lessons are as relevant today as they were in 1976 when Apple was a fledging company. 🧵 1. Tom Perkins and Eugene Kleiner (Kleiner Perkins) refused even to meet with Jobs.

2. Bill Draper sent an associate to visit Apple, and when the associate reported that Jobs and Wozniak had kept him waiting, Draper wrote them off as "arrogant".