It’s 7:15 a.m on the final day of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference and Mike Rice, a founding partner of LifeSci Advisors, is exceedingly energetic.
It’s hard to hold that against him because it’s for a worthy cause. Rice is excited because he’s now on the right side of the gender diversity debate in biotech and pharma. And it’s no longer just words. His team has created a program and a movement in less than 12 months.
To his left is Kate Bingham, a managing partner at SV Life Sciences, who matches Rice’s enthusiasm and brings the necessary credibility. On the elevator on the way down, Bingham underscored Rice’s commitment. Like many others, she was skeptical when LifeSci Advisors switched gears amidst a deluge of industry criticism.
It all began last January, at a reception hosted by LifeSci Advisors during the 2016 healthcare conference.
For the second year in a row, the New York-based financial communications firm chose to staff its party with female models acquired from local talent agencies. They wore non-business attire (read: there were cut-outs and a lot of leg).
On this occasion, several reporters from Bloomberg happened to attend. Outraged by the role women were accredited at the event — and at the wider healthcare congress — they wrote a scathing article that brought the issue to the fore.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
In the immediate aftermath, Rice and LifeSci Advisors dug a hole, stating that the models were a necessary solution to the extreme lack of female guests in attendance.
In response, Bingham and Karen Bernstein of Biocentury penned a frustrated open letter that was signed by hundreds of influential men and women in the life sciences.
“We can’t believe it’s 2016 and we have to spend our time writing this letter,” the first sentence read.
Rice flew back to New York and did some reflecting. After some time, the perspective of Bingham and other’s began to sink in, he said. So he picked up the phone and gave Bingham a call, requesting an in-person interview.
Over breakfast the following week, they bridged the gap and joined forces.
Boardroom Ready
Raising awareness is one thing. Tackling the issue and changing perspectives is another.
To begin taking action, LifeSci Advisors, Bingham and Women in Bio teamed up on a new program called Boardroom Ready.
The curriculum covers both public and private companies, lessons on how to be a director and more. This is taught during two in-person sessions, a couple of months apart. Each candidate is then paired with a mentor for ongoing advice and support.
The ultimate end-goal is to get each candidate a seat on a relevant board.
“I actually think the board angle is a real accelerator to get people into the C-suite,” Bingham told MedCity News.
Board positions frequently act as a launching pad.
“You can say, we want to have more women in the C-suite, which of course we all do,” she said. “But actually, achieving that is much tougher than getting qualified women on boards who are sub-C-suite. If they are at that level, and they have board experience, when they then go up for C-suite jobs they are much better qualified.”
Seventy women applied for the 2016 Boardroom Ready Program. Kate Haviland, a chief business officer at Blueprint Medicines, was one of twenty candidates chosen.
Kate Haviland, Blueprint Medicines CBO
Blueprint already stands out when it comes to equal opportunity. The leadership is 50-50 female and male, Haviland said, and one of its core goals for 2017 is to further increase diversity on the board.
According to Haviland, the progressive approach stems from CEO Jeff Albers, but it is supported by the wider leadership team and company culture.
It was Albers that told Haviland about the Boardroom Ready Program and suggested she sign up.
“He found out about it and sent it to me and said you know, I think this would be a great thing. And, if you’re interested, I would fully support you applying and support, you know, me essentially being on a board as well,” she said.
That happens to address one of the remaining challenges Bingham discussed. Many large pharma companies are reluctant to let their senior leadership – male and female – serve on outside boards. There is a risk they will get recruited.
It’s a mentality that has to be overcome, Bingham said, to grow the talent base of the industry.
Haviland believes the increased awareness is particularly vital for women looking to make that next step up.
“It’s the idea of, giving a more public venue for senior women and accomplished women to raise their hand and say ‘hey I’m interested in these kinds of leadership roles and board seats,’ so that if something does come up, they are on the list and they are considered,” Haviland said of the program.
That doesn’t guarantee them a spot, she added; there are many other criteria to fit. But awareness must come first.
“Just having your name on a list, where people can at least evaluate your experience is half the battle.”
Onwards and upwards
“I’ve now got people in the streets saying, I want to tell you what we’re doing for gender because it’s really cool,” Bingham said on Thursday morning.
“Then a week before the conference, I get an email from a lady who I’ve sold businesses to, so you know, really senior. And she said ‘I’ve just been on this Boardroom Ready Program sponsored by LifeSci Advisors. I want to tell you what a great program it was,'” Bingham said. “So then I just met up with her and her team from J&J and they’re saying, now what can we do?”
“I love that,” Rice chimes in. “I was sitting with another J&J person who went through the boardroom program and she was saying that they wouldn’t be a sponsor of this event unless there was a diversity panel and there were women sitting on those panels. I said that’s great. Because when they say that, it really does carry a lot of weight.”
On Wednesday morning, another open letter went out to the industry, outlining more concrete recommendations for improving female representation. Rice and Bingham were among more than one hundred cosignatories.
There is still a long way to go. The healthcare investor conference still looks like a scene out of the Matrix with thousands of men in suits.
Yet there is a lot to be optimistic about. With the momentum now underway, it seems the infamous LifeSci party could be the best thing to happen to women in biopharma in recent years.
“It has catalyzed everything,” Bingham said of getting Rice and LifeSci Advisors on board.
Photo: Choreograph, Getty Images
