Written by Vinam Puri Vishal Soni, Ph.D., is the Principal and CEO of Viridbio Solutions, a service-providing company focused on medical writing, medical communications and information technology. Prior to Viribidio, he served as global head of NTE and Clinical Pharmacology Medical Writing at Teva Pharmaceuticals and a team leader at Innopharma (now part of Pfizer). He taught Immunology, Microbiology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard Medical School, and Medical Microbiology at the University of Massachusetts and Fairleigh Dickinson University. With experience in regulatory medical writing, scientific communications, molecular diagnostics and drug development, Dr. Soni’s work has been published in nine peer-reviewed journals and presented at 12 national/international conferences. He has led global teams for development of global medical affairs plans and clinical development plans and has submitted more than 20 New Drug Applications, Biologics License Applications and 25 Investigational New Drugs. He authored two book chapters, named on eight patents and has supported clinical documents of more than 100 studies across 25 different programs. He completed his doctoral degree at the Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, India, followed by postdoctoral research in Cell and Molecular Biology at Harvard Medical School. 
Viridbio Solutions mostly work with Pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, and a festreamlw medical devices companies. Viridbio Solutions helps them ine a clinical development and medical strategy. They also provide efficient documentation requirements such as Biologics License Applicatio andn Investigational New Drug Application. In addition, they often meet with Key Opinion Leaders and Key External Expert to seek their opinion on a strategy. They also help strategize to resolve different types of regulatory challenges that their clients may be facing. They also act as advisory committee to use their science background successful business development. When asked about industry opportunities for aspiring leaders like me, Dr. Soni suggested that the most important thing would be to get to know who to work for. Then determine if the role being offered is the right fit. When these two are resolved then see if there is a mutual benefit for you and the organization. According to him, “Leaders fix what’s not working! “, therefore this is one quality that one should reflect on to see if they can develop in an organization. He also advised that a leader should not worry about failure but worry about not trying. He is a risk-taker and he promotes educated and smart risk-taking in order to receive meaningful returns. The one key skill that will be needed for all future leaders is Focus. The coming generation is the smart generation and have access to tremendous information, therefore, their thoughts might need some direction. There will be a need to bring focus in their thoughts in order to not get distracted and loose direction. In the words of Dr. Soni, Leadership is different for a team leader and different for an entrepreneur but consists of two main components – a Vision you believe in and your ability to make others believe in that vision. For an entrepreneur, the vision is owned by you and you are leading with it whereas a team leader is buying into a vision and aligning with it. Your role as a leader is not only to lead but also to facilitate your team and make them feel a part and grow with the vision. We went on to discuss a comparison between an academic leader and an industrial leader. The two major differences that I was able to sum up were that one values education more while the other values experience and execution of the learnings. The lingo of the industry is very different from academia and would take some time for academic individuals to get used to. Leadership is needed in both spheres, but personality will identify what kind of role a person can take up. I asked him how a fresh graduate student, without previous experience, can successfully end up in an industrial leadership position. According to him, “the best thing to do is to find opportunities, during your studies, which allow you to gain industry-like experience by means of internships, externships and co-ops. Leading a group of people comes with many challenges and Dr. Soni shared some of them with me. A major challenge is finding the right people to share your vision, add value to it and carry it forward. The way to overcome this is to first get to know a prospective employee in other capacities before adding them to the team. It is important for this to happen mutually as it is essential for the member to fully understand the company. This can be done by working in a consulting capacity first before moving into a more committed role. This will help you learn more about the candidate and they will also learn more about the company. Another challenge for an entrepreneurial leader is aligning the finances and this is very important for smaller organizations that may not always have enough resources to maintain routine activity. Therefore, it is important to be very aware of the situation of the organization at all levels and take appropriate corrective steps before it gets too late and difficult. The last challenge is providing adequate training and grooming for your people. This is very important as it helps you understand the compatibility/capability of the personnel in the organization. It is important to respect the thought process of others. If there is flexibility, offer that to them and see how well they develop. However, if a company cannot be flexible and a personnel does not connect with the team then the relationship should be severed. For smaller companies, financial situation matters and as that gets better then difficulties can be easily solved. When asked about the future of his industry, Dr. Soni explained that there are not many big players in clinical/medical consulting and writing and communication space. There are a few big companies but there is still a lot of scope for growth. This segment of the industry has a bright future and there is a need to bring it from a fragmented and incohesive state to a structured state and more people are needed to make this happen. He advised that not trying is much worse than being afraid of failing. He advised that if you are figuring out the best area for you to work, talk to people doing it and then decide if you like it or not. Don’t just assume that something will not work for you because that can sometimes be the thing that works best. Here are some highlights from the interview:
- Don’t worry about failure, worry about not trying.
- Leaders fix what is not working.
- Leaders are required to find the right people for the right kind of role who share the vision of the organization and add value to it.
- Leadership involves making others recognize the shared vision and make them believe in it.
This article was edited by Emily K. Castro and Maryam Alapa.