Connect with us

Ordinary People Achieving The Extraordinary: Lessons In Leadership From The Court To The C-suite

Ordinary People Achieving The Extraordinary: Lessons In Leadership From The Court To The C-suite

Published

4 years ago

on

This blog was written by Josh Brumm, CEO of Dyne Therapeutics, as part of the From The Trenches feature of LifeSciVC.

I stood in front of 15 skeptical parents and prepared to sell them on an improbable mission.

They had all signed their daughters up for the first-grade basketball team. I would be coaching that team. And I was here to advise them that this would not be the type of experience their six- and seven-year-olds were used to.

I clicked on the PowerPoint that shared my vision: I would teach the girls teamwork and skills. I would establish clear roles. And I would hold them accountable for doing their jobs well. We would not give everyone equal playing time. We would not hand out participation trophies. We would insist that every girl come to every practice and every game with the team’s mission firmly in mind.

That mission? This team would go to the AAU national championships in Orlando to play at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. 

I know some of the parents thought my presentation was over the top. After all, these were ordinary girls, not athletic superstars. For many, it was their first experience playing organized sports. But I knew from my own long experience in athletics that teams need a mission, a vision and a plan.

Over the next two seasons, the girls of California Crush Basketball became nearly unbeatable. We kept teaching, learning and competing. As fourth graders, the girls made it to the championship in Orlando, placing second as national runners-up. Mission accomplished.

This story encapsulates my approach to leadership – an approach I think is broadly applicable across biotech.

It’s all too easy in this industry for startups to lose sight of their founding mission in pursuit of the next big thing. When I joined Dyne Therapeutics as president and CEO in October of 2019, I made clear that we would stay true to the mission that Atlas Venture and our founders had laid out for the company: We would pioneer life-transforming therapies for patients with serious muscle diseases.

Then we added another layer to our vision: We would become the world’s leading muscle disease company.

Our FORCETM platform, which deploys antibody-oligonucleotide therapeutics to modify disease-causing RNA in a cell’s nucleus, has the potential to treat diseases beyond muscle. Nonetheless, I feel very strongly that we cannot lose focus by chasing all the possible applications of our platform. We have a clear mission, and it’s a vitally important one. People living with relentless muscle diseases such as myotonic dystrophy type 1 and Duchenne muscular dystrophy are losing strength and function month after month. We owe it to them to move as quickly as we can to bring our investigational therapies to the clinic.

Drawing on my leadership experience – including, yes, as a first-grade basketball coach – I have established five straightforward principles aimed at setting our team up for success:

#1: We keep our mission top-of-mind

One of my colleagues noted the other day that at Dyne, you can’t so much as grab a new pencil without being reminded of our goals. It’s true. Our monthly goals are taped to the door of each supply closet, and our annual goals are posted in huge type in the break room. Each and every member of the team knows what we have to accomplish in May, in June and next December.

We know, of course, that any number of things could throw us off track — this is biotech, after all. But uncertainty is baked into our industry; it’s not a reason to waffle on establishing goals.

The goals are not just for show, either. Every month, we assess how we performed against them. We hold ourselves accountable, both as a management team and as a company. We’re here to get a job done, and if we’re slipping on any one metric, we put our heads down and redouble our efforts until we’ve caught up.

#2: We check our egos at the door

When I first came in as CEO, I told my team that Dyne has no place for egos.

Some of us will have our photos on the corporate website. Some will not. You may be asked to go to a conference. Or you may not. Your presentation slot may be 15 minutes – or it may be 30 seconds. We know such decisions can lead to bruised egos, but we ask the whole team to make an effort to rise above. Our expectation is that no one will dwell on, mope about, or gossip about such issues. The inefficiencies of such griping have always bothered me; doers do and there is no place for excuses.

I’ve tried to model that behavior by example. My executive team – and by extension, the broader Dyne organization – is a superstar group, all of them. We support one another, we stay focused and we get our jobs done. It’s a team that’s all about the mission, not the “me.”

#3: We communicate to comprehension  

I believe in transparency. I believe in communication. And that’s how I run Dyne.

Our team members understand their roles; we make sure they also understand how their “to do” lists ladder up to our larger ambitions. After each board meeting, for instance, we hold an all-company town hall to share decisions and goals with the entire team. We reinforce those takeaways in one-on-one check-ins. That’s a vital part of communicating to comprehension: We take every opportunity to reinforce our key messages via multiple platforms, so every member of the team internalizes our mission.

I’ve told the management team that I believe in telling it like it is. I don’t like to sugar-coat or dance around a topic: I believe in honest, straightforward communication. Only then can you feel confident your team truly understands your message – and will stand behind you in both the banner moments and the more difficult times.

The COVID-19 pandemic has admittedly made communication a challenge, but like most companies, we are finding our way through. We have weekly all-company Zoom meetings to ensure we’re all aligned on our goals and getting the support we need to accomplish them. I have also made it a habit to pick up the phone and call members of my team regularly, just to check in. It’s a good way to maintain that sense of connection and common purpose that’s intrinsic to Dyne.

We’ve also started a leadership group text thread. In the early days, we used it for strategic planning around our coronavirus response. It’s now also a channel for giving virtual high fives. In addition, we’ve started sharing items that make us laugh. In such a stressful time, it’s important to be able to step back and smile while also continuing to demonstrate the importance of transparent and clear communication. The text chain is a fun way to do that and has absolutely drawn us closer as a team.

#4: We operate in a paradigm of “quality, speed, cost” – always in that order

Quality is the bedrock, of course; we must do things right every step of the way.

Speed has two components. We move with urgency, knowing that patients are counting on us. I also think of speed as a way to keep us focused. On any given project, we know we may fail before we succeed. That’s inherent to biotech. What’s important to me is that we fail fast. I insist that we evaluate our progress objectively at each step. If what we’ve done isn’t working, we must swiftly move on and find a better solution.

As investors everywhere will agree, it’s crucial that we keep an eye on cost as well. But you’ll note that I’ve put cost third in this paradigm. Quality and speed come first; if we succeed on those fronts, I’m confident that we’ll have the funds we need to deliver for patients and for stakeholders.

Following these operating principles in this order is not always intuitive or comfortable, but as I told my team at my first all-employee meeting: “Comfort is the enemy of progress.”

#5: Our definition of success is simple

All the principles I’ve laid out so far ladder up to how we define success at Dyne: We do what we say we are going to do – period, full stop. We keep our commitments to patients, teammates, ourselves and all Dyne stakeholders. What we do, and how we do it, define us.

Importantly, the “how” matters as much as the “what.” That’s at the core of my leadership philosophy, whether on the basketball court or in the C-suite. We endeavor to act with integrity and transparency, always.

As I look around and see the team we’ve built at Dyne – backed by the incredible power of our FORCE platform – I am confident in our ability to achieve our mission to bring transformative therapies to the patients who so urgently need them and become the world’s leading muscle disease company.

As I think about the incredible odds we face each day in our collective profession, I’m reminded of a quote from basketball coach Jimmy Valvano. Cancer has taken Coach Valvano from us, but before it did, he won the 1983 NCAA National Championship against all odds. I think his words are so appropriate for all of us today.

“God must have loved ordinary people because he made so many of us. Yet, every single day, in every walk of life, ordinary people accomplish extraordinary things.” Jimmy Valvano

At Dyne, our team of ordinary people is achieving extraordinary things, and I’m privileged to be leading the charge.

The post Ordinary People Achieving The Extraordinary: Lessons In Leadership From The Court To The C-suite appeared first on LifeSciVC.

Read More

Related Topics:
Continue Reading

Spread & Containment

Sylvester researchers, collaborators call for greater investment in bereavement care

MIAMI, FLORIDA (March 15, 2024) – The public health toll from bereavement is well-documented in the medical literature, with bereaved persons at greater…

Published

25 mins ago

on

March 15, 2024

By

MIAMI, FLORIDA (March 15, 2024) – The public health toll from bereavement is well-documented in the medical literature, with bereaved persons at greater risk for many adverse outcomes, including mental health challenges, decreased quality of life, health care neglect, cancer, heart disease, suicide, and death. Now, in a paper published in The Lancet Public Health, researchers sound a clarion call for greater investment, at both the community and institutional level, in establishing support for grief-related suffering.

Credit: Photo courtesy of Memorial Sloan Kettering Comprehensive Cancer Center

MIAMI, FLORIDA (March 15, 2024) – The public health toll from bereavement is well-documented in the medical literature, with bereaved persons at greater risk for many adverse outcomes, including mental health challenges, decreased quality of life, health care neglect, cancer, heart disease, suicide, and death. Now, in a paper published in The Lancet Public Health, researchers sound a clarion call for greater investment, at both the community and institutional level, in establishing support for grief-related suffering.

The authors emphasized that increased mortality worldwide caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, suicide, drug overdose, homicide, armed conflict, and terrorism have accelerated the urgency for national- and global-level frameworks to strengthen the provision of sustainable and accessible bereavement care. Unfortunately, current national and global investment in bereavement support services is woefully inadequate to address this growing public health crisis, said researchers with Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and collaborating organizations.  

They proposed a model for transitional care that involves firmly establishing bereavement support services within healthcare organizations to ensure continuity of family-centered care while bolstering community-based support through development of “compassionate communities” and a grief-informed workforce. The model highlights the responsibility of the health system to build bridges to the community that can help grievers feel held as they transition.   

The Center for the Advancement of Bereavement Care at Sylvester is advocating for precisely this model of transitional care. Wendy G. Lichtenthal, PhD, FT, FAPOS, who is Founding Director of the new Center and associate professor of public health sciences at the Miller School, noted, “We need a paradigm shift in how healthcare professionals, institutions, and systems view bereavement care. Sylvester is leading the way by investing in the establishment of this Center, which is the first to focus on bringing the transitional bereavement care model to life.”

What further distinguishes the Center is its roots in bereavement science, advancing care approaches that are both grounded in research and community-engaged.  

The authors focused on palliative care, which strives to provide a holistic approach to minimize suffering for seriously ill patients and their families, as one area where improvements are critically needed. They referenced groundbreaking reports of the Lancet Commissions on the value of global access to palliative care and pain relief that highlighted the “undeniable need for improved bereavement care delivery infrastructure.” One of those reports acknowledged that bereavement has been overlooked and called for reprioritizing social determinants of death, dying, and grief.

“Palliative care should culminate with bereavement care, both in theory and in practice,” explained Lichtenthal, who is the article’s corresponding author. “Yet, bereavement care often is under-resourced and beset with access inequities.”

Transitional bereavement care model

So, how do health systems and communities prioritize bereavement services to ensure that no bereaved individual goes without needed support? The transitional bereavement care model offers a roadmap.

“We must reposition bereavement care from an afterthought to a public health priority. Transitional bereavement care is necessary to bridge the gap in offerings between healthcare organizations and community-based bereavement services,” Lichtenthal said. “Our model calls for health systems to shore up the quality and availability of their offerings, but also recognizes that resources for bereavement care within a given healthcare institution are finite, emphasizing the need to help build communities’ capacity to support grievers.”

Key to the model, she added, is the bolstering of community-based support through development of “compassionate communities” and “upskilling” of professional services to assist those with more substantial bereavement-support needs.

The model contains these pillars:

  • Preventive bereavement care –healthcare teams engage in bereavement-conscious practices, and compassionate communities are mindful of the emotional and practical needs of dying patients’ families.
  • Ownership of bereavement care – institutions provide bereavement education for staff, risk screenings for families, outreach and counseling or grief support. Communities establish bereavement centers and “champions” to provide bereavement care at workplaces, schools, places of worship or care facilities.
  • Resource allocation for bereavement care – dedicated personnel offer universal outreach, and bereaved stakeholders provide input to identify community barriers and needed resources.
  • Upskilling of support providers – Bereavement education is integrated into training programs for health professionals, and institutions offer dedicated grief specialists. Communities have trained, accessible bereavement specialists who provide support and are educated in how to best support bereaved individuals, increasing their grief literacy.
  • Evidence-based care – bereavement care is evidence-based and features effective grief assessments, interventions, and training programs. Compassionate communities remain mindful of bereavement care needs.

Lichtenthal said the new Center will strive to materialize these pillars and aims to serve as a global model for other health organizations. She hopes the paper’s recommendations “will cultivate a bereavement-conscious and grief-informed workforce as well as grief-literate, compassionate communities and health systems that prioritize bereavement as a vital part of ethical healthcare.”

“This paper is calling for healthcare institutions to respond to their duty to care for the family beyond patients’ deaths. By investing in the creation of the Center for the Advancement of Bereavement Care, Sylvester is answering this call,” Lichtenthal said.

Follow @SylvesterCancer on X for the latest news on Sylvester’s research and care.

# # #

Article Title: Investing in bereavement care as a public health priority

DOI: 10.1016/S2468-2667(24)00030-6

Authors: The complete list of authors is included in the paper.

Funding: The authors received funding from the National Cancer Institute (P30 CA240139 Nimer) and P30 CA008748 Vickers).

Disclosures: The authors declared no competing interests.

# # #

Journal

The Lancet Public Health

DOI

10.1016/S2468-2667(24)00030-6

Article Title

Investing in bereavement care as a public health priority

Article Publication Date

13-Mar-2024

COI Statement

The authors declared no competing interests.

Read More

Continue Reading

International

Copper Soars, Iron Ore Tumbles As Goldman Says “Copper’s Time Is Now”

Copper Soars, Iron Ore Tumbles As Goldman Says "Copper’s Time Is Now"

After languishing for the past two years in a tight range despite recurring…

Published

2 hours ago

on

March 15, 2024

By

Copper Soars, Iron Ore Tumbles As Goldman Says "Copper's Time Is Now"

After languishing for the past two years in a tight range despite recurring speculation about declining global supply, copper has finally broken out, surging to the highest price in the past year, just shy of $9,000 a ton as supply cuts hit the market; At the same time the price of the world's "other" most important mined commodity has diverged, as iron ore has tumbled amid growing demand headwinds out of China's comatose housing sector where not even ghost cities are being built any more.

Copper surged almost 5% this week, ending a months-long spell of inertia, as investors focused on risks to supply at various global mines and smelters. As Bloomberg adds, traders also warmed to the idea that the worst of a global downturn is in the past, particularly for metals like copper that are increasingly used in electric vehicles and renewables.

Yet the commodity crash of recent years is hardly over, as signs of the headwinds in traditional industrial sectors are still all too obvious in the iron ore market, where futures fell below $100 a ton for the first time in seven months on Friday as investors bet that China’s years-long property crisis will run through 2024, keeping a lid on demand.

Indeed, while the mood surrounding copper has turned almost euphoric, sentiment on iron ore has soured since the conclusion of the latest National People’s Congress in Beijing, where the CCP set a 5% goal for economic growth, but offered few new measures that would boost infrastructure or other construction-intensive sectors.

As a result, the main steelmaking ingredient has shed more than 30% since early January as hopes of a meaningful revival in construction activity faded. Loss-making steel mills are buying less ore, and stockpiles are piling up at Chinese ports. The latest drop will embolden those who believe that the effects of President Xi Jinping’s property crackdown still have significant room to run, and that last year’s rally in iron ore may have been a false dawn.

Meanwhile, as Bloomberg notes, on Friday there were fresh signs that weakness in China’s industrial economy is hitting the copper market too, with stockpiles tracked by the Shanghai Futures Exchange surging to the highest level since the early days of the pandemic. The hope is that headwinds in traditional industrial areas will be offset by an ongoing surge in usage in electric vehicles and renewables.

And while industrial conditions in Europe and the US also look soft, there’s growing optimism about copper usage in India, where rising investment has helped fuel blowout growth rates of more than 8% — making it the fastest-growing major economy.

In any case, with the demand side of the equation still questionable, the main catalyst behind copper’s powerful rally is an unexpected tightening in global mine supplies, driven mainly by last year’s closure of a giant mine in Panama (discussed here), but there are also growing worries about output in Zambia, which is facing an El Niño-induced power crisis.

On Wednesday, copper prices jumped on huge volumes after smelters in China held a crisis meeting on how to cope with a sharp drop in processing fees following disruptions to supplies of mined ore. The group stopped short of coordinated production cuts, but pledged to re-arrange maintenance work, reduce runs and delay the startup of new projects. In the coming weeks investors will be watching Shanghai exchange inventories closely to gauge both the strength of demand and the extent of any capacity curtailments.

“The increase in SHFE stockpiles has been bigger than we’d anticipated, but we expect to see them coming down over the next few weeks,” Colin Hamilton, managing director for commodities research at BMO Capital Markets, said by phone. “If the pace of the inventory builds doesn’t start to slow, investors will start to question whether smelters are actually cutting and whether the impact of weak construction activity is starting to weigh more heavily on the market.”

* * *

Few have been as happy with the recent surge in copper prices as Goldman's commodity team, where copper has long been a preferred trade (even if it may have cost the former team head Jeff Currie his job due to his unbridled enthusiasm for copper in the past two years which saw many hedge fund clients suffer major losses).

As Goldman's Nicholas Snowdon writes in a note titled "Copper's time is now" (available to pro subscribers in the usual place)...

... there has been a "turn in the industrial cycle." Specifically according to the Goldman analyst, after a prolonged downturn, "incremental evidence now points to a bottoming out in the industrial cycle, with the global manufacturing PMI in expansion for the first time since September 2022." As a result, Goldman now expects copper to rise to $10,000/t by year-end and then $12,000/t by end of Q1-25.’

Here are the details:

Previous inflexions in global manufacturing cycles have been associated with subsequent sustained industrial metals upside, with copper and aluminium rising on average 25% and 9% over the next 12 months. Whilst seasonal surpluses have so far limited a tightening alignment at a micro level, we expect deficit inflexions to play out from quarter end, particularly for metals with severe supply binds. Supplemented by the influence of anticipated Fed easing ahead in a non-recessionary growth setting, another historically positive performance factor for metals, this should support further upside ahead with copper the headline act in this regard.

Goldman then turns to what it calls China's "green policy put":

Much of the recent focus on the “Two Sessions” event centred on the lack of significant broad stimulus, and in particular the limited property support. In our view it would be wrong – just as in 2022 and 2023 – to assume that this will result in weak onshore metals demand. Beijing’s emphasis on rapid growth in the metals intensive green economy, as an offset to property declines, continues to act as a policy put for green metals demand. After last year’s strong trends, evidence year-to-date is again supportive with aluminium and copper apparent demand rising 17% and 12% y/y respectively. Moreover, the potential for a ‘cash for clunkers’ initiative could provide meaningful right tail risk to that healthy demand base case. Yet there are also clear metal losers in this divergent policy setting, with ongoing pressure on property related steel demand generating recent sharp iron ore downside.

Meanwhile, Snowdon believes that the driver behind Goldman's long-running bullish view on copper - a global supply shock - continues:

Copper’s supply shock progresses. The metal with most significant upside potential is copper, in our view. The supply shock which began with aggressive concentrate destocking and then sharp mine supply downgrades last year, has now advanced to an increasing bind on metal production, as reflected in this week's China smelter supply rationing signal. With continued positive momentum in China's copper demand, a healthy refined import trend should generate a substantial ex-China refined deficit this year. With LME stocks having halved from Q4 peak, China’s imminent seasonal demand inflection should accelerate a path into extreme tightness by H2. Structural supply underinvestment, best reflected in peak mine supply we expect next year, implies that demand destruction will need to be the persistent solver on scarcity, an effect requiring substantially higher pricing than current, in our view. In this context, we maintain our view that the copper price will surge into next year (GSe 2025 $15,000/t average), expecting copper to rise to $10,000/t by year-end and then $12,000/t by end of Q1-25’

Another reason why Goldman is doubling down on its bullish copper outlook: gold.

The sharp rally in gold price since the beginning of March has ended the period of consolidation that had been present since late December. Whilst the initial catalyst for the break higher came from a (gold) supportive turn in US data and real rates, the move has been significantly amplified by short term systematic buying, which suggests less sticky upside. In this context, we expect gold to consolidate for now, with our economists near term view on rates and the dollar suggesting limited near-term catalysts for further upside momentum. Yet, a substantive retracement lower will also likely be limited by resilience in physical buying channels. Nonetheless, in the midterm we continue to hold a constructive view on gold underpinned by persistent strength in EM demand as well as eventual Fed easing, which should crucially reactivate the largely for now dormant ETF buying channel. In this context, we increase our average gold price forecast for 2024 from $2,090/toz to $2,180/toz, targeting a move to $2,300/toz by year-end.

Much more in the full Goldman note available to pro subs.

Tyler Durden Fri, 03/15/2024 - 14:25

Read More

Continue Reading

Government

Moderna turns the spotlight on long Covid with new initiatives

Moderna’s latest Covid effort addresses the often-overlooked chronic condition of long Covid — and encourages vaccination to reduce risks. A digital…

Published

2 hours ago

on

March 15, 2024

By

Moderna’s latest Covid effort addresses the often-overlooked chronic condition of long Covid — and encourages vaccination to reduce risks. A digital campaign debuted Friday along with a co-sponsored event in Detroit offering free CT scans, which will also be used in ongoing long Covid research.

In a new video, a young woman describes her three-year battle with long Covid, which includes losing her job, coping with multiple debilitating symptoms and dealing with the negative effects on her family. She ends by saying, “The only way to prevent long Covid is to not get Covid” along with an on-screen message about where to find Covid-19 vaccines through the vaccines.gov website.

Kate Cronin

“Last season we saw people would get a flu shot, but they didn’t always get a Covid shot,” said Moderna’s Chief Brand Officer Kate Cronin. “People should get their flu shot, but they should also get their Covid shot. There’s no risk of long flu, but there is the risk of long-term effects of Covid.”

It’s Moderna’s “first effort to really sound the alarm,” she said, and the debut coincides with the second annual Long Covid Awareness Day.

An estimated 17.6 million Americans are living with long Covid, according to the latest CDC data. About four million of them are out of work because of the condition, resulting in an estimated $170 billion in lost wages.

While HHS anted up $45 million in grants last year to expand long Covid support initiatives along with public health campaigns, the condition is still often ignored and underfunded.

“It’s not just about the initial infection of Covid, but also if you get it multiple times, your risks goes up significantly,” Cronin said. “It’s important that people understand that.”

Read More

Continue Reading

Trending