What is the best advice someone has ever given you?

“Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.”

I have always been a person with an analytical mind but still my upbringing brought with it a different mindset: a necessity to ensure my future was well planned and financially stable, i.e stability over finding new learnings. This quote from Aurelius was the best advice someone gave me to find confidence in doing things I wanted rather than the one that was easier or proved to be easier.

What advice would you give us?

Always be curious! There is nothing more important than questioning and learning every single day. Our life is a sum total of our experiences and the learnings we accumulate from these experiences. And by this I dont mean, university degrees or more educational accrediations, it is our ability to ask, learn and analyze what we see, read & observe everyday. Without our own reasoning and questioning of things, we are only guided by illusions of knowledge. I always refer to Stephen Hawking’s quote for this: “The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge”.

An essential quality to lead…

Vision. A leader without vision is like a car driving without a headlight in the darkness. When things go well, leader can probably navigate easily just like a car can do so in the daylight. But the true quality of a leader is really to lead when things are murky, uncertain and unstructured. Its the ability to see through the chaos and to be confident in one’s decision making that makes one lead and not follow. That can only be done with a Vision.

What book, podcast, YouTube channel or any other type of content do you recommend us…

“Skin in the game” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. It is a must read to understand the society and bureaucracy of today.

What historical figure would you like to have on your team?

Napoleon for leadership, ability to turn the tide against all odds and inspire the team to switch to his side even when they were there to fight him. I am from India and one of the emperors from my region was called Raja Raja cholan and before he became an emperor. He actually handed over his crown to his uncle, as he considered him the rightfuland then inherited it after his uncle’s death. Therefore also him, for the ability to say “no” to power even when offered on a platter.

Have you always been clear about your professional objective?

No. I could never articulate well what I wanted to become when I grew up unlike others. I knew I was going to be in science or engineering but to do “what” there was not clear. However, I knew what I didnt want to become and that continues to this day. I realized what my strengths were and what my weaknesses were and every step in my career is about finding a place where my strengths can be leveraged while at the same time doing something that is new to me in terms of experience. It has been a gradual growth that has been driven by continuous learning.

What is the bravest decision you have made in our life?

Quitting a well paid job to go study Masters in Bioinformatics without knowing what the future would entail for it. I didnt do Biology in high school either. So that was like jumping into the deep end of the pool. It is also now, when I quit another well paid & respected job to try something on my own. Saying “no” to the salary isnt easy.

What is the most curious app you have on your mobile?

Brilliant – an app where I get to learn topics that I loved but could never appreciate when taught in school, probability, quantum physics etc!

What do people assume about you, and that isn’t true?

I am meek because I am short and I generally joke around a lot. I am easy going but can be firm when needed.

What do you think will be the next revolution in your sector/industry?

Lifesciences is brimming with innovation already. Gen AI has made some giant leaps here and it even won the Nobel prize for 2024 for Chemistry.

The next revolution is we let AI find the drug that gets launched into the market after regulatory approvals though. AI is finding a needle in a haystack and this is what I think we need.

What do you admire and do not tolerate in a person?

I admire people who are deep in a subject and have a natural talent for it. It could be a musician who composes orchestral scores writing them down directly in a sheet or a scientist who completely revolutionizes a domain by finding something new. I do not tolerate arrogance in a person, however.

People, who are superficial and arrogant and ones I abhor. And also people who namedrop. I love to learn from people on subject matter and not just about whom they know.

Which three top managers would you like to nominate?

Loïc Giroud, CDAO at Novo Nordisk.

Matteo Tommaso, Sr. Vice President, Drug Discovery Business Insights & Technology at Bristol Myers Squibb.

Wilma van Oosten, Strategic Account Executive at Snowflake.