A
lot of people make news in the biopharma business. Few of them are influential.
Influence,
simply put, is the ability to make your mark in such a way as to get other
prominent people in this business to rethink the way they do business. Last year, that definition caused us to put
GlaxoSmithKline's ($GSK) Deirdre Connelly on the list for her plan to do away
with sales quotas in the U.S. The influential idea then was that ethics had to
come before numbers--a big issue at a company that has been challenged time and
again by an unethical approach to business that spurred a series of sordid
messes and a second take at a painful reorganization.
But
influence can have a short shelf life.
Right
now, Connelly is no longer employed at GSK, and more than a few analysts say
that it's the new sales plan--followed by some dismal numbers on new
products--that prompted her departure. Perhaps she should be back on the list
this year, for being influential in demonstrating where the real focus was all
along on the sales side of GSK.
The
people on this year's list of influentials are doing everything from helping
change the metrics on R&D performance, crusading new technologies and
redefining biotech in a boom, to trying to forge a new definition for Big
Pharma--still a hot topic after many of the old definitions failed to generate real
growth.
Over
the years, we've seen many high-profile individuals adopt a selfless motivation
for what drives them. It's all about patients, they'll say. Or honesty. Or
putting staffers first. And no doubt sometimes that's true. The truly
influential, though, never lose sight of the fact that in order to make a
lasting impact on this business, you have to force it to change in some
fundamental way. Or get people to look your way while you give it a try.
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Here are 25 individuals who
meet those criteria.
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