This Girl KAM with Jimita Parekh

Liv: Good morning Jimita. It is very early morning for you, isn’t it?

Jimita: Good morning, yes and especially with fall, the sun is still in, waiting to come out!

Liv: Thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show. It’s lovely to see you, and you look bright-eyed, considering it is 6:00 a.m. there!

Jimita: I usually prefer an early start. I have three beautiful girls who get straight into those golden hours, when it comes to school. So I prefer an early start so I can get my quiet thinking done before they’re up.

Liv: How old are you girls?

Jimita: I have twins who will turn 13 in April. So I have twin teenagers. Oh my God. I can’t even believe that. And I have a 10-year-old, so I have three girls, very close in age.

Liv: Fabulous. Tell me a bit about your journey and your career to date, Jimita,  including some of the key turning points for you and let’s get straight into this.

Jimita: I’m going to start from the very beginning. I’m a pharmacist by training. I grew up in Mumbai, India. I chose pharmacy as a profession because I watched my dad, who was in pharmaceuticals too. Growing up, I learned how to manufacture medicine. I saw him grow his business. So I felt truly passionate about learning that side, learning how it works, helping him, and getting that satisfaction you get when you’re following your passion. So, I feel I chose pharmacy, where my journey started.

I’ve had amazing mentors and leaders I have followed in that way. In the case of my education, I followed my father, who’s been amazing, coming from a very small town in India, making himself known and having such a fulfilling career. He’s retired now, but I followed him to choose my profession. But also to choose how I got into the profession and what I wanted to do that would mean something and give me a sense of purpose. So that’s where I started. I did my graduation from Mumbai – one of the best colleges in Mumbai for pharmacy. Then I met my husband. He was studying here, we got married, and I moved here. So that’s where part two of my journey started. As a pharmacist, I felt like coming into a new country, I had to learn a lot. Go back to school even. In parallel, I wanted to try out different things. I felt like I needed something else. And I landed into a job called Data Listings Reviewer.

So, starting off, coming to a new country, starting from scratch, having done bench research and drug development, and having done some hospital pharmacy work, this was new for me. When I started as a data listings reviewer, having that pharmaceutical background, I knew what to look for regarding patients.

So what a data listings reviewer does is, they are a clinical scientist. They look through all the patient records to see if there are any discrepancies, if there was any safety event that was missed or forgotten, or any safety signals that you see in the data. So I enjoyed doing that. I enjoyed doing it for two reasons. First, I was back to the core of what I had studied, and second, I was coming closer to the patient. So that has been a common thread throughout my journey,

I was learning, not just living, in a new country, in all aspects. I didn’t even know how to drive! We drive on the opposite side of the road. So simple things that were so natural for me in India, this was a whole new ballgame.

So as a 24, 25 year old, I started my life again. It felt like it as if I had to learn to walk again. Some of the best friends I’ve made have been in that timeframe. I’m still friends with those colleagues who’ve not just taught me how to learn on the job but also taught me how to live life.

I joined Genentech because that gave me a path. I worked as a site coordinator working directly with the patients, at a company called Benchmark Research, and this is where I made some of my best friends. My office was in San Francisco, right in the middle of downtown. So colourful, so vibrant, but also with, with people who are so open and inviting. Coming from India, knowing that I didn’t see a lot of things. I hadn’t even eaten peanut butter and jelly. This is how naive I was! But that became a staple. I didn’t know what a subway was. I mean, the sandwich, right? Not the train station, because that Mumbai has a lot of!

Some of those friends were really inviting. I think San Francisco is one of the best places, having now travelled through the world quite a bit. San Francisco is a melting pot, a true melting pot in that sense.

So I joined Genentech in 2007, as a clinical study manager. Having been in San Francisco for two to three years, and then going to Genentech, it was another amazing place to work. Full of mentors, full of female leaders. That’s the first time I saw what women can achieve if they’re able to overcome their own biases. One of my biggest mentors is Sue Desmond Helman.

Sue was heading up clinical drug development for Genentech at the time. This is pre-merger with Roche and Sue was amazing. Amazing. I had met strong women who had done great things. I had observed them from afar, but this was me in observing leadership, but also leaders that were able to cut through the noise and make way for women to lead, to make a difference in society.

I have a couple names for you there. Sue Desmond-Hellmann is amazing, a force, and she’s done great things, not just at Genentech but she went on to become the CEO of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and is on the board of Pfizer, especially helped during the Covid times, now is part of the White House Advisory Committee. So you can see her path. You can see what happens when you cut through the noise and focus on what difference you want to make in the world. I have to thank my stars for getting me that opportunity and being able to witness her.

There are two things that I’m super passionate about. One is making a difference in the world, especially in the oncology space. I’ve seen too much of that where my loved ones have been affected. So I want to be among the few people making a difference in the oncology space. The second one is I want my girls to have the same feeling, follow their passion, and also follow outstanding female leaders.

I don’t discriminate between men and women, but there is a special force that drives these women. It’s just different. I want my girls to model that. I want them to think about me as one of those they can model after, not just in my successes and accomplishments but also in my failures and in my choices. I want them to be able to make their own choices. I want them to be able to follow their passion without having any inhibitions.

Those two common things drive me and help me do better every day. It’s very satisfying when you get that recognition from your kids that, “Hey, I want to do this. You did that; I want to do this. You’re doing so well for yourself. Why do I have to choose this or that?”  So, I want to leave that legacy for my kids. Genentech gave me that platform. To follow both of my dreams.  I was introduced to women leadership at Genentech. Even now, the CEO, Teresa Graham, she’s a fantastic leader. I’ve witnessed her through her early days; she’s been incredible.

After being at Genentech for almost 17 years in different roles, I joined Medable a year and a half ago. Again, following my core, which is, following Michelle Longmeyer, who’s another fearsome leader. She is a physician by academia, and she’s a practising physician, but she is an innovator. She is a leader who wants to make a difference. This is where I feel my path has led me. I have followed these women so that I can learn from them, and I can observe them. Even if I get just 1% of what they have to give, I feel I will have learned and grown quite a bit. In parallel, I am starting to pick up a liking towards regulatory innovation and Michelle has been a force when it comes to patient centricity and helping me learn more in that space.

There are a couple of others that have been starting to mould my mind in the direction of, we need the ecosystem to change, not just this part, but that part and this part, the regulators, the sites, the patient mindset, the physician mindset, and all of that from a regulatory innovation perspective.

I’ve been following Michelle Rohr, who heads up regulatory at Roche. She has these amazing Monday minutes, which I learned a lot from.  Then there’s Karen Jones. Karen heads up regulatory at Gilead. She is also very innovative in her thinking. She believes in sustainability. That our industry as a whole, if we want to do right for the patients, will have to come up with a sustainable model.

She believes the way we operate needs to evolve. Evolve with the use of technology, with the use of experience and data that we’ve collected throughout these years. So Karen Jones is another one that I follow. These are women who I feel have shaped me as a female leader in a way that I wouldn’t have imagined, coming into this country. There are several other leaders, I would say, and I’m only calling out women leaders because I really want to shine a spotlight on them and thank them for shaping my career as well as my thinking, in who I am.

Liv: You’ve highlighted there some key female leaders that have impacted you. Now that you’ve got to this point in your career, with the experience that you’ve gained and the way your purpose has developed since having your girls, do you now see yourself as a leader too?

Jimita: You know, it’s such a good question, and I ask that question to myself every day. I feel I have come a long way. I cannot put myself next to them, even though I’m at the same table sometimes with some of these women. I want to do better. I don’t know, as women, I feel like the imposter syndrome is real for us in a lot of different ways. These women are amazing. They continue to evolve, continue to grow. I want to be like them pretty much every day and I try to emulate that. Though I have a lot to learn.

Liv: You’re right. Imposter syndrome is most definitely real. So often leadership isn’t something that women particularly seem ready to see in themselves.

Jimita: Yeah, and, and you know, it’s interesting Olivia, because we subconsciously know that the answer to that question is yes, of course I’m a fearsome leader myself, of course, I’m a good mentor to lots of different people. Of course, I’m a good role model to my kids. But somehow we want to do better. We want to be the best version of ourselves and leave a legacy that, makes us answer this question differently.  I feel like there’s something to say about us in terms of being able to grow and nurture that feeling, but also subconsciously keep telling that voice in our heads that we are real. This is all real. If I just look back and think about where I was when I moved to this country and where I am today, that should be a no-brainer question.

But no, I do want to do better. I do want to see myself someday as someone like me that maybe your kids are interviewing that says, “I want to be like that.” So here’s an interesting observation for you. My twins are almost teens. They see me and they have so much, I want to call it respect, they know I’m one of the best leaders out there. So, for them, the answer to that question is yes, of course my mom is that, and of course, they’re my kids. So they have that bias.

But I feel like we hold ourselves back as women. We want to thrive. We want to always do better. We want to be the best, and I would say we are getting there. Hopefully, the answer to that question in the next five years will have changed to a yes.

Liv: I saw something on LinkedIn a few days ago where someone posted, “Be the person your dog thinks you are.” Perhaps this conversation tells us that we need to be the people our children see we are.

Jimita: Absolutely. I have three critiques and three judges in my life. As you can imagine, my kids are my biggest critique, but they’re also my biggest followers. I appreciate it; it helps me be the best version of myself.

I look up to my dad.  He’s my sounding board. He and my husband are my sounding boards. So those are my three critiques and my three biggest cheerleaders when it comes to doing better and being the better version of myself. Everyone needs that. For two reasons. One is to always keep true to themselves. Be there to recognise your accomplishments and successes, but also help you through your failures, help you through the decisions that didn’t go well, or things that you could have done better. So everyone should have that. And my mentors, of course, are my fourth cohort, who keep me honest, keep me alive and kicking and make sure I balance my passion with reality.

Liv: That leads me nicely into passion because I want to get more into that. Your role now is focused very much on drug development and patient centricity, and how the two come together.

 I also know that you are fascinated by AI. I want to get your take on how you think tech and innovation can impact patient centricity and drug development and the knock-on impact on the whole of pharma and biotech.

Jimita: This is a topic close to my heart, and I’ve talked about this with a few people and presented on it last year. There’s a lot that can be done. Our drug development processes are dated. Not because they don’t want to evolve but because they’re dated because some of our policies and regulations are age-old. So, to change and evolve our drug development process and do better for the patients, we need to look at the ecosystem as a whole. We need to look at all the actors in the ecosystem that have a role to play, the regulations changing, and the regulators starting to think differently. A digital transformation office in the F D A is looking into this, but even pharma companies are looking into this to see how we can do better. Everyone wants to evolve, but wants to evolve together.

So, that is a big paradigm shift I’m seeing in the industry. And that’s a well-needed paradigm shift, not just for AI but technology in general. Shifting from how we’ve been doing things to what we need to do to help free up resources, capacity, and space in our minds as well as in our pockets. So, both of those are critical, and I see that shift in the industry happening. In terms of drug development, where we are, I’ll talk about this in three different segments.

So, as the industry and there is a paradigm shift, we as consumers or patients ourselves need to update our mindset, and we are doing that. Generationally, we are changing. How our parents might look at care differs from how we look at care. And the tools and resources we need are different. The interactions we have with our providers are different. We are much more aware of what is available to us than our parents. So that shift is happening from the ecosystem perspective, and that’s what’s prompting the regulators to think differently and accept information differently. Data is powerful, very, very powerful. We are seeing trends, and we’re evolving. From a disease perspective, there’s a lot of awareness about the disease and the available data. So, ecosystem-wise, that paradigm is shifting. Drug development wise, that’s where the change is coming. In terms of how things can be expedited, this is where I talk about Karen Jones and her mission about sustainability because we need to build a sustainable process and, as a whole, develop medicines and bring them to patients faster because it’s about speed, it’s about cost.

All of those add up today to make it heavier for the patient and the providers. If we can bring things faster but also in a sustainable fashion, then that’s where things can evolve, and that’s where technology comes in. That’s where AI comes in. I’m a big believer in intelligent automation, human-assisted AI, or some form of validation where we need to hold hands with technology to make this change in the world.

I’m a big proponent of that, and I’ve seen that happen where you can bring down processes that would take you weeks to do something down to a few days. So I, I’m a true believer of that. But for us to do that, we also need a mindset shift. For lack of a better word, we need people who are operators or actors of these technologies to understand its ability, its drawbacks, and their role in bringing that technology and using it for their own betterment.

I’ll give you an example, three years ago, we moved into a smart home. I was not a smart home type of person three years ago; neither was my husband. And we were like, “Do we need so many things to run our day-to-day household?” It took us some time to adjust, to learn and understand what we can use that can help us some things in our life. Eliminate processes because they can do better. Or decide, okay, this is not for us. I feel like that same feeling and process needs to happen with

drug development. We need to assess what technology will help us move this along faster and make our processes more sustainable. What is going to hinder us from doing that? And then as operators, and learners of these technologies, we need to learn to use them to our advantage and not block it. Part of that scepticism about AI and other technology solutions needs to change. We need to do that with a sense of purpose. We need to adopt it to create a sustainable ecosystem. In drug development, we can bring drugs faster to patients. We can reduce the cost of those medicines to patients and improve our quality of life as people working in this industry. So those three reasons are strong enough for us to try it out, see what works for us, what will hinder us and what is not for us, or we are not ready, or the industry’s not ready for it yet.

So, that second cohort of drug development is changing, and the paradigm is shifting. We have enough leadership in this space to say people are working towards sustainable visions.  I mentioned Karen and Michelle in that space, and others are striving towards that, too.

The third cohort is the patients, the one closest to my heart. This is what Michelle Longmeyer and the team are very close to doing what the patients need, bringing these technologies to the patients, and educating them. Part of the reason I joined Medable was not just because of Michelle and Ally, but because of their mission in what they want to do.

They have the technology that will make the lives of patients better by bringing drugs and research to patients, versus where we are today, where we have so many different pockets of the world that are technology savvy. Everyone has a smartphone, but they cannot get to a research centre or a hospital fast enough to get cured. So, Michelle and her mission with Medable, this is the third area which needs to evolve by bringing digital solutions to patients and caregivers so that we can bring drugs and cures to patients faster. This is why I’m at Medable, because this drives me every day. This helps me connect to a cause that is so dear to my heart, but also there is a strong sense of purpose that we need to do this to evolve and sustain the industry, whilst putting the patient at the centre of it. We’re doing it for the patient. We’re doing it because we as consumers have it. We have those tools. I have banking on my phone. I have all these different tools that help me. I have Instacart, you name it and I have an app, which can help make my life easier. When it comes to running the day-to-day household.

Why can’t we do that for patients? Why can’t we give them something that they need? We’ve come a long way in that journey. We saw that with covid when, when drug and clinical trials were at a halt, we couldn’t have made it possible without these technologies. So those three segments are where I see the paradigm shift with a strong force. And all three of those are critical in bringing AI and any digital solutions into drug development.

Liv: I love your analogy about moving into a house with all the smart options because it’s so true. And, as a nation, that’s where we are with AI. Yes, in drug development, but actually in every area now.  We have all this data and all this capability; we are just trying to figure out what will be useful and what’s a distraction.

Jimita: You know, you want to know about it as an individual. AI is in that space where it’s become such a buzzword, but there’s so much happening. It’s hard for us to keep up with that. But I think the basics we can do are know and keep ourselves educated about the topic. Keep your eyes and ears open. Just see what I mean. I’m seeing such outstanding work done when it comes to AI and patient matching. There’s a lot of potential that it shows when it comes to drug development and processes. But at the same time, I’m also seeing a lot of negatives.

Here’s an example for you:

The image recognition for a radiology report, being able to early detect breast cancer using a new machine learning model is fantastic. Can you imagine being able to predict and forecast and be preventive rather than reactive in that space? At the same time, that same technology is being completely misused when it comes to facial recognition.

So the same technology has pros and cons. We need to be able to use it in the right way. For doing good. There will always be pros and cons for each of those. But we need to be able to balance it and place regulations and build boundaries and the right guardrails for the technology. It doesn’t mean that it’s all or nothing; it just means that we need to govern it better. And the regulators are starting to do that.

Liv: So let’s talk more about patient centricity. Coming back to the technology, I’d like to get your perspective, on the opportunities that it brings for us. What is that gold standard we’re aiming for, and where are those opportunities for that excellence?

Jimita: I see drug development as a long process that starts with research; then finding a molecule that works, hypothetically, or theoretically, in a lab, then moving it, and that molecule moves through animal studies, moves through human studies or healthy volunteer studies, and then it’s given to patients that need that drug. So it goes through a strenuous process, a long, lengthy process. But the first stop for that process is to be discovered. You need to find a molecule, research a molecule, and identify that this is something that will scientifically work with the disease or the agent you’re trying to target.

And I’ll even narrow it down to oncology. That research can be fueled by AI and some of the solutions. But you can identify those molecules faster and have it go through the chain faster. So I’m starting to see speed, but I’m also starting to see volume. If we want to combat cancer and rare diseases that are popping up, left, right, and centre, I think this is the way to go.

So research is super important. And the first place I would probably try the new technology out because there are no patients involved. There are a lot of gates that you have to cross before you actually get to patients. But identifying and drug discovery can be totally fuelled by that.

Aviv Regev, who heads up Genentech Research and Development, I had the pleasure of hearing her speak last year at JP Morgan, and the way she talks about using technology to help us accelerate drug discovery is phenomenal. I think that’s the first area that has so much potential. There’s so much data already available that even if we can build models to comb through the data and identify newer targets, amazing. That’s the best place to start. And it’s the less riskier space because the risk to human life is less.

So drug discovery is your first area. Then when it comes to drug development and starting to test out or be part of clinical trials, et cetera, that’s where I would say there are two sets of technologies that we need to think of. One that helps us bring these therapies and trials and opportunities to patients. And second, using technology to our advantage as drug developers to accelerate our processes and make our processes more efficient. So that’s where in the first bucket you have Michelle and Abi, which is trying to make that leap in with all the digital solutions that help you decentralize clinical trials and bring trials to patients faster. Walgreens is in that space. There are a lot of efforts happening in that space. Coupled with the mindset shifts that are being brought on by patient advocates like Ricky Fairley, brought on by institutes like Milken. Esther Kfa and Yasmine Long are also in that space. So technology coupled with mindset shifts for that whole ecosystem, be it the physicians, the coordinators, the caregivers, the patients, coupled with technology solutions like the digital solutions that Medable provides is absolutely what is needed and we are seeing a lot of development. Michelle herself is trying to improve her processes by bringing in machine learning in a way that we can update our own operational processes.

And this is where the second bucket comes in, where drug developers, regulators, and providers like Michelle and Medable all need to start leveraging technology to free up capacity for intelligent people to do intelligent work and machines to take on some of their load.

We need to leverage technology in our operational processes for our people to have a good quality of life. Those are the two areas in drug development that are critical when it comes to applying technology.

And we’re seeing a lot of progress. We’re starting to come up with telemedicine. We’re starting to come up with all the different things that we, as consumers of goods, have as tools to our advantage. ,

In the third area, where we collect a lot of data, we haven’t talked about real world evidence or some of the trials that go on and the data we collect. I feel like that third area in drug development where we have so much data; we have so much evidence that has been generated. We need to apply some of these technologies specifically with AI, which can help us develop new insights from the same data. Now that there is a chicken and an egg, we have the technology, but the data is too disparate, so it needs to be curated or brought together to help us leverage these tools.

This is where I’m seeing a lot of startups; a few of them are pretty promising in this space where they are bringing together a way of using that data to generate new insights By still operating within the realms of safe harbour and G D P R and all of that. So that third area is also similar to the drug discovery area where there’s no patient involvement, but a lot of data can be harnessed to build And bring it back to drug discovery. So, the front and the end of the process, both of them are heavily data-driven. The middle is the patient-centric part, with decentralisation of trials using digital solutions and making our operational processes more efficient by using technology. Both of those things need a mindset shift alongside a technology shift. So those are the three segments of the drug development process that I feel are seeing significant change. , two of them, there’s a lot of data we need to harness, we need to use technology, and I’m starting to see big pharma use that, in the middle bucket. It needs to be heavily supported by

mindset shifts. Just like I couldn’t go onto Instacart for the same things, I can walk to a store and get it. It’s the same analogy for me here where that mindset needs to shift to say, okay, if I go to the store, it will take me at least 90 minutes to finish A to B. But if I leverage somebody else’s skillset and let technology help me shop for this, I’m going to do it in 10. That mindset shift must happen in drug development.

Liv: It’s so exciting. 

Jimita: It is. Our generation is going to write textbooks for our kids.

Liv: Absolutely. Before I let you go, talk to me a little bit about DEI and your passion there. What are your thoughts about where we are as an industry and where we need to get to?

Jimita:  So let me start with something. I learn a lot from my kids. As you can see. You know the movie Barbie just came out.

Liv: Yes!

Jimita:  From somebody who loved Pride and Prejudice, and I still love Pride and Prejudice, it is still one of my favourite go-to movies because it’s the epitome of strong women. Doing what they want to do versus being forced into doing what culture and society are asking them to do. I love all the characters. I have a similar feeling about Barbie as well. They’re two different genres, but I feel the same. And as I said, I learned from my kids. So, there were times when my kids couldn’t relate to things in Barbie, and I didn’t understand why. They’re preteens, so they should have. The reason they couldn’t relate is because they haven’t gone through it. So, there are certain things that my generation went through when it comes to gender biases and racial biases that my kids have not gone through. Not just because they’re young, but because it doesn’t exist to them. So I take that as a positive, as somebody who’s generally optimistic about life and everything she does, I found it very insightful, as well as making me feel optimistic as a woman. As a woman of Indian descent, I feel there were times when I got passed on. I think that is shifting. We are not there yet. We are not even close. We’ve only scratched the surface on D and I, and gender equality. But that is changing. In drug development, we have women leaders of all colours, and all descents who are recognised and have made their name. It speaks about us. I don’t think we’re there yet. We’ve just acknowledged that we have an issue. We’ve just acknowledged that we need to work towards this. There are very few that have made their way all the way up there. But they’re getting there. I see so many women CEOs who are of Indian descent and have cut through that noise that I talked about and have got themselves to a place which feels comfortable to them. It doesn’t mean it was an easy path. That doesn’t mean they didn’t have to go through what I’ve gone through sometimes, it doesn’t mean they weren’t judged for being a woman or judged for being a woman of Indian descent. They didn’t gain trust right away. We need to get to that place. So, when it comes to diversity, equity, and inclusion, the fact that we are addressing that topic is a starting point, but we have a long way to go. I’m hoping what my generation has had to go through, or what our generation and previous generations have had to go through, is not something my kids will have to go through. And that’s why they don’t relate to some of the Barbie references. That tells me I can be hopeful that someday we won’t be passed on for a white male. We will be seen for what we are worth, what we bring, what our value is versus something that somebody has a bias about. That’s how I feel, Olivia, that for our girls, the world will be different. How different. It’s hard to say.

Liv: We’ll have to see.

Jimita: Yeah. Think about it: growing up in India, my parents, my mum, didn’t have the same opportunities that I did, but they were progressive enough to let me grow the way I wanted to, follow my passions, and speak up. I think speaking up is a key quality because if we don’t speak up and don’t stand up for ourselves, be it for gender biases or racial biases or whatever, then we are not asking for what we want. We’re just that poor person, a poor individual who doesn’t have a voice. Having a voice matters. Be it in your home, be it in your workplace, or be it in the industry. It matters to speak up, not just when you see wrong but also voicing your opinions about how you feel about something. That’s the one thing I teach my kids every day: if you are not able to stand up for yourself, you’re not going to be able to stand up for the right thing that needs to happen in the industry or for the people that don’t have the courage to speak up. Going back to your point about D E I, I genuinely believe that although the conversation has started, it has a long way to go.

Liv: Thank you so much for taking this time out to speak to me Jimita.

Jimita: It’s been a pleasure talking to you.

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