 | Shire is embarking on an intensive study program conducted at Wharton – designed to shape and embolden Shire leaders |
Long focused on being the type of employer that brings out the very best in people, Shire is embarking on an intensive study program conducted at Wharton*– designed to shape and embolden Shire leaders. Twenty-five Shire managers attend an intensive, five-day program to discuss leadership qualities and corporate strategies that is geared to enhance Shire’s unique growth model; the program has already run twice, with another scheduled for the final quarter of 2008.
Mike Cola, President, Specialty Pharmaceuticals and member of the Shire Management Committee helped set up the first Shire General Management and Leadership Program as part of ongoing integration and talent management.
Cola turned to Wharton as a partner in the program initiative to develop “leadership with an entrepreneurial spirit.” After Cola had considered several options, “Wharton was the closest fit,” he says. “That, coupled with their willingness to customize the program, is what really sold us.”
“The number one objective of the Wharton program is to develop the leadership skills of existing and future general managers,” Cola says. “At Shire, general managers have broader and deeper responsibilities than at many pharmaceutical companies. General managers can be ‘mini’ CEOs of a product or a set of products – soup to nuts – from manufacturing right through to the customer,” Cola says. Shire’s general managers must create the culture of a smaller company within the larger Shire. “We want a small entrepreneurial leadership team that gets a lot done and is willing to take measured risks. That is how we differentiate ourselves from Big Pharma,” Cola explains. In return, general managers get to “leverage a much larger balance sheet than they would at most private or public companies.”
A key goal of the program is “to help people think holistically about the business,” says Mario Moussa, academic director. “They walk away with a common way of seeing and understanding problems, and they create a kind of ‘mini-culture’ that radiates through the business.” Another top program goal has been to ensure that attendees internalize the knowledge they gain and use it back at the office. The program represents Shire’s investment in its people, according to Cola. “We are very much a people-driven organization. This program shows that even in a challenging environment for pharmaceutical companies – with increasing pressures to control costs – we are still willing to invest and try to grow folks internally.”
*The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania – founded in 1881 as the first collegiate business school – is recognized globally for intellectual leadership and ongoing innovation across every major discipline of business education.
CR Report 2007