The Challenge:
Our client, a multi-billion-dollar medical device company, required a seasoned technology and engineering executive to guide their journey to becoming a leader in Digital Health. A uniquely structured role, the position had direct responsibility for the development of complex, next-generation solutions, across hardware, software and data analytics & AI.
Specifically, the Digital Health R&D leader was tasked with designing a connected device platform hardware architecture to span across all chronic care portfolios, building patient-centric web and mobile apps with intuitive UIs and enhanced functionality, as well as developing machine learning algorithms to enable personalized recommendations and automation. Furthermore, our client was in the early-stage of building their strength as an organization in these domains, and as such, the role demanded SME-level expertise across each of these disciplines, combined with a remarkable ability to build and develop teams around a clear and motivating vision.
The Solution:
The key to successfully determining the right candidates for this role was identifying organizations that set up their engineering groups in a similar fashion – putting Electrical Engineering, Firmware, Software and Analytics under a single leader. We discovered that this could typically be found in three areas:
- Mid and large-cap medical device firms that couched this type of group within the broader R&D organization of a particular business unit, focused on drug delivery, monitoring, diagnostic or imaging solutions.
- Pharma companies that have invested in internal resources for device development. Specifically, those companies that have developed, internally or through partnership, smart devices like inhalers, insulin pens, and more.
- Small-cap and start up MedTech companies that were either “digital-native” or heavily invested in digital technology, whose senior-most R&D executives possessed the technical knowledge, leadership and business acumen required for the job.
We developed a creative messaging strategy to attract candidates to the role, despite the great economic uncertainty caused by the pandemic, and tied that to a regular and persistent outreach cadence.. In addition, we designed a tailored interview to assess candidates’ depth of expertise in the relevant domains, ability to build teams and culture, and to lead engineers through unfamiliar and highly complex technical challenges.
The Result:
- Over 100 candidates from the top Medical Device, Pharma and HealthTech companies were identified
- A shortlist of 5 qualified candidates was presented within 3 weeks
- Within 90 days a candidate was secured, with unique breadth of experience working in both one of the top medical equipment companies in the world as well as one of the top data science and AI research labs in the world.
