This week we are in conversation with Fusion Pharma’s Founder and Managing Director, Leah Heathman. We will frequently be asking members of the Fusion team and their associates 5 questions about business and trends in the Pharmaceutical world.
1. How was Fusion Pharma developed and launched?
The company was launched in 2013 offering Regulatory expertise, plans to expand had always been the intention and in 2020 we rebranded and Fusion Pharma was born. With this brought the introduction of additional areas of expertise and the company now offers a bespoke consultancy service in Regulatory Affairs, Quality Assurance, Pharmacovigilance and Medical activities.
2. What is and how important is company culture to you and what measures do you take to maintain your desired culture?
Company culture is at the core of my vision for Fusion Pharma and one of my top objectives both now and long term. Personally, I want to work at a great company surrounded by happy people, creativity and growth. We are an energetic team with lots of personality and our clients enjoy working with us – if the company culture is off, this will feed through to our clients.
Being a small and growing business, it is paramount that I take on dedicated and passionate individuals committed to the success of the company. I involve the team in business decisions, listen to feedback and engage with them on all levels. We prioritise team engagement every day of the week, not just on ‘team days out’. It’s quite simple, happy people = productive people.
3. What is your current and ideal work/life balance? What measures do you take to control the work/life balance of you and your employees?
Being a Mum of a 5- and 7-year-old, a positive work/life balance is key to my success as a Mum and as a business owner. I am focused during the day as working in the evening is rarely an option. The team have families and interests outside of work, I discourage any out of hours working and I have turned away clients who have asked us to work long hours. We offer a decent holiday package, flexible working hours, remote working options and are sympathetic to the challenges of working parents. That being said I often get text messages in the evenings/weekend with new thoughts and ideas – which gets added to our Monday morning Team meeting agenda to discuss further.
4. What are your long-term goals for Fusion Pharma?
During the last 12 months we have truly seen what focus, commitment and dedication to a vision can build. Since the growth of the company is based on a clear vision, everything we do is aligned to our long-term goals. In the short-term we have another new team member joining which I will be excited to announce very soon, we are busy finalising three exciting collaborations and are onboarding new clients. We have also been nominated for the ‘Woman Who Achieves Business Award for Growing SME’ for which I am immensely proud. Our long-term goals are simply to grow the business and team in line with our company vision, continue to build our client base and keep our customers happy and to build on our reputation. We plan to put in place a graduate and apprentice program to support the next generation of professionals and truly put our stamp in Industry. We are keen to build on our full out-sourcing model since this is where we feel we can add the most value to our clients by taking full responsibility for their Regulatory Affairs, Quality Assurance, Pharmacovigilance and Medical activities.
5. Are there any particular areas of Industry that you are focusing on over the next 12 months?
Brexit is of course an area of interest with continual changes and challenges but with this also new opportunities such as Project Orbis and the Access Consortium. We are keen to grow our full outsourcing model and further expand on Regulatory Intelligence. In addition to this we are taking a keen interest in Medical Writing and have started further training in this area to add to our in-house expertise.