Being Digital is more than just important, it is critical
Interview with Rodrigo Lau
General Manager & HP Head Thailand at Boehringer Ingelheim
Could you share with us your background and what motivated you to work in the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry?
My name is Rodrigo Lau, General Manager & HP Head Thailand at Boehringer Ingelheim. My background in education is Business Administration, with a Master’s Degree in marketing.
The first company I joined was Johnson & Johnson (J&J), where I developed my personal sense of purpose to make a conscious choice to work for an organization where I could help and improve people’s lives. I remember hearing from senior executives about the passion and commitment that the company had for health care professionals, patients, the community, and employees. Those words really resonated and spoke to me. I shared the same values of caring for people. Based on that experience, I decided to focus my career in the Healthcare Sector.
After working for several years in J&J, I moved to other pharmaceutical companies; next was Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS), after that Novartis and finally I joined Boehringer Ingelheim. Boehringer Ingelheim at the time proposed a very interesting challenge for my career: to launch a product that would change the #1 worldwide cause of death: cardiovascular disease.
I have since stayed with Boehringer Ingelheim for 11 years.
What brought you to Thailand? Did you find any difficulty with settling into a new culture here, and how did you handle it? What support do you get from your colleagues in Thailand?
I came to Thailand with one clear goal: to grow and strengthen myself as a person that needs to be agile and constantly develop new abilities to deal with this fast-changing environment. In addition, I was keen to expose my spouse and children to a different environment where all of us can enrich our cultural understanding and strengthen our bonds as a family.
Before moving to Thailand, I had a lot of preparation with my family to adapt to the changes and the cultural aspects that are quite different from where I come from. The key is to stay very positive and open-minded, being very flexible to embrace change and to learn new things. The only thing that is more difficult to adapt is the spicy food. Maybe I will get used to it, let’s see if I get better after 1 year!
During the first 6 months in Thailand, I was glad and fortunate to not only receive strong support from my colleagues, but also from the Brazilian community, which surprised me a lot.
So, I would like to take this opportunity to thanks all of them for the warm reception and for all the support that my family and I had been given.
Since Boehringer Ingelheim is active in many areas of Pharma, Healthcare and Animal Health, could you please tell us more about your focus in Thailand?
Boehringer Ingelheim is committed to improving human and animal health. Both businesses in Thailand are important and share common priorities in our organization.
We want to ensure that patients can benefit from our innovative medications that can provide them with better care.
We are also strongly committed to bringing value to our key stakeholders by delivering extraordinary customer experiences with excellent engagement through a diverse channel of communication. This includes not only face-to-face interactions but using all the digital channels, to allow for flexibility and ease of use.
How important is it to ‘Be Digital’ in your industry? How do you integrate digitalization with your business strategy?
Being Digital is more than just important, it is critical. For any organization to thrive and grow, it needs to embrace how digital is able to transform and help us to innovate for patients and customers.
Digital transformation is already happening all around us – and in fact, has sped up due to the current pandemic. It has changed the way our customers engage, changed the way we work, and influenced our behavior.
In our business, it is connected to our key priorities in the organization. It will continue to be a driving force to help us create high-value services for the people we want to reach.
In your opinion, what are the key factors for successful management of Diversity & Inclusion in the Workplace? What would be your suggestion for other organizations who are working on this matter?
First of all, Diversity is one of Boehringer Ingelheim’s priorities worldwide. We are motivated to put this front and center in every country.
I strongly believe that the diversity of our people is a key pillar for ensuring that we better understand our customers, enhances our ability to innovate and ensure we can retain and attract talents. Diversity is also a crucial element to drive business growth.
So, if you want to create an agile organization, diversity can help you to bring different ideas, perspectives, and solutions.
Is there any specific campaign at Boehringer Ingelheim that cultivates a diverse and inclusive work environment? How do you enhance cross-cultural understanding in your team?
At Boehringer Ingelheim, Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) is more than just having a diverse workforce. It is about fostering an inclusive workplace for all, where everyone feels that they can be heard and feel valued. I believe that everyone plays an important role in creating a diverse and inclusive culture.
In Thailand, we have implemented several initiatives to embrace this culture. One good example to share is the D&I Week, where the leadership team actively participated in sharing and discussing topics related to this, with all the employees. Tips and ideas were also sent and webinars organized, where everyone can debate about D&I in our organization.
Most importantly, beyond these great initiatives, all the leaders in the organization shared the same goal and commitment to embrace D&I in our culture. This ensures we create a working environment that fully recognizes our people, our most important asset, and helps us to achieve our collective goals.
What would be your advice for the young generation who grew up with digital tools to integrate this advantage into their career development, especially the ones who are interested in the pharma and healthcare industry?
Young people in the workforce already have a digital-first mindset. They are used to being connected all the time and able to seamlessly switch and use different channels, to receive and push out on-demand customized content.
This is second nature to them, and for anyone who is keen to enter the pharma and healthcare industry – this is an asset. They should look to tapping this strong foundation of digital and apply it in a business context, to seize opportunities and help elevate our entire industry as we move towards a more innovative future.
What is your vision to empower businesswomen in your organization, and to support female career development? What is your plan to achieve these goals?
I was exposed to the challenges that working women faced, trying to succeed at the top, by watching my own mom struggle. This was in the 80s when it is uncommon to have women at the C-suite. She was at that time, the Chief IT Officer in a big company in Brazil. I watched as a child, how she had to navigate being the only woman in a top position and trying to balance between her professional and home responsibilities as a working mom.
The overall number of women at the top of leadership in business is still very low (5-10%). Fortunately, at Boehringer Ingelheim Thailand, this is not the case. In our leadership team, over 60% are women!
In fact, my first boss was a woman and while she was very results-oriented, she was also inclusive. She made me feel part of the team and empowered me to speak up. Throughout my career, I have been fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with many successful, driven women.
In my personal observation, female leaders are persuasive, tenacious, and demonstrate a lot more inclusivity. They work well in teams and can bring people together, to problem solve and make collective decisions.
In summary, to empower businesswomen in any organization, I personally foster an open environment where we truly live our core values: respect, empathy, trust, and collaboration.
Apart from your professional life, what do you do in your free time to recharge batteries? Do you have any hobbies?
My free time is entirely dedicated to my family. As we have recently arrived, we are still exploring all the interesting places around Bangkok city. There is so much to see, and I look forward to seeing the beautiful beaches and fantastic temples in the country with my family. I have enjoyed immersing myself in the culture and I truly admire the friendliness and warm hospitality of the people here. It has been a happy experience for me and my family.
As for hobbies, I like all sports with rackets: tennis, squash, maybe one day I will try badminton. However, during the current Covid situation, all sports venues are closed. So I run to stay healthy and use it as a stress reliever!
What inspires you, and who is your role model in working life and why?
I am inspired by helping people to have a better and happier life. This is something that I have always cultivated in my life, with my family and friends. I also realized that the desire to help people can be extended to my professional life, especially working in the Pharmaceutical & Healthcare Industry. It gives me a great sense of satisfaction and pride to be able to take care of people’s health. To be able to change the disease condition from a patient is what motivates me every day.
I don’t have a specific role model that I follow in my working life. There are so many people who are great leaders that I have had the chance to work with. At the same time, there are several people, such as executives and social entrepreneurs, who are transforming the world! I select the people I admire the most and try to improve myself, guided by their example.
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