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I have to say, I was so excited to talk to Bruce, and it
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did not disappoint. We talked about all kinds
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00:00:06
of things, including AI. You could almost see him switching
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00:00:09
hats. He was like, OK, I'm going to put on my chief people officer
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hat, and now I'm going to put on my chief legal hat, and now my IP hat, and
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Bruce is a super interesting person. He has a wealth of
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00:00:21
experience. He is currently the chief legal officer and corporate secretary
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00:00:24
at Deep Cell, but he has held a variety of positions with
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a variety of companies and just a really interesting guy to talk to.
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So I think people are really going to like this episode. Bruce, thank you so
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Awesome. Well, as always, our first question is, what did you want
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Yeah, I spent a lot of my time trying to figure it out rather than what
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00:00:50
I want to be, but what I like to do. And so with
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00:00:54
all the activities that I sort of try, attempted, I sort
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00:00:57
of came to a conclusion that I like to kind of
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00:01:00
ask, they all grab at two things, right? One is that I like to help
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00:01:03
people. I, for some reason, I found even
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00:01:07
at seven years of age, that people have a tendency to
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00:01:10
come and wanting to talk to me. They want to just talk
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00:01:14
to me, ask for suggestion or just for me to listen. And
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so I found that to be fascinating. And then if there's anything I can do to help people, even
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just cousins, neighbors, and I don't know, parents, I
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00:01:24
love doing that. And then the other one is I like to build things, events.
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So there are a lot of broken watches. be put
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together or sometimes they're together, but sometimes they're not. But
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what I also enjoy doing, I find myself liking to do, is to
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find some sort of pattern out of chaos. And
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so you could be putting things together in a new way or the
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same way, but I just enjoy that. And so now that I
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am a chief legal officer at the license company, And
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along this way, I have tried, again, dabble,
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I've dabbled in engineering. I have dabbled in business development, of
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course, legal, HR. And I
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00:02:04
would like to think that I still have kept a little bit of that
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It sounds like it. That is really very insightful as
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a seven-year-old because I definitely was running around in my backyard pretending
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to be a horse. So I'm really impressed
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by, you know, how you went about that career exploration and
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just staying true to yourself. You have a really interesting
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background. We talk a lot about career paths, both here on the
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podcast and we work with a lot of job seekers, just guiding
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00:02:35
them and thinking about what is possible. Your career
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00:02:38
path is really cool. And so I wonder if you could walk us through
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the adult part of the career path, you know, from school
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to where you are now, because you have a number of degrees and it's just really
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Yeah, I started my academic
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00:02:55
career thinking I was going to be a professor. I've
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00:02:59
enjoyed the academia portion of it. I like to do research, I like
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00:03:03
to find new things, learn new things. But shortly
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00:03:06
after I started my graduate school at MIT, I
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realized that I enjoy providing
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00:03:14
advice as I end up just by coincidence as
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00:03:17
an advice columnist at MIT Newspaper. And I found
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00:03:21
myself enjoying that a lot more than the
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00:03:24
lab itself. And that's
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00:03:28
also where I started to realize that there is that human element that
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00:03:32
I really, really liked. And again, if anything, that reminds me of
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00:03:35
the seven-year-old Bruce, right? They wanted to work with people together,
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00:03:40
but at the same time, still being able to build things and
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use the science aspect of it. And
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then so that's when I started to pivot to a more
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legal career. And so
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00:03:55
from that, that has been sort of my trajectory. And at the same time, I
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never really lost sight of trying to try
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00:04:02
different things, right? And then along the way, I picked up, as
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00:04:05
I mentioned earlier, there's the business development aspect of HR
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00:04:09
and others. And so rather than thinking that those
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00:04:12
are sort of discrete milestones, I sort of see them as just, I
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00:04:16
happen to be at the right time with
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00:04:19
the right people at the right place who are willing
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00:04:22
to invest in this person,
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00:04:26
me, and explore a potential new venture together.
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Yeah, how did you actually get into the biotech space? Because
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Yeah, so I actually, my initial research
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00:04:41
was actually on nanotechnology by physicists. And then it
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00:04:44
was sort of, but I finished, once I finished my master's degree, I
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00:04:48
decided to do something a little different. So I, for my PhD, I
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00:04:52
went into medical engineering. And so that was
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00:04:56
my first foray into a more bio area. And
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it just happens. And again, when I was in a law firm, I
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00:05:02
worked with clients in all types of spaces. I've worked with high tech
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00:05:06
companies, semiconductors, emerging technologies, and biotech. And
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it just somehow the biotech sort
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00:05:13
of end up just stuck, right? And be it sort of the mentality, personality,
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00:05:17
or just opportunity themselves. And I just ended up working
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00:05:25
That makes sense to me because as somebody who likes to do
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00:05:28
a variety of things myself, biotech is
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00:05:32
nothing if it's not variety, right? There are so many
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00:05:35
interesting technologies coming through and it's fast paced
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00:05:39
and for better or worse, we do move around with
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00:05:42
different companies because it's a bit volatile. But
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00:05:45
for the right personality, that means a lot of fun experiences. So
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Well, and I think it was Lynn Walder, who we spoke to on the podcast a
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00:05:54
few weeks ago, who said the thing with biotech is even when you try to
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00:05:58
get out, you always get sucked back in. So it's
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00:06:01
like once it sinks its claws into you, you're just working in biotech. That's
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00:06:06
And just to your point too, biotech is so broad, right? AI
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00:06:09
is biotech. The company I'm right now at,
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00:06:14
they try to marry AI engineering and biology all
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00:06:17
together. So it's as broad as you want it to
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00:06:22
Can you tell us a little bit about that? Let's dive into that topic because your
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DeepCell is the company where I'm at right now. It's
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using AI to image or understand
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00:06:35
better the cell morphological features
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00:06:40
so that we can better understand the different properties of cells. And
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00:06:44
with the hope that maybe it will provide
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00:06:47
better indications or information that
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00:06:51
might lead to treatments and all that cool stuff down
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00:06:56
And you're wearing a few hats there. Do you want to tell us about the couple
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00:07:01
Yeah. So I joined as a chief legal officer and
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00:07:05
the corporate secretary of Deep Cell. And recently I also became
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00:07:09
the interim head of people. And this is
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00:07:12
not actually my, not my first time being the head of people, but
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00:07:16
the interim head of people role at Deep Cell was fairly
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00:07:20
Can you take us through a little bit of what a day in the life looks
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like in your job, wearing all these hats and working with this cool
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00:07:27
tech? What do you do when you wake up? And what does your day look like?
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00:07:32
So my, my, I was going to say my every
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00:07:36
day is different, but I don't, I think my every hour is different. And
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00:07:39
then the joke I've turned into is, it's just being, I'm pretty
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00:07:43
much an octopus, right? I just got off a call. I could be having one
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00:07:46
call about IP. Um, and the next call
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00:07:49
I'll be talking about, uh, retention and the next time will be
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00:07:53
diversity. And the next time would be back to potential contracts.
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00:07:57
So it's exciting, it's
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00:08:00
chaotic, but at the same time, it allows
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00:08:04
me to look at the company even more holistically than
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That's a legit hat you're wearing, head of people. So we, you
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know, we work with some very small companies and a head of people
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00:08:21
might be overseeing, you know, 10 people. And that,
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00:08:25
you know, that's pretty early to bring in a head of people, but we've seen it before. But
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00:08:28
a hundred, that's a job. That's a lot of people to care
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How do you, I mean, if you don't mind me asking, I
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00:08:39
feel like, you know, everyone, maybe not to the extent that you
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00:08:42
do, but people are switching gears constantly, but that can be so
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00:08:46
exhausting and draining. So do you find that energizing or
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do you do something for yourself that kind of like resets when
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00:08:53
like at the end of the day, you're like, well, I was in 76 meetings and I literally
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00:08:58
I think my answer is a little bit of both, right? I will say I
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00:09:01
am an introvert, so I recharge by having
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00:09:04
a long time to decompress and then to be able
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00:09:08
to think through things. But at the same time, and
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00:09:11
back to my earlier comment, I just enjoy fighting
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00:09:15
that thread in a pool of chaos, and
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00:09:18
they thread that into different needles and thread it into
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00:09:22
something that makes sense. So to me, HR and
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00:09:25
legal are not necessarily independent because to me they are actually intertwined.
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00:09:29
Right. How do you make sure that people are empowered to
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00:09:33
do what they do so that, for example, the company can
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00:09:36
have the IP generated by the people because those are
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00:09:40
the assets. And how do you protect this IP that you generate? Because
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00:09:45
I have noticed that, you know, at companies about that size, it
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00:09:48
seems like many times the offices for the
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00:09:52
head of legal and head of people are very close by in proximity
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00:09:56
because there's a lot. There's a lot of exchange there, you
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00:09:59
know, to your point. So I want to think a
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00:10:02
little bit about the strategy role that you're playing as well. So
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00:10:07
in a growing biotech, I would break these
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00:10:10
out into two different questions, but let's just keep them together. What
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00:10:13
are the main strategies that you're thinking through on a daily basis so
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00:10:17
that you can help the company grow? Whether that's legal people,
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00:10:21
you know, what are the things that you find most enjoyable and impactful
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I see myself as a strategist. I spend a lot of my time trying
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00:10:31
to preempt what the outcome could be in
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00:10:35
a way that makes sense, right? And a lot of my GC
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00:10:38
friends, they are trained to sort
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00:10:42
of put out fires, right? Litigation ensues or
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00:10:45
transaction happens, then they turn into a
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00:10:49
more reactive, and there's nothing wrong with it, just different
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00:10:52
models, different business, a way of doing things. But
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00:10:56
I spend a lot of my time trying to craft a strategy in
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00:11:00
a way that if something unexpected happens,
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00:11:06
it's not an entire surprise. For example, we look
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00:11:10
at potential problems on the road for IP. We
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00:11:13
look at potential employment issues because of the new law that came out. Or
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00:11:17
the AI thing that just, you know, everything is sort of I'm
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00:11:21
not trying to find an answer to everything. I
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00:11:24
think it's important to know that because the moment I
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00:11:29
say I know everything is the moment I don't think I
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00:11:32
know everything or anything. So if I spend all of my time to
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00:11:36
understand what the problems are and can be and
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00:11:40
find a way to proactively mitigate the potential
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00:11:44
consequences of it. And by doing that, then I
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00:11:47
look at, back to your second part of the question, what empowers me, right?
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00:11:50
And so I, I find it the most energizing, um,
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00:11:55
to be able to work with the people. Um,
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00:11:58
I, I enjoy working with scientists, um, that sort of go back to
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00:12:01
my, my IP route, but I also enjoy working with.
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00:12:06
people on the non-IP portion, right? Talking about inclusion, talking
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00:12:10
about how to make a place more empowering
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00:12:14
for all kinds of employees. It touches
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00:12:17
on the humanity portion of my interests. So
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I like to weave them together, because I
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00:12:26
I like the way you describe that. I also like to look
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00:12:30
for things that could go wrong and have a plan for it. But
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00:12:33
I just call myself a negative optimist. I hope that it all works
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00:12:39
That's exactly a point well made. One of the things that I have tried to
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00:12:42
do so that, you know, lawyers have a reputation, right?
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00:12:45
Part of no. One of the things I try to do so that I don't become
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00:12:49
a part of no is I say I'm a part of maybe. Right.
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00:12:53
And so the way I do it is to say here are the risks. However,
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00:12:57
here are the things we can do in view of the risk. Now we
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00:13:01
have a menu in front of us to pick, rather than, no, no, no, no,
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00:13:04
no, no, no, no, no. And that also allows
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00:13:08
me to work with the other teams. For example, at the exact choosing
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00:13:11
level, at the different functional groups, or even down to the
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00:13:14
most junior of folks. Now we know the
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00:13:17
different risks. How do we then sit together and
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00:13:21
craft a strategy that people can actually
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00:13:30
Yeah, I think risk mitigation is such a fascinating thing. And it's
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00:13:34
kind of fun, right? Because if you're looking ahead and it's a risk down the
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00:13:37
line, it gives you more room to play. And you also do put parameters in
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00:13:41
I am the one, though, who is running ahead full speed. And Allison's
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00:13:45
like, have you considered X,
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00:13:48
Y, Z. It's really helpful to have somebody on the team who is maybe a
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00:13:52
little more, I'm the classic entrepreneur who's like,
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00:13:59
Right. And you talk about empowering and the energizing part. One
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00:14:03
of the part I, what makes, what drives a
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00:14:06
lot of the exercise I said, despite what I said, that being the
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00:14:09
part of it may be, is I surround people, like surround
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00:14:13
myself with people who are very different than I am. And
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00:14:16
that's intentional. I very often hire people who
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00:14:20
are very different than I am just so that I can get a
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00:14:23
new perspective, right? And so while I'm doing what I'm doing,
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00:14:26
my approach is this, I want to make sure there are other people checking
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00:14:31
to make sure I am not putting myself in a bubble and lose sight
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00:14:34
of what I don't know, what I don't know, right? And so that has been
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00:14:37
empowering. It's sometimes uncomfortable because people
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00:14:41
are different than you are. I intentionally put myself in an uncomfortable situation,
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00:14:46
but the idea is so that I can grow, the team can
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00:14:51
And you do a decent amount of work within the
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00:14:54
DEI realm as well in your company. So I
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00:14:57
think that getting comfortable with that diversity, that
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00:15:01
really, once you are comfortable, that makes the
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00:15:05
whole company better. And I wonder what
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00:15:08
your perspective is on helping people to push through that and sort
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00:15:11
of setting the stage for creating that diversity, those
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00:15:15
different perspectives within the company and helping people to overcome maybe their discomfort,
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00:15:21
Yeah, so I would say of the D, E, and
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00:15:25
I, I actually focus a lot on the I.
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00:15:29
It's not to say the other two are not important, but of the three, I like to focus
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00:15:33
a lot of my efforts on the I, the inclusion part. And
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00:15:37
as a gross analogy, the diversity will increase numbers,
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00:15:41
it will change representation. The equity might actually bring
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00:15:44
people in, but it's the inclusion piece that
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00:15:47
makes people stay. And so how do I do it
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00:15:51
so that people feel they're included? And included to me
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00:15:54
doesn't mean, okay, you have a party, I invite you. It's that I
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00:15:57
want you to feel like you're part of the dance. You don't
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00:16:01
get a ticket and that's it. You are part of the party to
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00:16:04
dance with me. And so to me, that is
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00:16:07
my, that's all of my efforts on that piece of
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00:16:11
the D&I, or I like to call it ID really, I'd
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00:16:15
reverse the order. But that also means that people
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00:16:18
come from all kinds of backgrounds, right? And people have different
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00:16:22
levels of comfort, they view the world differently. So
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00:16:25
very often we need to calibrate not to lose ourselves.
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00:16:29
I would like to be true. I think it's important that we are true
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00:16:33
to ourselves. But how do we do that so other people can
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00:16:36
also be true to themselves? I think that that has been a
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00:16:40
lot of work that needs to be done, right? And how do you do it
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00:16:43
so that people feel they're listened to, they're seen?
Speaker:
00:16:47
At the same time, more importantly, they are empower to
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00:16:51
contribute. Because being seen is one thing, but feeling like they
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00:16:54
can be part of that community, to be included, and
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00:16:58
do something together as a team, that is
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00:17:05
What have you seen work in companies, you know, when they're really trying
Speaker:
00:17:09
to focus on the inclusion piece? Are there actionable things
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00:17:12
that you've implemented or you've seen companies implement that you think if
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00:17:15
other organizations were to know and do the same, it would actually
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00:17:22
Um, so I will, I will speak from my own experience, right?
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00:17:25
That's, that's my way of saying this is not a guidebook because I think it depends, it
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00:17:29
depends on that demographic of the company. It depends on the industry of the
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00:17:32
company. But what I found to be helpful, um,
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00:17:36
is that the, the team that the senior leadership
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00:17:40
team, um, she strived for transparency, accountability,
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00:17:45
and more importantly, vulnerability. And so it's
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00:17:49
important, I think, for the employees to see
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00:17:53
that the efforts to
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00:17:56
create a more inclusive environment doesn't just come
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00:18:00
from one person or some lip service that you
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00:18:04
give out as a brochure or some training you do once a
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00:18:07
year. It's that it should all come all
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00:18:11
the way from the top to all the way to the bottom. And I
Speaker:
00:18:15
mean, they shouldn't even be about it. It should be just an entire company should be
Speaker:
00:18:18
an effort for everyone to be involved. And that also means
Speaker:
00:18:22
if there is a challenge, right? So maybe there's something that hasn't
Speaker:
00:18:25
been done well. The team should actually
Speaker:
00:18:29
confront it, right? I believe that one way
Speaker:
00:18:32
to work together, to build that trust, to
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00:18:35
build that intimacy is actually by solving hard problems together.
Speaker:
00:18:40
Not to avoid them together, but to actually confront them and then
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00:18:43
deal with it heads on. And that's how I feel
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00:18:46
in my experience, people starting to trust each
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00:18:50
other. And once you have that trust, people feel safer
Speaker:
00:18:53
to potentially speak out, right? And to potentially make
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00:18:57
mistakes. And that's when you actually handle
Speaker:
00:19:01
and work together as one. Because otherwise you have a bunch
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00:19:04
of sort of discrete point people working on
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00:19:07
different things, but they never are bound together by some sort
Speaker:
00:19:12
That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. That's really impactful. Can
Speaker:
00:19:16
we switch gears and talk about legal matters? I'm
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00:19:21
so curious about where you see the future of
Speaker:
00:19:25
IP going with all of the rapid changes
Speaker:
00:19:28
that we're seeing. Is there anything that you are just fascinated
Speaker:
00:19:34
I, well, yeah, the answer is definitely yes. I'm fascinated by
Speaker:
00:19:37
quite a few things. And again, just a few months ago, I never
Speaker:
00:19:41
heard of JotGPT. I don't think anybody knows what JotGPT is, but and
Speaker:
00:19:44
look at, look at where we are now. Right. And I think one of the
Speaker:
00:19:47
things I find fascinating and one of the reasons I
Speaker:
00:19:50
am where I am in both a company perspective
Speaker:
00:19:54
or the legal career I'm in is actually to learn the
Speaker:
00:19:58
technology. at the very beginning stage, right?
Speaker:
00:20:02
And that's actually by design where
Speaker:
00:20:06
IP comes from. You learn it before it's publicly available. You learn it before
Speaker:
00:20:10
it's well known. I think there's going to be a
Speaker:
00:20:13
lot of unknowns. And it's not going to be a
Speaker:
00:20:17
linear growth. It's going to be an explanation because And once
Speaker:
00:20:20
we open the door to taking AI as one example, I
Speaker:
00:20:25
would not be surprised that all of a sudden AI can be used for multiple,
Speaker:
00:20:28
multiple things that had never even been contemplated before. Now,
Speaker:
00:20:32
that also means, now putting my lawyer's hat
Speaker:
00:20:35
back on, The technology
Speaker:
00:20:39
is going to be ahead of the time or before the
Speaker:
00:20:43
legal paradigm catch up. So before the courts
Speaker:
00:20:46
can act, before Congress can act, we're going to have a lot
Speaker:
00:20:49
of challenges as a result of exciting
Speaker:
00:20:53
development in science and technology that we need to confront,
Speaker:
00:20:57
right? And how do we protect privacy? How do we protect You
Speaker:
00:21:01
know, even bias, you know, our AI, should
Speaker:
00:21:04
AI be treated as people? I mean, there are a lot of things that are not
Speaker:
00:21:08
yet resolved legally, but it has to
Speaker:
00:21:13
Within your space particularly, we're talking about
Speaker:
00:21:17
imaging, right? And so using your technology to
Speaker:
00:21:20
be able to survey vast quantities of
Speaker:
00:21:24
images and to find the pattern so that we can identify
Speaker:
00:21:28
disease tissues faster and that sort of thing. Are there any
Speaker:
00:21:31
thoughts to the ramifications of that patient confidentiality and
Speaker:
00:21:35
where will those datasets come from and all of those things? Because, you
Speaker:
00:21:39
know, we we're still in the midst of, for instance, the HeLa cell
Speaker:
00:21:42
legal issues. And so I'm just curious, are we
Speaker:
00:21:46
going to see that again in 50 years with people's
Speaker:
00:21:49
I think that problem has never gone away. The
Speaker:
00:21:53
reason is sort of on the surface, less
Speaker:
00:21:57
heard of is because of the legal paradigm that was created. Right.
Speaker:
00:22:00
And then that's my way of saying, because the problem never went
Speaker:
00:22:04
away. Anytime there is a scientific advancement,
Speaker:
00:22:09
that will probably be brought back in front and center. Right.
Speaker:
00:22:12
And so how do you, how do we. advance
Speaker:
00:22:16
the science of our kind, humankind, so that we benefit everybody
Speaker:
00:22:21
without compromising at the same time the people being part
Speaker:
00:22:24
of the experiments. That is
Speaker:
00:22:27
going to be challenging, right? And that's another part
Speaker:
00:22:31
of that also is there is right now no cohesive framework,
Speaker:
00:22:36
Europe act this way, US act that way, even in the United
Speaker:
00:22:40
States, this country, different states act different ways. So until
Speaker:
00:22:43
there is a more cohesive framework, and I would, I remain hopeful
Speaker:
00:22:47
that sometime soon, this will happen. But until
Speaker:
00:22:51
then, it's going to be quite a bit of back to the, my
Speaker:
00:22:55
earlier comment about how do you preemptively and
Speaker:
00:22:59
proactively think about the possible consequences before
Speaker:
00:23:04
Karina's question was so intelligent and like so far reaching
Speaker:
00:23:08
and consequential. Mine is very in the moment. Do
Speaker:
00:23:11
you allow employees to use ChatGTP at DeepCell or
Speaker:
00:23:15
is that like, no, don't be funneling our information into
Speaker:
00:23:21
Well, that's going to be a work in progress. But for now, we
Speaker:
00:23:24
are not prohibiting child GPT. And
Speaker:
00:23:28
to be realistic, this is the engineering part of me, right? It's
Speaker:
00:23:32
impossible to prohibit. So rather than prohibiting, we've
Speaker:
00:23:35
been focused on how do we do it so
Speaker:
00:23:45
Yeah, it's a lot to think of right now. I agree. We're seeing
Speaker:
00:23:48
schools are prohibiting it. Oh, okay.
Speaker:
00:23:52
But how, how are you prohibiting this? You know, this is where it's
Speaker:
00:23:55
the education component. What should and shouldn't we use it
Speaker:
00:24:01
And actually the joke, the joke actually is when someone asked to,
Speaker:
00:24:05
to write a policy of how to not use ChargeGBT, someone
Speaker:
00:24:11
But here's my whole thing with it. I mean, here's my soapbox. This
Speaker:
00:24:15
is the prime opportunity to teach people how to think critically. Just
Speaker:
00:24:19
because it spits it back out at you and the tool is there does not mean it's accurate.
Speaker:
00:24:22
And it's like a calculator. If you understand what the
Speaker:
00:24:25
answer roughly should be or how you got there, sometimes you
Speaker:
00:24:29
mistype in the calculator and it gives you a crazy answer and you need to be
Speaker:
00:24:32
able to parse that out. And so I think it's like, you know, when we talk about people
Speaker:
00:24:35
using these tools, they just have to understand the critical components of what
Speaker:
00:24:42
And also, you raised a very good point, right? I mean, that's again, that's a
Speaker:
00:24:45
different way. That's my way of seeing the world is
Speaker:
00:24:49
that One reason child GPT becomes child
Speaker:
00:24:53
GPT is our framework and our way of
Speaker:
00:24:56
looking at data being generated. It may
Speaker:
00:25:00
not be healthy, right? So for example, one of the reasons
Speaker:
00:25:03
that school kids can actually use child GPT to get away
Speaker:
00:25:06
our assignment is those are meeting rubrics, right?
Speaker:
00:25:11
If you were to look at this and say the assignment is
Speaker:
00:25:15
to for you to actually provide your thinking
Speaker:
00:25:18
process, those are not things JWT can do. Just
Speaker:
00:25:21
like going back to a larger company environment, if what
Speaker:
00:25:25
we are looking for is truly people generating
Speaker:
00:25:29
new ideas, and it could be IP, it could be non-IP, but
Speaker:
00:25:33
it's the thought process of sharing what you are generating, those
Speaker:
00:25:37
are not replicable by JWT, or even created by JWT. And
Speaker:
00:25:41
so I think it may be helpful for us
Speaker:
00:25:45
as a whole, as a society, to look at what is valuable information
Speaker:
00:25:51
Yep. I completely agree. I think it's a great tool for brainstorming. I think people
Speaker:
00:25:54
just have to think through it and take it to the next level. Take the
Speaker:
00:25:58
first iteration and say, okay, well that's what that's been out, but now how do I
Speaker:
00:26:01
improve it and where does that lead me and chase the rabbits, you know?
Speaker:
00:26:04
So kind of staying on this legal route, we
Speaker:
00:26:08
are moving so fast. How do you keep up with that with the IP?
Speaker:
00:26:15
whole thing about strategy is you need to preemptively think
Speaker:
00:26:19
of what could be and might be in a practical way, right? And the reason
Speaker:
00:26:23
is nobody has unlimited budget. And so that goes
Speaker:
00:26:27
to what if the strategy shouldn't be just cover everything, scorch the
Speaker:
00:26:30
earth. And so that also means I think
Speaker:
00:26:33
it's important when we build an IP, the strategy
Speaker:
00:26:37
should be a science-driven strategy rather than a legal-driven strategy.
Speaker:
00:26:41
Because if the strategy is based on science, then
Speaker:
00:26:44
you capture a technical solution rather than
Speaker:
00:26:48
a legal-driven maneuvering, which
Speaker:
00:26:52
can come and go based on how the courts act. right, how the laws change.
Speaker:
00:26:56
But if a solution is a solution, that actually builds a
Speaker:
00:26:59
lot of the foundational pieces of
Speaker:
00:27:03
what the assets of the company can be. And that also
Speaker:
00:27:06
allows you to be more creative, right? Rather than using legal as
Speaker:
00:27:10
a reason of what not to do, or what
Speaker:
00:27:13
to do, you now open yourself up to a potential, endless
Speaker:
00:27:17
potentials, because your science will
Speaker:
00:27:20
allow you to capture that from different angles.
Speaker:
00:27:24
How do you find the different elements of that development, that
Speaker:
00:27:28
technology improvement? And also, how do you do it
Speaker:
00:27:31
to find a synergy of the different elements? Those
Speaker:
00:27:34
are things that are independent and
Speaker:
00:27:38
agnostic from the legal requirements as well. And
Speaker:
00:27:41
with that, then the company can actually have an IP
Speaker:
00:27:45
asset that match better with
Speaker:
00:27:49
its commercial interest. And you can explain to the
Speaker:
00:27:53
investors or the rest of the world, here's what I'm
Speaker:
00:27:56
doing and why, rather than some arbitrary legal
Speaker:
00:28:04
I think that when we think about people who are building a biotech in the
Speaker:
00:28:08
very early stages, you know, obviously, They
Speaker:
00:28:11
need to advance the science. There's IP. They have like just standard HR legal
Speaker:
00:28:14
issues. But most people aren't bringing in like a full time
Speaker:
00:28:18
chief legal officer. Right. But when do you think the right time to start
Speaker:
00:28:21
incorporating that in is for a small firm? What
Speaker:
00:28:25
do you think the tipping point is to like you need someone on site? Is it in a
Speaker:
00:28:31
It's important to know that different companies are different, right? And
Speaker:
00:28:35
then there are companies that are not generating as
Speaker:
00:28:38
much IP as some of the more life sciences and biotech companies.
Speaker:
00:28:41
So I don't, I don't want to pretend that, you know, they should be all the
Speaker:
00:28:45
same. In fact, they should not be the same to be strategic. But
Speaker:
00:28:48
however, for a science or, or a IP, an
Speaker:
00:28:51
IP generating company, life sciences being one, biotech, life
Speaker:
00:28:55
sciences and biotech, and also high tech. I, I
Speaker:
00:28:58
would say it's probably better. to
Speaker:
00:29:02
bring an attorney that
Speaker:
00:29:05
is at least knowledgeable on the IP front
Speaker:
00:29:09
as early as possible. Because very often what ends up
Speaker:
00:29:13
happening is when they hire, when they have the
Speaker:
00:29:17
resources, more often is when they were
Speaker:
00:29:22
told to do it by the board, it's still a little too late, right?
Speaker:
00:29:26
Because a lot of the founders didn't appreciate how important IP
Speaker:
00:29:29
really is. And think about this, I would encourage us to think about this.
Speaker:
00:29:33
Before a company commercialized a product, very
Speaker:
00:29:37
often the only tangible asset is actually IP.
Speaker:
00:29:42
And so if there is to be a merger and acquisition, if there's going to be whatever
Speaker:
00:29:45
transaction, before a product is actually launched
Speaker:
00:29:50
or sold in the market, the only thing that
Speaker:
00:29:53
you can show, or one of the very few things you can show, really is the IP
Speaker:
00:29:57
assets you have. And so rather than playing catch up,
Speaker:
00:30:01
it is important, I would even say critical, particularly for
Speaker:
00:30:04
a biotech company, to focus on the assets as early
Speaker:
00:30:09
Could see your chief business officer hat in that one. Yep. No,
Speaker:
00:30:15
that's really, really point well taken. That
Speaker:
00:30:19
is critical. And I think not very many founders do think
Speaker:
00:30:23
about that as like, I have an asset. How
Speaker:
00:30:26
do I protect this asset? There's a lot of people who can't
Speaker:
00:30:29
afford, you know, at an early stage to bring in a full time head
Speaker:
00:30:33
of legal or even, you know, someone on the IP space.
Speaker:
00:30:37
How useful is it? Is it possible to use a firm to
Speaker:
00:30:40
leverage an external firm? And if so, when is that? not
Speaker:
00:30:47
At the minimum, the company should focus on
Speaker:
00:30:50
IP, right? And be, whether that is on an outside counsel, outside
Speaker:
00:30:54
firm or internal, at the minimum, some effort should
Speaker:
00:30:58
be made. That's what I recommend. The question of when that
Speaker:
00:31:01
balance is tilted so that it becomes an in-house, it
Speaker:
00:31:05
would depend on a lot of factors, right? And so
Speaker:
00:31:09
resources being one. What I though would say
Speaker:
00:31:12
from a sort of anecdotally, what
Speaker:
00:31:16
has been successful for a
Speaker:
00:31:20
license or biotech company to handle
Speaker:
00:31:24
their IP is actually to have that transition to
Speaker:
00:31:28
in-house as early as possible. And here's why.
Speaker:
00:31:32
Outside councils, law firms, to no
Speaker:
00:31:36
fault of their own, they can handle a task-oriented IP
Speaker:
00:31:41
project. However, they are not going to have the visibility or
Speaker:
00:31:46
even the insight into where the company wants to go.
Speaker:
00:31:50
So the information they have is as good as whatever they
Speaker:
00:31:53
receive. On the other hand, if you have someone strategic
Speaker:
00:31:57
in-house, what they can bring to the table is asking,
Speaker:
00:32:01
well, what about something else? What have we missed? Right. And
Speaker:
00:32:04
that strategy piece is very often not able
Speaker:
00:32:08
to capture by an outside counsel that is not on the ground day
Speaker:
00:32:12
to day and figure out where the company may
Speaker:
00:32:15
go or where the company can be benefited in
Speaker:
00:32:19
That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, that was sort of my assumption as
Speaker:
00:32:22
well. But so it sounds like, you know, if you
Speaker:
00:32:26
have to choose keeping external counsel that's
Speaker:
00:32:29
doing like contracts and, you know, more of the regular
Speaker:
00:32:33
legal aspects, but can that be handled
Speaker:
00:32:36
by your IP attorney or is that not generally done? I know you wear both hats,
Speaker:
00:32:39
but can your IP attorney usually generally
Speaker:
00:32:48
very often different, but they're also very often
Speaker:
00:32:51
the same, particularly in a life science company. And that's another reason
Speaker:
00:32:55
I like to weave my legal
Speaker:
00:32:58
strategy based on an IP-centric approach. And
Speaker:
00:33:02
so again, this is applicable in a more life science, biotech,
Speaker:
00:33:06
or high-tech settings where it's very uncommon
Speaker:
00:33:11
any transaction will go through without touching IP in some
Speaker:
00:33:14
way. even a hiring of a consultant, right,
Speaker:
00:33:18
or collaboration. So very
Speaker:
00:33:22
often an IP trained attorney should
Speaker:
00:33:25
be able to at least contribute to the transactional
Speaker:
00:33:29
pieces that legal exercise, although
Speaker:
00:33:33
they are, they're designed to be different. But
Speaker:
00:33:37
that's my way of saying that if
Speaker:
00:33:40
there is to be a legal transactional exercise, IP should
Speaker:
00:33:43
have some input into it. But whether the person can
Speaker:
00:33:47
actually do both, that would depend on what
Speaker:
00:33:52
Yeah, this is an area I have very little experience other than, yeah,
Speaker:
00:33:57
we get contracts signed. But we
Speaker:
00:34:00
have not had to deal directly with IP because that's just not our
Speaker:
00:34:04
area. Other than if a candidate comes in, you know, attached to a patent, we have
Speaker:
00:34:10
In a situation, unless it's an IP focus, typically companies
Speaker:
00:34:15
like to have people who are focused on the more
Speaker:
00:34:22
For anyone listening who is like, wow, what a cool career. I mean, I
Speaker:
00:34:25
think it would be very difficult to replicate your career path. It is very
Speaker:
00:34:29
interesting and it is just diverse. It is fascinating. But
Speaker:
00:34:33
if someone was like, wow, I really think that like being the chief legal officer
Speaker:
00:34:37
or, you know, any of these interim roles you had or chief business officer, like
Speaker:
00:34:40
I guess in general, what advice do you have to someone who's, you
Speaker:
00:34:43
know, maybe early stage career, maybe they're still figuring it out, but
Speaker:
00:34:50
I actually get asked that question quite a bit. I
Speaker:
00:34:53
do a lot of mentoring. And so that's actually one of the
Speaker:
00:34:56
most common questions I get asked. So my recommendation
Speaker:
00:35:00
is this. I think it's important to
Speaker:
00:35:04
find your North Star values. Because that
Speaker:
00:35:08
is going to be what helps you weather the storms, if there is one.
Speaker:
00:35:11
That is going to be what helps you find your interests and understand what
Speaker:
00:35:15
you don't like. So find your North Star values
Speaker:
00:35:19
as early as possible, appreciating that value can
Speaker:
00:35:22
change. but in the actions can change and
Speaker:
00:35:26
you should be willing to embrace that change because that's how
Speaker:
00:35:29
you evolve. But find that value as early as possible and
Speaker:
00:35:33
at the same time be intellectually curious, right? And to say,
Speaker:
00:35:37
look, there might be things I don't know. But let's find
Speaker:
00:35:41
out, right? Don't stop there. Don't stop at there's something I don't know.
Speaker:
00:35:44
OK, too bad. But find out, make an effort to find
Speaker:
00:35:47
out, be vulnerable and say, I'm going to show up. I'm
Speaker:
00:35:51
going to give it a try. And if it doesn't work, then let's be resilient
Speaker:
00:35:54
and come back again or do something else. Know what you like, be
Speaker:
00:35:58
true to yourself and then give it a try and just
Speaker:
00:36:04
I think that's great life advice. Yeah. Honestly, career,
Speaker:
00:36:10
Yeah. So what is next for
Speaker:
00:36:13
you on this wild career ride that you're on? Do you
Speaker:
00:36:16
have anything that is undone and you think, you know, before I'm done,
Speaker:
00:36:21
I don't really have one, probably because
Speaker:
00:36:25
I keep trying new things regardless. And I know I'm going to
Speaker:
00:36:28
keep trying new things regardless. But career-wise, I
Speaker:
00:36:31
think, first of all, I have had a remarkable career
Speaker:
00:36:35
journey to be where I am. And I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes. But
Speaker:
00:36:39
being where I am right now, I've started to enjoy
Speaker:
00:36:43
a lot more giving back. to
Speaker:
00:36:46
the community, mentoring, and making sure that
Speaker:
00:36:50
whatever I'm doing can actually help the
Speaker:
00:36:54
next generation of folks who want to participate
Speaker:
00:36:57
in any part of the journey I've been on, the legal part, the BD part,
Speaker:
00:37:02
the HR part, you know, science part, that I'm,
Speaker:
00:37:05
I'm part of that community to make that environment a
Speaker:
00:37:09
better place, an easier place for them to, to thrive. Right. I
Speaker:
00:37:12
see myself in participating a lot more on the community efforts,
Speaker:
00:37:16
right. On a, in a board capacity perhaps, or,
Speaker:
00:37:20
or, or advisory kind of, so that, so that it's,
Speaker:
00:37:24
it's for me to be able to help people
Speaker:
00:37:30
what is your favorite book, fiction, nonfiction, could have read
Speaker:
00:37:33
it 20 years ago, could have read it yesterday, a book you think everyone should
Speaker:
00:37:38
You know what? One of my favorite, favorite fiction
Speaker:
00:37:41
book, it's actually a children's book. It's actually called
Speaker:
00:37:46
The Rabbit Listened. And in essence, it's about
Speaker:
00:37:49
this little kid. He was very frustrated, right? Because the
Speaker:
00:37:53
toys fell down. And there are a series of animals coming, came
Speaker:
00:37:56
to sort of comfort him. The bear roared because he was angry. The
Speaker:
00:38:00
chicken said, let's talk. And the snake, you know, just a whole bunch
Speaker:
00:38:03
of different things and said, let's do this, let's do this, let's do this. he
Speaker:
00:38:07
didn't feel better. And what happened was this little rabbit, the
Speaker:
00:38:11
rabbit came, sat by the kid, the child, and
Speaker:
00:38:15
they just listened without saying a thing. And
Speaker:
00:38:20
so as a result of that, the child started to
Speaker:
00:38:24
angrily scream and then to roar and then to do
Speaker:
00:38:27
all that stuff. And then at
Speaker:
00:38:31
the end, the child goes, Now I'm
Speaker:
00:38:34
ready to rebuild. Right. And so to me, that was such a lot
Speaker:
00:38:37
of times we think we're helping people the
Speaker:
00:38:41
way we know how to help, but that's counterproductive. Right.
Speaker:
00:38:45
And so if anything, that's a reminder for myself that I would like
Speaker:
00:38:48
to help. We should help people the way they want to be helped. if
Speaker:
00:38:52
anything, that create a more inclusive environment because that
Speaker:
00:38:56
can avoid a lot of the issues we're seeing with microaggressions
Speaker:
00:39:00
and all that because we don't have the perspective of the other
Speaker:
00:39:04
person. I do read a lot of fiction books, but this is probably one
Speaker:
00:39:07
of my favorite ones. Yeah. And then now fiction, this book I really like
Speaker:
00:39:10
is called Emotional Agility by Susan David. And
Speaker:
00:39:14
to me, it was almost a summary of a lot of works that I really
Speaker:
00:39:17
enjoy, right? Brene Fran's work, Alan Grant's work, Keenan
Speaker:
00:39:21
Scott's work. And so this sort of summarizes how
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00:39:24
to be vulnerable, how to show up, how to stay intellectually curious
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00:39:28
and agile, and then give it a try. Right. And so that's
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00:39:35
Amazing. I'll put that on my list too. Yeah. I
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00:39:38
love all of the authors you mentioned and so anything that brings that together.
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00:39:43
Where can our audience get in touch with you if they have questions or
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00:39:50
Perfect. We'll link that in the show notes. If anyone wants to go Lincoln with you, I'm
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00:39:54
sure you'll get quite a few folks that are wanting to join your network and
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00:39:57
just follow your career. I'm fascinated. I can't wait to see what
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00:40:00
you do next. And I'm going to be following your career religiously because it
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00:40:04
is so fascinating. Thank you so much for coming on. This was a
00:00:00
I have to say, I was so excited to talk to Bruce, and it
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did not disappoint. We talked about all kinds
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of things, including AI. You could almost see him switching
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00:00:09
hats. He was like, OK, I'm going to put on my chief people officer
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00:00:13
hat, and now I'm going to put on my chief legal hat, and now my IP hat, and
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Bruce is a super interesting person. He has a wealth of
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experience. He is currently the chief legal officer and corporate secretary
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00:00:24
at Deep Cell, but he has held a variety of positions with
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a variety of companies and just a really interesting guy to talk to.
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So I think people are really going to like this episode. Bruce, thank you so
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00:00:40
Awesome. Well, as always, our first question is, what did you want
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Yeah, I spent a lot of my time trying to figure it out rather than what
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I want to be, but what I like to do. And so with
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all the activities that I sort of try, attempted, I sort
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of came to a conclusion that I like to kind of
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ask, they all grab at two things, right? One is that I like to help
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people. I, for some reason, I found even
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at seven years of age, that people have a tendency to
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come and wanting to talk to me. They want to just talk
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to me, ask for suggestion or just for me to listen. And
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so I found that to be fascinating. And then if there's anything I can do to help people, even
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just cousins, neighbors, and I don't know, parents, I
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love doing that. And then the other one is I like to build things, events.
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So there are a lot of broken watches. be put
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together or sometimes they're together, but sometimes they're not. But
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what I also enjoy doing, I find myself liking to do, is to
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find some sort of pattern out of chaos. And
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so you could be putting things together in a new way or the
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same way, but I just enjoy that. And so now that I
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am a chief legal officer at the license company, And
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along this way, I have tried, again, dabble,
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I've dabbled in engineering. I have dabbled in business development, of
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course, legal, HR. And I
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would like to think that I still have kept a little bit of that
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It sounds like it. That is really very insightful as
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a seven-year-old because I definitely was running around in my backyard pretending
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to be a horse. So I'm really impressed
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by, you know, how you went about that career exploration and
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just staying true to yourself. You have a really interesting
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background. We talk a lot about career paths, both here on the
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podcast and we work with a lot of job seekers, just guiding
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them and thinking about what is possible. Your career
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path is really cool. And so I wonder if you could walk us through
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the adult part of the career path, you know, from school
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to where you are now, because you have a number of degrees and it's just really
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Yeah, I started my academic
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00:02:55
career thinking I was going to be a professor. I've
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enjoyed the academia portion of it. I like to do research, I like
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to find new things, learn new things. But shortly
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00:03:06
after I started my graduate school at MIT, I
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realized that I enjoy providing
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00:03:14
advice as I end up just by coincidence as
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00:03:17
an advice columnist at MIT Newspaper. And I found
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myself enjoying that a lot more than the
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lab itself. And that's
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also where I started to realize that there is that human element that
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I really, really liked. And again, if anything, that reminds me of
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00:03:35
the seven-year-old Bruce, right? They wanted to work with people together,
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but at the same time, still being able to build things and
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use the science aspect of it. And
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then so that's when I started to pivot to a more
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legal career. And so
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from that, that has been sort of my trajectory. And at the same time, I
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never really lost sight of trying to try
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different things, right? And then along the way, I picked up, as
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I mentioned earlier, there's the business development aspect of HR
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and others. And so rather than thinking that those
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are sort of discrete milestones, I sort of see them as just, I
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happen to be at the right time with
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the right people at the right place who are willing
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to invest in this person,
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me, and explore a potential new venture together.
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Yeah, how did you actually get into the biotech space? Because
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Yeah, so I actually, my initial research
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00:04:41
was actually on nanotechnology by physicists. And then it
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was sort of, but I finished, once I finished my master's degree, I
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decided to do something a little different. So I, for my PhD, I
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went into medical engineering. And so that was
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my first foray into a more bio area. And
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it just happens. And again, when I was in a law firm, I
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worked with clients in all types of spaces. I've worked with high tech
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companies, semiconductors, emerging technologies, and biotech. And
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it just somehow the biotech sort
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of end up just stuck, right? And be it sort of the mentality, personality,
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or just opportunity themselves. And I just ended up working
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That makes sense to me because as somebody who likes to do
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a variety of things myself, biotech is
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00:05:32
nothing if it's not variety, right? There are so many
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interesting technologies coming through and it's fast paced
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and for better or worse, we do move around with
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different companies because it's a bit volatile. But
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for the right personality, that means a lot of fun experiences. So
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Well, and I think it was Lynn Walder, who we spoke to on the podcast a
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few weeks ago, who said the thing with biotech is even when you try to
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get out, you always get sucked back in. So it's
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like once it sinks its claws into you, you're just working in biotech. That's
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And just to your point too, biotech is so broad, right? AI
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is biotech. The company I'm right now at,
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they try to marry AI engineering and biology all
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together. So it's as broad as you want it to
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Can you tell us a little bit about that? Let's dive into that topic because your
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DeepCell is the company where I'm at right now. It's
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using AI to image or understand
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00:06:35
better the cell morphological features
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so that we can better understand the different properties of cells. And
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with the hope that maybe it will provide
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better indications or information that
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might lead to treatments and all that cool stuff down
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00:06:56
And you're wearing a few hats there. Do you want to tell us about the couple
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Yeah. So I joined as a chief legal officer and
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the corporate secretary of Deep Cell. And recently I also became
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00:07:09
the interim head of people. And this is
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not actually my, not my first time being the head of people, but
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the interim head of people role at Deep Cell was fairly
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Can you take us through a little bit of what a day in the life looks
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like in your job, wearing all these hats and working with this cool
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tech? What do you do when you wake up? And what does your day look like?
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So my, my, I was going to say my every
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day is different, but I don't, I think my every hour is different. And
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then the joke I've turned into is, it's just being, I'm pretty
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00:07:43
much an octopus, right? I just got off a call. I could be having one
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00:07:46
call about IP. Um, and the next call
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I'll be talking about, uh, retention and the next time will be
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00:07:53
diversity. And the next time would be back to potential contracts.
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So it's exciting, it's
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chaotic, but at the same time, it allows
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00:08:04
me to look at the company even more holistically than
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That's a legit hat you're wearing, head of people. So we, you
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know, we work with some very small companies and a head of people
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00:08:21
might be overseeing, you know, 10 people. And that,
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00:08:25
you know, that's pretty early to bring in a head of people, but we've seen it before. But
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a hundred, that's a job. That's a lot of people to care
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How do you, I mean, if you don't mind me asking, I
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feel like, you know, everyone, maybe not to the extent that you
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do, but people are switching gears constantly, but that can be so
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exhausting and draining. So do you find that energizing or
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do you do something for yourself that kind of like resets when
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like at the end of the day, you're like, well, I was in 76 meetings and I literally
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I think my answer is a little bit of both, right? I will say I
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00:09:01
am an introvert, so I recharge by having
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00:09:04
a long time to decompress and then to be able
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00:09:08
to think through things. But at the same time, and
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back to my earlier comment, I just enjoy fighting
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that thread in a pool of chaos, and
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00:09:18
they thread that into different needles and thread it into
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00:09:22
something that makes sense. So to me, HR and
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legal are not necessarily independent because to me they are actually intertwined.
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00:09:29
Right. How do you make sure that people are empowered to
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00:09:33
do what they do so that, for example, the company can
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00:09:36
have the IP generated by the people because those are
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the assets. And how do you protect this IP that you generate? Because
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I have noticed that, you know, at companies about that size, it
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seems like many times the offices for the
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head of legal and head of people are very close by in proximity
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because there's a lot. There's a lot of exchange there, you
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know, to your point. So I want to think a
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little bit about the strategy role that you're playing as well. So
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in a growing biotech, I would break these
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out into two different questions, but let's just keep them together. What
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are the main strategies that you're thinking through on a daily basis so
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00:10:17
that you can help the company grow? Whether that's legal people,
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00:10:21
you know, what are the things that you find most enjoyable and impactful
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I see myself as a strategist. I spend a lot of my time trying
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to preempt what the outcome could be in
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00:10:35
a way that makes sense, right? And a lot of my GC
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friends, they are trained to sort
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00:10:42
of put out fires, right? Litigation ensues or
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00:10:45
transaction happens, then they turn into a
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00:10:49
more reactive, and there's nothing wrong with it, just different
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00:10:52
models, different business, a way of doing things. But
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I spend a lot of my time trying to craft a strategy in
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00:11:00
a way that if something unexpected happens,
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00:11:06
it's not an entire surprise. For example, we look
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00:11:10
at potential problems on the road for IP. We
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00:11:13
look at potential employment issues because of the new law that came out. Or
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the AI thing that just, you know, everything is sort of I'm
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not trying to find an answer to everything. I
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00:11:24
think it's important to know that because the moment I
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00:11:29
say I know everything is the moment I don't think I
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00:11:32
know everything or anything. So if I spend all of my time to
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00:11:36
understand what the problems are and can be and
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find a way to proactively mitigate the potential
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00:11:44
consequences of it. And by doing that, then I
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00:11:47
look at, back to your second part of the question, what empowers me, right?
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00:11:50
And so I, I find it the most energizing, um,
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00:11:55
to be able to work with the people. Um,
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00:11:58
I, I enjoy working with scientists, um, that sort of go back to
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00:12:01
my, my IP route, but I also enjoy working with.
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00:12:06
people on the non-IP portion, right? Talking about inclusion, talking
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00:12:10
about how to make a place more empowering
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for all kinds of employees. It touches
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00:12:17
on the humanity portion of my interests. So
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I like to weave them together, because I
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00:12:26
I like the way you describe that. I also like to look
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00:12:30
for things that could go wrong and have a plan for it. But
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I just call myself a negative optimist. I hope that it all works
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00:12:39
That's exactly a point well made. One of the things that I have tried to
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do so that, you know, lawyers have a reputation, right?
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00:12:45
Part of no. One of the things I try to do so that I don't become
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00:12:49
a part of no is I say I'm a part of maybe. Right.
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00:12:53
And so the way I do it is to say here are the risks. However,
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00:12:57
here are the things we can do in view of the risk. Now we
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00:13:01
have a menu in front of us to pick, rather than, no, no, no, no,
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00:13:04
no, no, no, no, no. And that also allows
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00:13:08
me to work with the other teams. For example, at the exact choosing
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00:13:11
level, at the different functional groups, or even down to the
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00:13:14
most junior of folks. Now we know the
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00:13:17
different risks. How do we then sit together and
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craft a strategy that people can actually
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00:13:30
Yeah, I think risk mitigation is such a fascinating thing. And it's
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00:13:34
kind of fun, right? Because if you're looking ahead and it's a risk down the
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00:13:37
line, it gives you more room to play. And you also do put parameters in
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00:13:41
I am the one, though, who is running ahead full speed. And Allison's
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00:13:45
like, have you considered X,
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00:13:48
Y, Z. It's really helpful to have somebody on the team who is maybe a
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00:13:52
little more, I'm the classic entrepreneur who's like,
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00:13:59
Right. And you talk about empowering and the energizing part. One
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00:14:03
of the part I, what makes, what drives a
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00:14:06
lot of the exercise I said, despite what I said, that being the
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00:14:09
part of it may be, is I surround people, like surround
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00:14:13
myself with people who are very different than I am. And
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00:14:16
that's intentional. I very often hire people who
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00:14:20
are very different than I am just so that I can get a
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00:14:23
new perspective, right? And so while I'm doing what I'm doing,
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00:14:26
my approach is this, I want to make sure there are other people checking
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00:14:31
to make sure I am not putting myself in a bubble and lose sight
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00:14:34
of what I don't know, what I don't know, right? And so that has been
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00:14:37
empowering. It's sometimes uncomfortable because people
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00:14:41
are different than you are. I intentionally put myself in an uncomfortable situation,
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00:14:46
but the idea is so that I can grow, the team can
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00:14:51
And you do a decent amount of work within the
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00:14:54
DEI realm as well in your company. So I
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00:14:57
think that getting comfortable with that diversity, that
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00:15:01
really, once you are comfortable, that makes the
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00:15:05
whole company better. And I wonder what
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00:15:08
your perspective is on helping people to push through that and sort
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00:15:11
of setting the stage for creating that diversity, those
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00:15:15
different perspectives within the company and helping people to overcome maybe their discomfort,
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00:15:21
Yeah, so I would say of the D, E, and
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00:15:25
I, I actually focus a lot on the I.
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00:15:29
It's not to say the other two are not important, but of the three, I like to focus
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00:15:33
a lot of my efforts on the I, the inclusion part. And
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00:15:37
as a gross analogy, the diversity will increase numbers,
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00:15:41
it will change representation. The equity might actually bring
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00:15:44
people in, but it's the inclusion piece that
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00:15:47
makes people stay. And so how do I do it
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00:15:51
so that people feel they're included? And included to me
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00:15:54
doesn't mean, okay, you have a party, I invite you. It's that I
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00:15:57
want you to feel like you're part of the dance. You don't
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00:16:01
get a ticket and that's it. You are part of the party to
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00:16:04
dance with me. And so to me, that is
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00:16:07
my, that's all of my efforts on that piece of
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00:16:11
the D&I, or I like to call it ID really, I'd
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00:16:15
reverse the order. But that also means that people
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00:16:18
come from all kinds of backgrounds, right? And people have different
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00:16:22
levels of comfort, they view the world differently. So
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00:16:25
very often we need to calibrate not to lose ourselves.
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00:16:29
I would like to be true. I think it's important that we are true
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00:16:33
to ourselves. But how do we do that so other people can
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00:16:36
also be true to themselves? I think that that has been a
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00:16:40
lot of work that needs to be done, right? And how do you do it
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00:16:43
so that people feel they're listened to, they're seen?
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00:16:47
At the same time, more importantly, they are empower to
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00:16:51
contribute. Because being seen is one thing, but feeling like they
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00:16:54
can be part of that community, to be included, and
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00:16:58
do something together as a team, that is
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00:17:05
What have you seen work in companies, you know, when they're really trying
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00:17:09
to focus on the inclusion piece? Are there actionable things
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00:17:12
that you've implemented or you've seen companies implement that you think if
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00:17:15
other organizations were to know and do the same, it would actually
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00:17:22
Um, so I will, I will speak from my own experience, right?
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00:17:25
That's, that's my way of saying this is not a guidebook because I think it depends, it
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00:17:29
depends on that demographic of the company. It depends on the industry of the
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00:17:32
company. But what I found to be helpful, um,
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00:17:36
is that the, the team that the senior leadership
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00:17:40
team, um, she strived for transparency, accountability,
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00:17:45
and more importantly, vulnerability. And so it's
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00:17:49
important, I think, for the employees to see
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00:17:53
that the efforts to
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00:17:56
create a more inclusive environment doesn't just come
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00:18:00
from one person or some lip service that you
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00:18:04
give out as a brochure or some training you do once a
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00:18:07
year. It's that it should all come all
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00:18:11
the way from the top to all the way to the bottom. And I
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00:18:15
mean, they shouldn't even be about it. It should be just an entire company should be
Speaker:
00:18:18
an effort for everyone to be involved. And that also means
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00:18:22
if there is a challenge, right? So maybe there's something that hasn't
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00:18:25
been done well. The team should actually
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00:18:29
confront it, right? I believe that one way
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00:18:32
to work together, to build that trust, to
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00:18:35
build that intimacy is actually by solving hard problems together.
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00:18:40
Not to avoid them together, but to actually confront them and then
Speaker:
00:18:43
deal with it heads on. And that's how I feel
Speaker:
00:18:46
in my experience, people starting to trust each
Speaker:
00:18:50
other. And once you have that trust, people feel safer
Speaker:
00:18:53
to potentially speak out, right? And to potentially make
Speaker:
00:18:57
mistakes. And that's when you actually handle
Speaker:
00:19:01
and work together as one. Because otherwise you have a bunch
Speaker:
00:19:04
of sort of discrete point people working on
Speaker:
00:19:07
different things, but they never are bound together by some sort
Speaker:
00:19:12
That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. That's really impactful. Can
Speaker:
00:19:16
we switch gears and talk about legal matters? I'm
Speaker:
00:19:21
so curious about where you see the future of
Speaker:
00:19:25
IP going with all of the rapid changes
Speaker:
00:19:28
that we're seeing. Is there anything that you are just fascinated
Speaker:
00:19:34
I, well, yeah, the answer is definitely yes. I'm fascinated by
Speaker:
00:19:37
quite a few things. And again, just a few months ago, I never
Speaker:
00:19:41
heard of JotGPT. I don't think anybody knows what JotGPT is, but and
Speaker:
00:19:44
look at, look at where we are now. Right. And I think one of the
Speaker:
00:19:47
things I find fascinating and one of the reasons I
Speaker:
00:19:50
am where I am in both a company perspective
Speaker:
00:19:54
or the legal career I'm in is actually to learn the
Speaker:
00:19:58
technology. at the very beginning stage, right?
Speaker:
00:20:02
And that's actually by design where
Speaker:
00:20:06
IP comes from. You learn it before it's publicly available. You learn it before
Speaker:
00:20:10
it's well known. I think there's going to be a
Speaker:
00:20:13
lot of unknowns. And it's not going to be a
Speaker:
00:20:17
linear growth. It's going to be an explanation because And once
Speaker:
00:20:20
we open the door to taking AI as one example, I
Speaker:
00:20:25
would not be surprised that all of a sudden AI can be used for multiple,
Speaker:
00:20:28
multiple things that had never even been contemplated before. Now,
Speaker:
00:20:32
that also means, now putting my lawyer's hat
Speaker:
00:20:35
back on, The technology
Speaker:
00:20:39
is going to be ahead of the time or before the
Speaker:
00:20:43
legal paradigm catch up. So before the courts
Speaker:
00:20:46
can act, before Congress can act, we're going to have a lot
Speaker:
00:20:49
of challenges as a result of exciting
Speaker:
00:20:53
development in science and technology that we need to confront,
Speaker:
00:20:57
right? And how do we protect privacy? How do we protect You
Speaker:
00:21:01
know, even bias, you know, our AI, should
Speaker:
00:21:04
AI be treated as people? I mean, there are a lot of things that are not
Speaker:
00:21:08
yet resolved legally, but it has to
Speaker:
00:21:13
Within your space particularly, we're talking about
Speaker:
00:21:17
imaging, right? And so using your technology to
Speaker:
00:21:20
be able to survey vast quantities of
Speaker:
00:21:24
images and to find the pattern so that we can identify
Speaker:
00:21:28
disease tissues faster and that sort of thing. Are there any
Speaker:
00:21:31
thoughts to the ramifications of that patient confidentiality and
Speaker:
00:21:35
where will those datasets come from and all of those things? Because, you
Speaker:
00:21:39
know, we we're still in the midst of, for instance, the HeLa cell
Speaker:
00:21:42
legal issues. And so I'm just curious, are we
Speaker:
00:21:46
going to see that again in 50 years with people's
Speaker:
00:21:49
I think that problem has never gone away. The
Speaker:
00:21:53
reason is sort of on the surface, less
Speaker:
00:21:57
heard of is because of the legal paradigm that was created. Right.
Speaker:
00:22:00
And then that's my way of saying, because the problem never went
Speaker:
00:22:04
away. Anytime there is a scientific advancement,
Speaker:
00:22:09
that will probably be brought back in front and center. Right.
Speaker:
00:22:12
And so how do you, how do we. advance
Speaker:
00:22:16
the science of our kind, humankind, so that we benefit everybody
Speaker:
00:22:21
without compromising at the same time the people being part
Speaker:
00:22:24
of the experiments. That is
Speaker:
00:22:27
going to be challenging, right? And that's another part
Speaker:
00:22:31
of that also is there is right now no cohesive framework,
Speaker:
00:22:36
Europe act this way, US act that way, even in the United
Speaker:
00:22:40
States, this country, different states act different ways. So until
Speaker:
00:22:43
there is a more cohesive framework, and I would, I remain hopeful
Speaker:
00:22:47
that sometime soon, this will happen. But until
Speaker:
00:22:51
then, it's going to be quite a bit of back to the, my
Speaker:
00:22:55
earlier comment about how do you preemptively and
Speaker:
00:22:59
proactively think about the possible consequences before
Speaker:
00:23:04
Karina's question was so intelligent and like so far reaching
Speaker:
00:23:08
and consequential. Mine is very in the moment. Do
Speaker:
00:23:11
you allow employees to use ChatGTP at DeepCell or
Speaker:
00:23:15
is that like, no, don't be funneling our information into
Speaker:
00:23:21
Well, that's going to be a work in progress. But for now, we
Speaker:
00:23:24
are not prohibiting child GPT. And
Speaker:
00:23:28
to be realistic, this is the engineering part of me, right? It's
Speaker:
00:23:32
impossible to prohibit. So rather than prohibiting, we've
Speaker:
00:23:35
been focused on how do we do it so
Speaker:
00:23:45
Yeah, it's a lot to think of right now. I agree. We're seeing
Speaker:
00:23:48
schools are prohibiting it. Oh, okay.
Speaker:
00:23:52
But how, how are you prohibiting this? You know, this is where it's
Speaker:
00:23:55
the education component. What should and shouldn't we use it
Speaker:
00:24:01
And actually the joke, the joke actually is when someone asked to,
Speaker:
00:24:05
to write a policy of how to not use ChargeGBT, someone
Speaker:
00:24:11
But here's my whole thing with it. I mean, here's my soapbox. This
Speaker:
00:24:15
is the prime opportunity to teach people how to think critically. Just
Speaker:
00:24:19
because it spits it back out at you and the tool is there does not mean it's accurate.
Speaker:
00:24:22
And it's like a calculator. If you understand what the
Speaker:
00:24:25
answer roughly should be or how you got there, sometimes you
Speaker:
00:24:29
mistype in the calculator and it gives you a crazy answer and you need to be
Speaker:
00:24:32
able to parse that out. And so I think it's like, you know, when we talk about people
Speaker:
00:24:35
using these tools, they just have to understand the critical components of what
Speaker:
00:24:42
And also, you raised a very good point, right? I mean, that's again, that's a
Speaker:
00:24:45
different way. That's my way of seeing the world is
Speaker:
00:24:49
that One reason child GPT becomes child
Speaker:
00:24:53
GPT is our framework and our way of
Speaker:
00:24:56
looking at data being generated. It may
Speaker:
00:25:00
not be healthy, right? So for example, one of the reasons
Speaker:
00:25:03
that school kids can actually use child GPT to get away
Speaker:
00:25:06
our assignment is those are meeting rubrics, right?
Speaker:
00:25:11
If you were to look at this and say the assignment is
Speaker:
00:25:15
to for you to actually provide your thinking
Speaker:
00:25:18
process, those are not things JWT can do. Just
Speaker:
00:25:21
like going back to a larger company environment, if what
Speaker:
00:25:25
we are looking for is truly people generating
Speaker:
00:25:29
new ideas, and it could be IP, it could be non-IP, but
Speaker:
00:25:33
it's the thought process of sharing what you are generating, those
Speaker:
00:25:37
are not replicable by JWT, or even created by JWT. And
Speaker:
00:25:41
so I think it may be helpful for us
Speaker:
00:25:45
as a whole, as a society, to look at what is valuable information
Speaker:
00:25:51
Yep. I completely agree. I think it's a great tool for brainstorming. I think people
Speaker:
00:25:54
just have to think through it and take it to the next level. Take the
Speaker:
00:25:58
first iteration and say, okay, well that's what that's been out, but now how do I
Speaker:
00:26:01
improve it and where does that lead me and chase the rabbits, you know?
Speaker:
00:26:04
So kind of staying on this legal route, we
Speaker:
00:26:08
are moving so fast. How do you keep up with that with the IP?
Speaker:
00:26:15
whole thing about strategy is you need to preemptively think
Speaker:
00:26:19
of what could be and might be in a practical way, right? And the reason
Speaker:
00:26:23
is nobody has unlimited budget. And so that goes
Speaker:
00:26:27
to what if the strategy shouldn't be just cover everything, scorch the
Speaker:
00:26:30
earth. And so that also means I think
Speaker:
00:26:33
it's important when we build an IP, the strategy
Speaker:
00:26:37
should be a science-driven strategy rather than a legal-driven strategy.
Speaker:
00:26:41
Because if the strategy is based on science, then
Speaker:
00:26:44
you capture a technical solution rather than
Speaker:
00:26:48
a legal-driven maneuvering, which
Speaker:
00:26:52
can come and go based on how the courts act. right, how the laws change.
Speaker:
00:26:56
But if a solution is a solution, that actually builds a
Speaker:
00:26:59
lot of the foundational pieces of
Speaker:
00:27:03
what the assets of the company can be. And that also
Speaker:
00:27:06
allows you to be more creative, right? Rather than using legal as
Speaker:
00:27:10
a reason of what not to do, or what
Speaker:
00:27:13
to do, you now open yourself up to a potential, endless
Speaker:
00:27:17
potentials, because your science will
Speaker:
00:27:20
allow you to capture that from different angles.
Speaker:
00:27:24
How do you find the different elements of that development, that
Speaker:
00:27:28
technology improvement? And also, how do you do it
Speaker:
00:27:31
to find a synergy of the different elements? Those
Speaker:
00:27:34
are things that are independent and
Speaker:
00:27:38
agnostic from the legal requirements as well. And
Speaker:
00:27:41
with that, then the company can actually have an IP
Speaker:
00:27:45
asset that match better with
Speaker:
00:27:49
its commercial interest. And you can explain to the
Speaker:
00:27:53
investors or the rest of the world, here's what I'm
Speaker:
00:27:56
doing and why, rather than some arbitrary legal
Speaker:
00:28:04
I think that when we think about people who are building a biotech in the
Speaker:
00:28:08
very early stages, you know, obviously, They
Speaker:
00:28:11
need to advance the science. There's IP. They have like just standard HR legal
Speaker:
00:28:14
issues. But most people aren't bringing in like a full time
Speaker:
00:28:18
chief legal officer. Right. But when do you think the right time to start
Speaker:
00:28:21
incorporating that in is for a small firm? What
Speaker:
00:28:25
do you think the tipping point is to like you need someone on site? Is it in a
Speaker:
00:28:31
It's important to know that different companies are different, right? And
Speaker:
00:28:35
then there are companies that are not generating as
Speaker:
00:28:38
much IP as some of the more life sciences and biotech companies.
Speaker:
00:28:41
So I don't, I don't want to pretend that, you know, they should be all the
Speaker:
00:28:45
same. In fact, they should not be the same to be strategic. But
Speaker:
00:28:48
however, for a science or, or a IP, an
Speaker:
00:28:51
IP generating company, life sciences being one, biotech, life
Speaker:
00:28:55
sciences and biotech, and also high tech. I, I
Speaker:
00:28:58
would say it's probably better. to
Speaker:
00:29:02
bring an attorney that
Speaker:
00:29:05
is at least knowledgeable on the IP front
Speaker:
00:29:09
as early as possible. Because very often what ends up
Speaker:
00:29:13
happening is when they hire, when they have the
Speaker:
00:29:17
resources, more often is when they were
Speaker:
00:29:22
told to do it by the board, it's still a little too late, right?
Speaker:
00:29:26
Because a lot of the founders didn't appreciate how important IP
Speaker:
00:29:29
really is. And think about this, I would encourage us to think about this.
Speaker:
00:29:33
Before a company commercialized a product, very
Speaker:
00:29:37
often the only tangible asset is actually IP.
Speaker:
00:29:42
And so if there is to be a merger and acquisition, if there's going to be whatever
Speaker:
00:29:45
transaction, before a product is actually launched
Speaker:
00:29:50
or sold in the market, the only thing that
Speaker:
00:29:53
you can show, or one of the very few things you can show, really is the IP
Speaker:
00:29:57
assets you have. And so rather than playing catch up,
Speaker:
00:30:01
it is important, I would even say critical, particularly for
Speaker:
00:30:04
a biotech company, to focus on the assets as early
Speaker:
00:30:09
Could see your chief business officer hat in that one. Yep. No,
Speaker:
00:30:15
that's really, really point well taken. That
Speaker:
00:30:19
is critical. And I think not very many founders do think
Speaker:
00:30:23
about that as like, I have an asset. How
Speaker:
00:30:26
do I protect this asset? There's a lot of people who can't
Speaker:
00:30:29
afford, you know, at an early stage to bring in a full time head
Speaker:
00:30:33
of legal or even, you know, someone on the IP space.
Speaker:
00:30:37
How useful is it? Is it possible to use a firm to
Speaker:
00:30:40
leverage an external firm? And if so, when is that? not
Speaker:
00:30:47
At the minimum, the company should focus on
Speaker:
00:30:50
IP, right? And be, whether that is on an outside counsel, outside
Speaker:
00:30:54
firm or internal, at the minimum, some effort should
Speaker:
00:30:58
be made. That's what I recommend. The question of when that
Speaker:
00:31:01
balance is tilted so that it becomes an in-house, it
Speaker:
00:31:05
would depend on a lot of factors, right? And so
Speaker:
00:31:09
resources being one. What I though would say
Speaker:
00:31:12
from a sort of anecdotally, what
Speaker:
00:31:16
has been successful for a
Speaker:
00:31:20
license or biotech company to handle
Speaker:
00:31:24
their IP is actually to have that transition to
Speaker:
00:31:28
in-house as early as possible. And here's why.
Speaker:
00:31:32
Outside councils, law firms, to no
Speaker:
00:31:36
fault of their own, they can handle a task-oriented IP
Speaker:
00:31:41
project. However, they are not going to have the visibility or
Speaker:
00:31:46
even the insight into where the company wants to go.
Speaker:
00:31:50
So the information they have is as good as whatever they
Speaker:
00:31:53
receive. On the other hand, if you have someone strategic
Speaker:
00:31:57
in-house, what they can bring to the table is asking,
Speaker:
00:32:01
well, what about something else? What have we missed? Right. And
Speaker:
00:32:04
that strategy piece is very often not able
Speaker:
00:32:08
to capture by an outside counsel that is not on the ground day
Speaker:
00:32:12
to day and figure out where the company may
Speaker:
00:32:15
go or where the company can be benefited in
Speaker:
00:32:19
That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, that was sort of my assumption as
Speaker:
00:32:22
well. But so it sounds like, you know, if you
Speaker:
00:32:26
have to choose keeping external counsel that's
Speaker:
00:32:29
doing like contracts and, you know, more of the regular
Speaker:
00:32:33
legal aspects, but can that be handled
Speaker:
00:32:36
by your IP attorney or is that not generally done? I know you wear both hats,
Speaker:
00:32:39
but can your IP attorney usually generally
Speaker:
00:32:48
very often different, but they're also very often
Speaker:
00:32:51
the same, particularly in a life science company. And that's another reason
Speaker:
00:32:55
I like to weave my legal
Speaker:
00:32:58
strategy based on an IP-centric approach. And
Speaker:
00:33:02
so again, this is applicable in a more life science, biotech,
Speaker:
00:33:06
or high-tech settings where it's very uncommon
Speaker:
00:33:11
any transaction will go through without touching IP in some
Speaker:
00:33:14
way. even a hiring of a consultant, right,
Speaker:
00:33:18
or collaboration. So very
Speaker:
00:33:22
often an IP trained attorney should
Speaker:
00:33:25
be able to at least contribute to the transactional
Speaker:
00:33:29
pieces that legal exercise, although
Speaker:
00:33:33
they are, they're designed to be different. But
Speaker:
00:33:37
that's my way of saying that if
Speaker:
00:33:40
there is to be a legal transactional exercise, IP should
Speaker:
00:33:43
have some input into it. But whether the person can
Speaker:
00:33:47
actually do both, that would depend on what
Speaker:
00:33:52
Yeah, this is an area I have very little experience other than, yeah,
Speaker:
00:33:57
we get contracts signed. But we
Speaker:
00:34:00
have not had to deal directly with IP because that's just not our
Speaker:
00:34:04
area. Other than if a candidate comes in, you know, attached to a patent, we have
Speaker:
00:34:10
In a situation, unless it's an IP focus, typically companies
Speaker:
00:34:15
like to have people who are focused on the more
Speaker:
00:34:22
For anyone listening who is like, wow, what a cool career. I mean, I
Speaker:
00:34:25
think it would be very difficult to replicate your career path. It is very
Speaker:
00:34:29
interesting and it is just diverse. It is fascinating. But
Speaker:
00:34:33
if someone was like, wow, I really think that like being the chief legal officer
Speaker:
00:34:37
or, you know, any of these interim roles you had or chief business officer, like
Speaker:
00:34:40
I guess in general, what advice do you have to someone who's, you
Speaker:
00:34:43
know, maybe early stage career, maybe they're still figuring it out, but
Speaker:
00:34:50
I actually get asked that question quite a bit. I
Speaker:
00:34:53
do a lot of mentoring. And so that's actually one of the
Speaker:
00:34:56
most common questions I get asked. So my recommendation
Speaker:
00:35:00
is this. I think it's important to
Speaker:
00:35:04
find your North Star values. Because that
Speaker:
00:35:08
is going to be what helps you weather the storms, if there is one.
Speaker:
00:35:11
That is going to be what helps you find your interests and understand what
Speaker:
00:35:15
you don't like. So find your North Star values
Speaker:
00:35:19
as early as possible, appreciating that value can
Speaker:
00:35:22
change. but in the actions can change and
Speaker:
00:35:26
you should be willing to embrace that change because that's how
Speaker:
00:35:29
you evolve. But find that value as early as possible and
Speaker:
00:35:33
at the same time be intellectually curious, right? And to say,
Speaker:
00:35:37
look, there might be things I don't know. But let's find
Speaker:
00:35:41
out, right? Don't stop there. Don't stop at there's something I don't know.
Speaker:
00:35:44
OK, too bad. But find out, make an effort to find
Speaker:
00:35:47
out, be vulnerable and say, I'm going to show up. I'm
Speaker:
00:35:51
going to give it a try. And if it doesn't work, then let's be resilient
Speaker:
00:35:54
and come back again or do something else. Know what you like, be
Speaker:
00:35:58
true to yourself and then give it a try and just
Speaker:
00:36:04
I think that's great life advice. Yeah. Honestly, career,
Speaker:
00:36:10
Yeah. So what is next for
Speaker:
00:36:13
you on this wild career ride that you're on? Do you
Speaker:
00:36:16
have anything that is undone and you think, you know, before I'm done,
Speaker:
00:36:21
I don't really have one, probably because
Speaker:
00:36:25
I keep trying new things regardless. And I know I'm going to
Speaker:
00:36:28
keep trying new things regardless. But career-wise, I
Speaker:
00:36:31
think, first of all, I have had a remarkable career
Speaker:
00:36:35
journey to be where I am. And I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes. But
Speaker:
00:36:39
being where I am right now, I've started to enjoy
Speaker:
00:36:43
a lot more giving back. to
Speaker:
00:36:46
the community, mentoring, and making sure that
Speaker:
00:36:50
whatever I'm doing can actually help the
Speaker:
00:36:54
next generation of folks who want to participate
Speaker:
00:36:57
in any part of the journey I've been on, the legal part, the BD part,
Speaker:
00:37:02
the HR part, you know, science part, that I'm,
Speaker:
00:37:05
I'm part of that community to make that environment a
Speaker:
00:37:09
better place, an easier place for them to, to thrive. Right. I
Speaker:
00:37:12
see myself in participating a lot more on the community efforts,
Speaker:
00:37:16
right. On a, in a board capacity perhaps, or,
Speaker:
00:37:20
or, or advisory kind of, so that, so that it's,
Speaker:
00:37:24
it's for me to be able to help people
Speaker:
00:37:30
what is your favorite book, fiction, nonfiction, could have read
Speaker:
00:37:33
it 20 years ago, could have read it yesterday, a book you think everyone should
Speaker:
00:37:38
You know what? One of my favorite, favorite fiction
Speaker:
00:37:41
book, it's actually a children's book. It's actually called
Speaker:
00:37:46
The Rabbit Listened. And in essence, it's about
Speaker:
00:37:49
this little kid. He was very frustrated, right? Because the
Speaker:
00:37:53
toys fell down. And there are a series of animals coming, came
Speaker:
00:37:56
to sort of comfort him. The bear roared because he was angry. The
Speaker:
00:38:00
chicken said, let's talk. And the snake, you know, just a whole bunch
Speaker:
00:38:03
of different things and said, let's do this, let's do this, let's do this. he
Speaker:
00:38:07
didn't feel better. And what happened was this little rabbit, the
Speaker:
00:38:11
rabbit came, sat by the kid, the child, and
Speaker:
00:38:15
they just listened without saying a thing. And
Speaker:
00:38:20
so as a result of that, the child started to
Speaker:
00:38:24
angrily scream and then to roar and then to do
Speaker:
00:38:27
all that stuff. And then at
Speaker:
00:38:31
the end, the child goes, Now I'm
Speaker:
00:38:34
ready to rebuild. Right. And so to me, that was such a lot
Speaker:
00:38:37
of times we think we're helping people the
Speaker:
00:38:41
way we know how to help, but that's counterproductive. Right.
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00:38:45
And so if anything, that's a reminder for myself that I would like
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to help. We should help people the way they want to be helped. if
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anything, that create a more inclusive environment because that
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can avoid a lot of the issues we're seeing with microaggressions
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and all that because we don't have the perspective of the other
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person. I do read a lot of fiction books, but this is probably one
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of my favorite ones. Yeah. And then now fiction, this book I really like
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is called Emotional Agility by Susan David. And
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to me, it was almost a summary of a lot of works that I really
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enjoy, right? Brene Fran's work, Alan Grant's work, Keenan
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Scott's work. And so this sort of summarizes how
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to be vulnerable, how to show up, how to stay intellectually curious
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and agile, and then give it a try. Right. And so that's
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Amazing. I'll put that on my list too. Yeah. I
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love all of the authors you mentioned and so anything that brings that together.
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Where can our audience get in touch with you if they have questions or
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00:39:50
Perfect. We'll link that in the show notes. If anyone wants to go Lincoln with you, I'm
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00:39:54
sure you'll get quite a few folks that are wanting to join your network and
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00:39:57
just follow your career. I'm fascinated. I can't wait to see what
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you do next. And I'm going to be following your career religiously because it
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is so fascinating. Thank you so much for coming on. This was a
