Hey, guys. Welcome to the podcast. My guest today is Ike Ogbaa. He is vice president and head of medical affairs, and we talk about how to build scientific credibility for career advancement. Ike's awesome. This amazing conversation. Guys, there's still time to sign up for MASS West. That's the Medical Affairs Strategic Summit, and that is in sunny San Diego, September 25-26 by Fierce Life Sciences. Amazing event, content, networking. It's awesome. Just go to Google, type in MASS West 2024.
You'll get all the details you need to register. I hope to see you in San Diego. Welcome to MSL Talk with Tom Caravela, a podcast specifically designed for MSLs and all things field medical. Hey, Ike. Welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining me, my friend. Thank you, Tom. I really appreciate the opportunity. Been looking forward to chatting with you. So thank you. Yeah. Yeah, guys. I'm excited. So let me you guys always know I like to tell you how these things come about.
And, so I I think the first time I met Ike was, jeez, probably many years ago at I think it was MASS East. Yes. Then ran into Ike at ASH. I think it was ASH in December. Yes. And I you know, it's funny. I was just I turned the corner. I see Ike standing. He's like, hey. When you having me on the podcast? So I was like, we gotta do it. So, you know, one thing leads to another, and here we are. So I'm I'm excited that that this is finally happening.
So before we get into it, Ike, why don't you do just a quick quick introduction? Yes. Well, thank you, Tom. I've been a big fan of yours, following you for years on LinkedIn, following your progress, and excited for the opportunity to come chat with you. Just a little bit about me, I'm an internal medicine physician by training. A Yale undergrad, Rutgers Medical School, then ended up in Texas at Baylor College of Medicine to do my internal medicine residency.
I did that for four years and decided to make the transition to the pharmaceutical industry. Been in the industry now for 15 years. First six years, I spent in drug development. And last nine years as a medical affairs professional, I started as an MSL. I was in the field for three years before transitioning to medical affairs leadership. And I must say an MSL is the best job in the industry right now. So that's why I'm excited to talk to you. For sure. For sure. That's a common theme.
We talk about that all the time. But the thing I'm excited about is we're gonna talk about scientific credibility. I don't think we've actually really talked about it on this show to this extent. No better person to talk about this than Ike. You wanna talk about scientific credibility? This guy is a scientific guru, so I'm excited.
So let's start with, you know, when we talk about scientific credibility and the medical affairs profession, why is it so crucial, and why is it so crucial, like, in the current landscape? Yeah. I think being credible is the easiest way to build rapport with your audience. As medical affairs professionals or MSLs, I think our most important job is building key relationships with the top leaders in the space and what we call the KOLs, the key opinion leaders.
And in order to be able to do that in an efficient and quick manner, they have to see you as a peer. And to be seen as a peer, you have to have some credibility in terms of your scientific knowledge. And that's why a lot of times when we're hiring MSLs, we stress the degrees, whether it's a PharmD, Ph.D., M.D. But the whole point of that is to get people who can learn the science pretty quickly and be able to explain it and teach it in an efficient manner. So, that's how I feel about that.
You know? Yeah. No. That's such a valuable point. And I think it's becoming even as access has become more and more challenging, I think it's gonna be even more crucial. Yeah. So when looking at it from the recruiting side, as you mentioned, most times, companies are hiring scientific experts.
So I guess one of the things I'm curious about is when people like medical affairs professionals and MSLs, how do they assess their current level of scientific knowledge and identify the areas of improvement that they may need? Yeah. Well, the interesting thing about the job we do is that a lot of the products that we're educating folks on are cutting-edge science. It's stuff you don't learn when you're in pharmacy school or medical school.
So a lot of times, you have to learn things from scratch. But having some background knowledge, you know, having been a clinician or pharmacist or researcher in an area adjacent or in the same area really helps you learn that data quicker. Right?
And so it's all about keeping up with the latest science in that field, and and the best way to build that knowledge is attending conferences, reading the latest periodicals on a topic, the latest, review papers or the latest big clinical trials that have come out. Always trying to keep up with the latest science. And that's one really great way we can be of value to our key opinion leaders is to keep them up to date on the latest science.
Because a lot of times, if they're not involved in the trials with that medication, they might not knew what the new they might not know what the new data is out there. Or if they're not going to all the conferences, they don't know. So I think it's being self-aware and just being honest with yourself. Do I know this topic well? Do I know it well enough?
And if you know or you don't, then you have to take it upon yourself to go learn more, read more, or talk to people to increase their expertise on that topic. Yeah. And I'll tell you, there's no greater time because there's so much access to data now. There's so much available. So I guess that leads me to kind of my next question, which is, like, what are the key areas of scientific knowledge that are most viable?
And, like, what do medical affairs professionals really need to hone in on and focus on to remain credible and relevant in their field? Yeah. I would say the first and foremost is product knowledge. You have to know the product, know the product in and out. Your package insert or the label, know that very, very well. And then learning the disease state, the disease landscape that the product is addressing.
Also, knowing the competitors that are out there, the competing drugs in the area, knowing the key players, the key opinion leaders, the key payers, knowing what they want to know, knowing what the barriers are to adoption, knowing what's working and what's not working, quote, unquote insights, knowing about the health care system, the health care landscape in the different region, whatever region you're covering or on a national level, on a global,
country level, there's some nuances to the way science is practiced in different regions. So it's incumbent upon you to know your local market. So I would just work my way up from the product to the disease state, to the key players, to the health care landscape. And I think those are the key aspects to scientific education. Yeah. And I know it can be overwhelming just from working with MSLs, talking with MSLs. Obviously, they're busy in their current job.
And you mentioned therapeutic area and disease state knowledge. Yeah. So what resources or what ways would you say is most effective in someone's ability to stay up to date, but also be resourceful in obtaining that knowledge? Well, most companies, I think, in most therapeutic areas, they usually have some intelligence reports or, where you can sign up for a subscription, where you get alerts when new data and new science is out.
So I've I've find that to be one, easy way to keep up with the science. But if you work for a really small company that can't afford that, a lot of times, I just set up Google alerts on the topic of the drug name or the science or the disease state. And I every morning before I start my day, I just look up what's new or in a weekly basis or every other day.
But, again, as I mentioned earlier, going straight to the source, reading the primary literature on this on the on the data, the trials, and then reading big review articles in in the in the in in the area. Sometimes looking at CMEs or replays of presentations at conferences, those can be other good ways of learning. And digital. Digital now. Like, there are digital key opinion leaders.
They're becoming more and more prominent, and I try to subscribe to their channels, and a lot of times, you can hear the latest information when they post on their different platforms. So those are just some ideas on how to keep up with the data. Yeah. No. Those are great. But is there anything different as it relates to, let's just say you had someone because this seems to happen a lot. Let's say you had someone that's brand new to a therapeutic area.
Yeah. And they're, like, kinda sort of they're smart, maybe, you know, have a doctorate-level degree, maybe even have experience, but they're like, okay. Brand new area. Is there any advice you have for those folks? Yeah. Usually, the company you join should have some type of training curriculum. Mhmm. I always start with that. Go through your company training curriculum, and then you can supplement it with all these other sources that I mentioned.
But if you don't have if they don't have a training curriculum, it's you know, create one yourself, you know, and go through all those sources that I mentioned. Like, look for the primary data, primary publications. I always start with that. Yep. And then I go to review articles, and then I look at the competition. You know, those are ways to supplement your data.
I had a great mentor when I was a medical student who told me, to become a master of a topic, you need to study from at least three different perspectives or three different sources. So I encourage people not to just rely on one source. You have to read the same topic in at least two or three different perspectives or two or three different sources before you even start becoming an expert. No. It's great advice. I love that.
Yeah. As far as a leader, you obviously see a lot of different types of professionals and MSLs and people that are looking to advance in their career, and they wanna be subject matter experts and have the scientific credibility. But to what extent do they need to go? Obviously, there's that work-life balance. There's demands of the job, then there's educating yourself on being a subject matter expert, and then there's you know, obviously, you have to find some time for some work-life balance.
So how do you balance all this? Yeah. I'm a big fan of Pareto's rule, or the 80-20 rule. There's always in everything we do in life, including being an MSL or medical affairs professional, there's 20 percent of information or 20 percent of things that are responsible for 80 percent of the results. Yep. So the trick is trying to figure out that 20 percent. And if you work for a good medical affairs organization, they usually distill that 20 percent in what we call FAQs.
Mhmm. Or, you know, they develop resources around it. So it's gonna be impossible to learn everything you need to learn in a new job before you get out there. In my experience, it takes two years to master the MSL role. So try to focus on that 20 percent. That's gonna represent 80 percent of the questions that you're gonna get in the field. Learn that really well before you get out there. And then while you're out there, you continually learn. You continually add to your learning point.
So I always start with the FAQ, you know, your PI, your package insert first, then your frequently asked questions or FAQs, then all your decks, your internal resources, proactive decks, reactive decks. You start with that. Learn enough to pass whatever your certification exam is and be comfortable getting out there, but know that you're not gonna know 100 percent. And when you get out there, you can continually increase your knowledge.
Or if you get asked something that you don't know the answer to, don't be afraid to tell, "I don't know, but I know where to get the answer, and I'll get back to you within a day or two with your response." So you can go back and ask questions. I'll go back and do additional research to get the answers.
Well, it sounds like what you're saying is there's the importance of utilizing internal resources, knowing the internal stakeholders, not just in medical affairs, but I imagine in other departments or in the area. Right? Yes. Yes. Yes. I mean, the people who are creating these resources, which are usually medical directors or on the commercial side, the marketing directors or trainers. They've probably been in that area a long time.
They've been at it longer than you, so they've developed a sense of what's important or what people have been asking. They've done ad boards. They've done market research to figure out what's really important, and they just distill that information for either the MSLs or the sales teams to utilize. So don't underestimate how important those internal resources are for your engagements. Yeah. For sure.
Yeah. And thinking about the external, we started this conversation where you said that scientific credibility, one of the most important things is the ability to create relationships, key relationships. So which makes total sense. Obviously, the more scientifically credible you are, the more of a subject matter expert you are, the better chance you're gonna get access and FaceTime and be able to communicate peer to peer.
But can you elaborate on that a little bit as it relates to, like, that trust and long-term relationship that you could establish? Yeah. I mean, these KOLs that we're all calling, they're extremely, extremely busy individuals. They're either running clinical trials or out there on the speaker podium educating about new data, or they're dealing with seeing tons and tons of patients. So they have constant demands on their time.
And so a lot of times, the last thing they wanna do is to see someone from the pharmaceutical industry. But there's something I think the easiest way to build rapport with people is to look for an area of common interest or area of common pain. So if they see something either in your intro or your CV or in your email or introduction, that's an area of common interest, they're more willing to wanna talk to you. Right?
And anyone may see you once, but what's gonna get them to constantly call on you or wanna see you is if you're bringing some kind of value. And the easiest and quickest way to bring value is to stay on top of the science and be that expert that they wanna call on whenever they're gonna go through their next speaking opportunity. They wanna be able to call you to say, Ike, what's new in this disease area? Are there any new data that I need to know about?
Or do you know where I can find this resource? So on and so forth. So the more of an expert you can be to them and provide value to them in that way, the more likely they're going to want to keep seeing you or want to call on you. And so that's why I think being a scientific expert is very valuable. Well, it makes sense. And I think it's more obvious, and we talk about this all the time. There's that foot in the door. There's pieces of it. There's the scientific credibility.
But if you can't connect on a personal level or a professional level or make some sort, you know, create that share the value and create that give-and-take reciprocal relationship, then the long term would be in jeopardy. Yes. Yes. But I love what you just said about being able to utilize that scientific credibility, but finding the connection is where you pull it all together. Yes. Absolutely.
Absolutely. So I know that there are I've had situations where there are people that struggle with either finding time to educate themselves more, or the information may be a little more complex than they had imagined. Mhmm. We've had people that haven't gotten through their certifications for one reason or another. What advice do you have for people that experience challenges with this piece of it? Yeah. For me, it's all about being efficient with your time, and being focused and disciplined.
Some people try to cram information. I find that it doesn't work for me. What I find that works better is, like, that concept of compound interest, doing a little bit every day. And over time, your knowledge is just gonna compound. So I set aside at least 30 minutes or an hour every day to learn something new, and I try to make it interesting for myself. I don't use the same way to learn. I don't always read articles. Sometimes I watch videos. Sometimes I listen to podcasts. Sometimes I read.
Or sometimes I ask someone questions who's an expert in that field, or I listen to a lecture. You know? So varying your learning style is really important to help you retain the information. Also, knowing yourself, knowing what time of the day is best for you to learn. Like me, I'm a morning person. I learn the most in the morning. So most of my learning, I do first thing in the morning. Some people are night people or some, you know? So knowing yourself, knowing how you learn the easiest.
Some people are visual. Some people are auditory. You know? Some people have to talk through it. So recognizing your learning style, mixing it up, looking at multiple different sources, I think all that will increase your chance. And practice, practice, practice, especially for these certifications. A brother of mine, I don't think he created this, but he told me this. That's the 5 P's: proper preparation prevents poor performance.
So the best way to pass these certifications is to be very prepared, proper preparation. So that's my advice on that. So good. Those are great. You hit on so much good stuff. I actually feel like rewinding that and replaying it. That's how good that was. So guys, if you haven't been taking notes, you're gonna have to go back and replay. That's just great advice for, I really think, for any part of your career is to really know thyself. Yes. And know how you work best and the preparation piece.
I mean, everything you just said is so spot on. Yeah. I guess one of the wrinkles that gets thrown in at least nowadays that I'm finding and that I'm hearing from people is keeping up with the pace of technology. So now there's all this technical innovation that has made it easier and more complicated at the same time. So can you talk about the advent of technology and how that fits into this? Well, I'm glad you're asking me this because I'm a big, big fan of technology.
I actually just finished a certification by MIT, how to apply AI to the pharma industry, pharma and biotech industry. I definitely think AI is gonna disrupt our industry, and I'm trying to stay ahead of it so I don't get left behind. But I think just like anything else, it's a tool. You can use it in a good way or it could be abused or used in a bad way. The problem with AI, you know, there's just so much information. You gotta know what's what, and some of it hasn't been verified.
Like, you don't know what's necessarily accurate and what's not accurate and things like that. But to summarize, I would say it's all about being focused and disciplining your approach to learning. I think I would not completely rely on technology to learn. I'm still old school at heart, and I like to look at the primary source for things to get the basics, the fundamentals, and then I just add to it.
And you can look something up on ChatGPT or any of these AI platforms to summarize things, but also use your instinct and your common sense. If something you read there doesn't make sense, you need to double-check it. Because once in a while, you may have inaccurate information. And that's another reason why looking at multiple sources is good, looking at least three different sources.
If they're all saying the same thing, then you could be comfortable that what you're reading is likely accurate. But if they're all saying different things or what you're seeing on ChatGPT is different from what you're reading in the primary source, then you have to go back and reevaluate what you're reading. So I think this technology can be a tool. It can help you if used the right way.
But, if you're not using it the right way, it can become overwhelming because there's so much data out there, and you have to know what's credible, what's not credible, and so on. There's a lot to unpack there, but I don't know if you guys picked up on this. So let me just point something out. Yeah. So here we are. We're in this podcast, and we're talking about scientific credibility and continuous learning.
This guy is an Ivy League-trained MD. He's a genius who wanted to learn about AI, so he went to MIT. I mean, let's think about that. Like, if that doesn't prove the whole point of this conversation. Yeah. And I kinda wanna end it in a place where, you know, can you talk about how important it is to be proactive with this? I think we all think it's important. I think everybody thinks continuous learning and scientific, it's important. But you just proved how important it is to be proactive.
Can you talk about that a little bit? Yeah. What I've learned, what I learned—I wish I learned this earlier in my career—but the key to all great leaders is that they are great readers. They love learning. Mhmm. So what has been responsible, the keys to my success, is skill acquisition and value creation. I'm always trying to figure out how to learn new skills, and I'm always trying to figure out how to add value, bring value to folks.
And that's why your podcast is so important, and that's why I was so eager to come to your podcast because I know you impact a lot of people in the MSL or medical affairs industry. You could have easily kept all this information on your own, continued to monetize through your recruitment firm, but you're sharing. You're providing value to everyone. And so I think you gotta be a lifelong learner. Don't get comfortable in whatever you're doing. Don't get comfortable.
The minute you get comfortable is when you become extinct. So always think about ways you can learn new topics, add more tools to your toolkit, add more skills, and not just that. Figure out how to bring value to others. And that's why I've been dying to be here so I can share some of the things I've learned also. Well, listen, man. You did not disappoint. This was amazing. That was, like, the fastest 30 minutes we've ever had on the show. You're awesome, Ogbaa. Thank you for coming on.
I'm so grateful for you, and you shared some really awesome pros. So really appreciate you. Thank you, Tom. I appreciate you. Thank you. Yep. And, guys, thank you for joining us. If you got value out of this, as I say always, please share it with others. And thank you all for your support of the show. It means so much. And we will see you next time. Thank you so much for listening to the show.
And if you enjoyed it, please subscribe so that you don't miss an episode in the future and feel free to leave a rating or a review or a comment. Thanks again, and we look forward to seeing you soon.