Background: In July 2020, young talents from Luye Pharma passed rounds of interviews and were selected to join LY50 program, a 2-year talents cultivation program targeting young employees to meet the Group’s demands at the key stage of strategic transformation. Trainees of LY50 have participated various kinds of activities and courses since the initiation of the program and gained development during the process.

 

Q: Hi, Liu Jia thank you for accepting our interview, to start with, please give a brief introduction of yourself.

Liu: I joined the injection workshop of Luye Pharma in July, 2016 and participated in new production line construction in 2018. I was transferred to the solid preparation workshop for Seroquel project at the beginning of this year, my responsibilities include construction of the manufacturing and documentation systems, Seroquel product transfer, process establishment and optimization during the transfer, as well as drafting of SOP files.

 

Q: The main topic of this interview is about learning and growth, what do you think is the most important significance of continuous learning after entering the workplace?

Liu: I learned theoretical knowledge at school and gradually realized the importance of professional knowledge at work. It is quite impossible to learn mechanism of process equipment, deviation change and validation at school. I don’t even know what is culture medium simulation filling, luckily my colleagues and supervisors are willing to teach me which allows me to achieve faster growth. And also regulations of the pharmaceutical industry are always changing, which motivates us to keep learning so that we can better understand our work.

After joining LY50, we got the chance to have face-to-face communication with excellent management staff and learn management courses to broaden our knowledge scope. The ultimate pursuit of product quality can only be achieved when we continuously learn to improve our own capabilities. I believe this represents Luye’s core value—pursuit of excellence.

 

Q: As we know, you have to pass several rounds of tests to be enrolled in this program, what is your feeling and expectation when you receive the admission notice?

Liu: Candidates of this program requires to have maximum of 5-year experience, and it was my fifth year. My supervisor strongly suggested me to sign up for the selection. I hope to step out my comfort zone and let more people to know me. I was not that confident after the interview, since communication is my weak link, and the post-interview feedback actually helps me to know my improvement areas, I want to achieve self-improvement and breakthrough through this project.

 

Q: Can you share with us which activity impressed you the most in this project?

Liu: Since the start of this program, we have participated various activities, including talent portrait, hiking, LY50 forum, club events, practice of management courses, New Chapter New Journey annual meeting and reading club. The one impressed me the most is the annual meeting, we received the notice to organize the annual meeting within 10 days, considering intensive meeting arrangements at the year end, it was truly a challenge to us. As the culture and sports secretary of the program. I immediately informed club leaders and other secretaries, and we were managed to deliver a plan within 3 days. During the process, we had a brainstorming session where everyone expressed their opinions. Eventually the annual meeting was held online due to the pandemic, it was the work of the whole team. After the annual meeting, we prepared a cup of warm milk tea for all trainees to bring our heart together.

 

Q: you just mentioned about the reading club, and I heard recently you volunteered to organized the first reading club activity, can you share with some details about that?

Liu: Yes, as I said, LY50 offered all sorts of activities and reading club was one of them. When Hu Fengfeng from Organizational Development Department asked which team would like to be the first to do reading club, as the leader of group 6, I volunteered to sign up. The book we read is called “Growth Mindset” which is about the cultivation of leadership thinking. I did a lot of thinking after read the book, especially when it reminds me of the Seroquel project that I’m working on at the moment. We need to copy AZ’s process, however to simply copy it can only achieve temporary success. We are two different companies with totally different systems, which means we need to produce our own product in the end. Also, based on my own experience and by observing others, I can always get some experience to enhance my skills. I need to maintain passion with my work, therefore I can get continuous development and breakthrough. I want to give my sincere appreciation to my team members as they were all busy with their work, but when I asked for their support with the reading club, they all make time to get involved in the preparation.

 

Q: Besides reading club, you have attended the mentorship workshop recently, can you talk about your experience with it?

Liu: Jen Liu, the HR Director of Boan is our mentor. She talked about her professional background during the kick-off meeting, her sharing also include some real cases. In summary, there will always be wind and rain in our life, and we need to keep learning during this process. When supervisor gives you a chance, you need to seize it and accomplish your task no matter what. During the one-on-one session, Jen answered some problems we met at work. I kept communication with her during the preparation of the reading club and she offered some very good suggestions.

 

Q: What have you improved since the start of this program and what area needs to be further improved in the future?

Liu: My language expression and communication capabilities got improved. Because of participating in this program, I have to take more responsibilities and thus strengthened my competencies. Growth is a long-term process, I remember a management course during the training, we were asked to make proposals. Trainees came up with some very creative proposals, however over half of them were terminated in the half way. Even if we can have 1-2 proposals to be approved, that would be a tremendous improvement to the team and ourselves.

I want to further enhance my professional capabilities in the future. I never stopped learning since I joined the Seroquel project. First of all, I need to build up my confidence, because only when you have some achievement in your professional career, then you can have a say in it. Second, I need to improve teamwork ability, because I found cooperation is as important as communication when I work with other departments. Also, I have to build up my capability to break down problems. As you go deeper into the project, you will find more problems, such as the unexpected problems encountered in the production transfer process of Seroquel. For the Group's current action of cost reduction and consumption reduction, we need to break down existing resources from all aspects to achieve cost reduction and achieve the desired results.

 

Q: Last but not least, please share with us your expectations on future career development.

Liu: LY50 program is a great platform, and as I continue to grow, I have discovered shortcomings that I need to fill. In the recent 3-5 years, my focus will remain on the Seroquel project, and hopefully I can share what I have learned in the program with the rest of the team, which will be helpful to everyone.