SVA Consulting's Andrew Demarco Presents for SchellingPoint Webinar

SVA Life Sciences’ Principal and Commercialization Strategist, Andrew DeMarco, was recently a guest speaker in the webinar “New Techniques for Producing Super Returns in a Biopharma Portfolio”. The webinar was conducted by Michael Taylor, Principal and Co-Founder of SchellingPoint. SchellingPoint are thought leaders in the emerging management science of strategic collaboration – how a group of people maximizes agreements, goals, and plans to achieve more successful outcomes. In the webinar, Michael explains how SchellingPoint’s research found no group measured was ever fully aligned and that we should not expect any group to be fully aligned. Accordingly, SchellingPoint developed the Alignment Index and Sentiment Index (AISI) metric which is used to objectively quantify a group’s Degree of Alignment to pinpoint what a group should discuss in order to improve alignment.

The webinar looks through the lens of venture capitalists and private equity investors and discusses three imperatives for investors to consider as they make investment decisions relative to life science portfolio companies. These imperatives are based on the assumption that investing in a highly effective management team is paramount, as the value of an organization is the sum of the collaborations the team makes. These collaborations happen across dozens of activities ranging from raising funds, managing clinical trials and executing a commercialization program. The three imperatives are:

1. Adopt a firm “On-Benefit, On-Time, On-Cost Standard” when it comes to discussing performance. Move from measuring “performance improvement” to a more conclusive “did we or did we not” achieve said goals.
2. When discussing strategies and plans, do so from an “Outside-In Sequence” that starts with value to patients and external stakeholders and letting those goals drive decisions and development of internal capabilities.
3. Use SchellingPoint’s AISI predictive index to gauge a team’s success pre-investment, or to identify and drive necessary dialogue on an ongoing basis. The AISI metric is a 90-minute process that gives an alignment report on a group on where they differ in areas of alignment and pinpoints their likelihood of success in working together.

SVA is trained and certified in the use of SchellingPoint techniques. Andrew DeMarco, principal and commercialization strategist provided an example where SchellingPoint techniques empowered a complex group of stakeholders to reach alignment and to execute with shared goals and plans. This particular group ultimately saved $20M in low priority projects thanks to their ability to derive a cohesive mindset around their goals and strategies to get there.