For the sixth consecutive year, IQVIA was named to FORTUNE’s list of “World’s Most Admired Companies” list and once again, earned the first-place ranking in our industry for innovation, people management, and social responsibility, among other attributes. 

We recently sat down with IQVIA’s Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer, Trudy Stein, who shared what the award means to IQVIA and gave an inside look into what it’s like to work here – everything from our people to what drives us.

1. What does it mean to be named to FORTUNE magazine’s “World’s Most Admired Companies” list and ranked number one in the Healthcare: Pharmacy and Other Services category?

For IQVIA, this distinction reflects how passionate our people are about driving healthcare forward, and how our company culture encourages that passion. We are tackling some of the most complex health challenges in the world, and each IQVIAN comes to work motivated by something bigger than themselves. Being recognized for that passion is an indication that others also see the importance of working to make a difference in the world.

For example, clinical trials are the pathways to developing new medicines, but for many patients who don’t live near a clinical trial site, it can be impossible to participate. We built the most robust Decentralized Clinical Trials (DCT) platform in the industry to help patients solve this problem by using technology to bring the trial to where the patient is. We’re able to reach underserved areas more easily that way, because instead of having to travel long distances, a patient might be able to complete some or all trial activities from their home or wherever they receive healthcare locally. Decentralized clinical trials also significantly increase the enrollment of diverse patient populations, which makes the trial more representative of the variety of patients who may one day take the medicine.

2. FORTUNE’s list places IQVIA alongside Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, and other big-name organizations with strong reputations. What makes IQVIA stand out?

We innovate together. IQVIA is incredibly unique in our ability to intelligently connect data, broad and deep expertise, analytics, and research in the life sciences sector. We call this intersection of insights “IQVIA Connected Intelligence™,” and it’s essential because while the digital age has resulted in vast repositories of knowledge, we’re at the point where we can’t solve the most complex problems unless we can make connections across systems, disciplines, and stakeholders. More than 10,000 customers worldwide trust us to help them use those insights and connections to accelerate the development of innovative treatments, get treatments to patients, and improve their health outcomes. 

As an example, we do a lot of work that leverages artificial intelligence for early disease detection, treatment response prediction, and adverse event management. Through our partnership with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), we recently used various pieces of information from anonymized, real-world medical records to develop an AI algorithm to identify Type 1 Diabetes patients who are most likely to be misdiagnosed. But that project went well beyond mining data stored on a server – our epidemiologists, data scientists, technologists, and diabetes experts came together and used their best thinking to solve the problem. 

We help our people take the next step in their careers, whatever that step may be. Whether you want to expand your skill set in your current role, or grow as a manager or leader here, we have many avenues to help you achieve your goal – including development programs, apprenticeship-style projects, and direct and reverse mentoring. Recently, one of our AI Leads in the U.K. used our internal career platform to quickly connect and work with two machine learning engineers – one in Germany and one in the U.S. – to tackle a quantum machine learning proof of concept he’s working on related to improving medical diagnoses. The system helps match people to internal opportunities like that based on their interests, skills, and where they want to go next. 

We strive to bring out the best in each other. There’s a real ‘can-do’ spirit across IQVIA, where you can call just about anyone if you need a thought partner, and they will help you. Our AI for Healthcare & MedTech group recently needed expert communicators to help them create materials for patients to explain a new algorithm we are testing to identify those at risk for developing heart failure. The group quickly ended up with 15 volunteers from different departments, including marketers, statisticians, clinicians and nurses, and graphic designers. People are very responsive, and that culture of collaboration extends to our work with external partners. For example, our IQVIA Innovation Hub’s whole purpose is to connect pioneering young companies with IQVIA’s unique capabilities to create new solutions much faster than those solutions might otherwise reach patients.   

All these aspects of our work and our culture support our ability to bring talented people into our organization. Great people want to work here because we’re creating a place where extraordinary people can come together to achieve extraordinary things.

3. What would you say to someone considering a career at IQVIA?

IQVIANs leverage tangible development opportunities at work and can chart their own career paths.  One of the big jumps I’ve seen lately is IQVIA employees in clinical research roles wanting to utilize their life sciences backgrounds in a different space – developing technologies that improve clinical trials. They use our programs to build tech skills they need, and then they move into our IT areas where they use both skill sets.

It’s not just possible to have multiple careers here – we’re designed that way. We make variety of learning opportunities available to all employees, many of which focus on business-specific topics, such as client-focused training, technology, analytics, clinical and therapy areas and more. And our people take advantage of those opportunities to build new skills – our internal Talent and Learning hub had over 1.3 million visits in 2022.

People who come to IQVIA have the tools, resources, and reach to make a meaningful and tangible impact on patients and healthcare outcomes. If you want to grow while working to create a healthier world, and you’re passionate, innovative, and collaborative, then you might be ready to become an IQVIAN.

1. Are you interested in joining a world-class organization? Explore available career opportunities now.