This is the second article in the leadership series that includes interviews with statistical leaders among the biopharmaceutical community.
I am pleased to present an interview with Dr. Kelly H. Zou. Kelly Zou, PhD, PStat, ASA Fellow, is Senior Director and Analytic Science Lead, Real-World Data and Analytics at Pfizer Inc. She is an elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association and an Accredited Professional Statistician. She received both her MA and PhD degree in Statistics from the University of Rochester and completed her post-doctoral fellowship training at Harvard Medical School. Her undergraduate major was Mathematics, along with a minor in Physics. Previously, she was Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School, Associate Director at Barclays Capital, and Senior Director and Statistics Lead at Pfizer Inc. She has authored over 130 articles and several statistical monographs.
Kelly has been on several professional journal and magazine editorial boards. She is the incoming Chair-Elect and Past Secretary, Health Care Policy Statistics Section (HPSS) of the American Statistical Association (ASA), Chair and Past Vice Chair, ASA Statistical Partnerships among Academe, Industry, and Government (SPAIG) Committee, and Chair, Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS) Awards.
Kelly may be reached at Kelly.Zou@pfizer.com. For additional biographical information, please see:
http://community.amstat.org/spaig/myprofile/profile?UserKey=c7fc5186-69de-4e22-81a7-faa5560f3689.
List of Photos
Photo 1. Kelly Zou's professional photo.
Photo 2. Kelly's colleagues and she won several BIOP poster awards during the Joint Statistical Meetings. From left to right: Drs. Birol Emir, Kelly H. Zou, Ching-Ray Yu, Bo Huang, and Neal Thomas.
On Leadership
Alex Dmitrienko: What is your particular leadership style?
Kelly Zou: I entered an election for the first time when I was in High School Affiliated to Fudan University in Shanghai, China. Our homeroom teacher and a wonderful mentor, Mr. Dehong Wang, encouraged the students to volunteer by taking charge of student activities. There were multiple roles to be filled, and I entered the race to become a league representative. I discussed with my boarding-school roommates, wrote a speech with solid suggestions on how to improve our organization and connectivity among students, and gave a speech in front of all my classmates. Then the ballots poured in...
Probability became an extremely useful tool that my classmates can still recall tallying up and counting the ballots one-by-one on a blackboard. It was a gut-wrenching moment between the two fierce candidates. After being declared as the winner, I helped other class officers on events such as celebrating the New Year, other national holidays, and traditional cultural events such as the Moon Festive.
Fast-forward to 2016; my most recent election was for the incoming Chair-Elect position of the HPSS of the ASA. I am very grateful that our ASA members have put their faith in my hands by casting their votes of confidence. Several goals have entered my plan for our section members, which are how to encourage professional statistical activities, improve networking opportunities, enhance communication skills, and providing influences in the policy arena using sound statistical methodology and applications in health care and related fields.
I would like to bring up a useful article, which has echoed well in my experience on the topic of statistical leadership. It summarizes the following nine important traits that define leadership: (1) Awareness; (2) Decisiveness; (3) Empathy; (4) Accountability; (5) Confidence; (6) Optimism; (7) Honesty; (8) Focus; (9) Inspiration (http://www.inc.com/peter-economy/the-9-traits-that-define-great-leadership.html).
In my view, an effective leader exhibits a combination of all of these qualities. Although these traits would embody a universally admired figurehead, you get the general picture that this leader is an inspiring visionary who is also compassionate and responsible towards the betterment of our society.
I wish that there are visionaries with determinations, innovations, and compliance in the statistical profession and quantitative analytics community in general. My favorite author, Lu Xun (1881–1936), once wrote: "Hope can be neither affirmed nor denied. Hope is like a path in the countryside: originally there was no path - yet, as people are walking all the time in the same spot, a way appears."
A key obstacle for those who are technically-focused is that excellent workers may not easily evolve into visionary leaders. Many of us may wonder why it is not so easy to break and then surpass this artificial ceiling by thinking strategically. For example, it can be a dilemma how to juggle and balance multiple tasks in work and in life. The personalities on a team may be varied, and a leader must understand the purpose of a complex task, the main paths taken to achieve the success, and to understand the needs and limitations of the team members.
In turn, a great leader can function as a shepherd who guides passengers to form a critical mass. (http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/11/reviews/21513.html). Facing with employees with diverse goals, interests, skill sets, and background, an effective leader takes charge but collaborate effectively. In my company, for example, the "own it" mentality is highly encouraged for all leaders and employees alike.
I have been fortunate enough to thrive along two quite different career tracks. For about ten years, I progressed from Post-Doctoral Fellow to Associate Professor at Harvard. For nearly just as long, I have been working in the industry from Associate Director at Barclays to Senior Director at Pfizer. Although these are well-known academic and private institutions, my experience has been with these selective few. While at Harvard, I was a Member of the Faculty Taskforce, the Joint Committee on the Status of Women (JCSW). The JCSW discussed extensively, particularly in terms of the glass ceiling for female employees and faculty.
I tend to be an extrovert in terms of my personality, except when I am reading a protocol, designing a statistical analysis plan, or writing a manuscript. I generally solicit opinions well in advance, but I also give colleagues or committee members time to discuss on a smaller scale within sub-teams before finalizing the overall task or project.
Since I have been exposed to multi-national and multi-functional settings, I also see things in different angles and from various cultural perspectives. Everyone has a different and innate purpose and mission in life, and everyone must come up with and come to terms with his or her own definition of happiness. As long as life is fulfilling, it will make one's life content.
On Aspirations and Goals
Alex Dmitrienko: What are your views on the pursuit of the American dream?
Kelly Zou: There may not be a universally-acceptable magical equation that will solve all of the career-related puzzles, dilemmas, and challenges. In fact, there is hardly a common panacea to guarantee the attainment of happiness if everyone has his or her own version of definition of happiness. A relatively-young Steve Jobs once famously asked the vice-president at Pepsi-Cola, John Sculley: "Do you want to sell sugared water for the rest of your life? Or do you want to come with me and change the world?" For some diligent workers, selling sugar water is precisely the heart of their pride and joy, and there is nothing wrong with that, either.
As an extrovert and a people-oriented person, I get integrated into the environment and culture fairly quickly and seamlessly. I can easily engage in a meaningful chat with new acquaintances through common aspirations and interests. In America, which is a multi-culatural melting pot, I have not only showed acceptance and gratitude but also respect and curiosity. I am also realistic and tend to look forward.
I like to set reachable goals and identify the best quality of each collaborator. For example, when planning for a major project, a grant application, or a manuscript, I pay attention to the guidelines, instructions, authorship arrangement, and deadlines. Thus, others will know what to expect of the entire team well in advance. Then I hope to motive and spark the creativity in each of my coauthors or teammates, so that the project would glue the entire team together. Efficiency is as important as perfection, and I always strive for utmost excellence and efficiency.
Over the years, my coauthors and I are grateful for the various opportunities that we have had by winning multiple poster awards from the Biopharmaceutical Section and the Scientific and Public Affairs Advisory Committee of the ASA. The coauthors not only developed and published new methodology, but also learned how to present complex statistical work and analyses in visual and succinct ways. After all, solving new problems is a fun way of extending a perpetual learner and scholar to a technically savvy statistician or data scientist in the biomedical field.
However, having aspirations by pursuing the "American dream" may mean different things for different people. Some of us may aim to be leaders, some may aspire to be excellent applied statisticians and data scientists, and some may find theoretical work highly rewarding.
In the Asian culture where I grew up, for example, we wish for our family members to be completely free of any major illness or catastrophe. To achieve such a balance, we may choose to maintain "the doctrine of the mean" and value harmony, rather than constantly riding the ebbs and flows of unexpected tides. Along one's career journey, a bamboo ceiling may be encountered.
To be successful, one must first become an expert in a particular subject matter or a specific topic area, without being easily replaceable due to the lack of knowledge. Another suggestion is to acquire the useful skill of delegating tasks and not being hands-on all of the time. If an assignment is not within one's comfort zone, then it is imperative to examine whether the task adds value and, if so, learn more about it and grow from the learning experience.
In reality, however, implicit biases may exist but must be eliminated. For example, there are the so-called glass ceiling and bamboo ceiling. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, glass ceiling is "the unseen, yet unbreachable barrier that keeps minorities and women from rising to the upper rungs of the corporate ladder, regardless of their qualifications or achievements" (https://www.dol.gov/dol/aboutdol/history/reich/reports/ceiling2.pdf). The same report urged: "Breaking the glass ceiling is an economic priority that this nation can no longer afford to ignore. It is an economic imperative driven by recent dramatic shifts in three areas that are fundamental to business success: (1) changes in the demographics of the labor force; (2) changes in the demographics of national consumer markets; and (3) the rapid globalization of the marketplace.""
On Partnership and Collaboration
Alex Dmitrienko: Do you feel there is sufficient collaboration among statisticians within industry, regulatory agencies, and academia? And how to achieve innovation?
Kelly Zou: I have observed or participated in effective and impactful partnerships between at least two organizations via various career tracks across industry, government and academia. For example, a former collaboration was formed between a professional medical society and a company, which has generated fruitful work, including real-world database analyses, practice pattern evaluation, unmet-need identification, and joint peer-reviewed publications.
Have we done enough to help foster statistical partnerships? The answer is yes, on an enterprise level, and no, on a professional community level as a whole.
Fortunately, the ASA recognizes that the elements of statistical analysis can best be applied in conjunction with subject matter experts. Consequently, the ASA's Statistical Partnership among Academe, Industry and Government (SPAIG) Committee, which I chair currently, has organized a panel discussion on effective partnerships and collaborations (http://magazine.amstat.org/blog/2016/01/01/a-recipe-for-successful-collaborations/).
The latest exciting news is that the ASA Board of Directors has approved the re-instatement of the SPAIG Award, restarting from 2017 (http://community.amstat.org/spaig/home).
Another relevant aspect concerns statistical internships, which are increasingly popular and present many opportunities for statisticians to become formal or informal mentors in academia, industry and government. We have provided tips for getting successful statistical internships (http://stattrak.amstat.org/2015/12/01/top-10-tips-for-getting-successful-statistical-internships/), successful interns' stories (http://stattrak.amstat.org/2016/04/01/4students/).
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, innovation represents the act or process of introducing new ideas, devices, or methods. Besides new statistical methodology, the hardware and software may also be part of the innovation, particularly, in the era of big data and the big tent of statistics (https://www.amstat.org/news/pdfs/RodriguezSpeech8_13_12.pdf). There will be much more innovative ideas and cutting-edge products as a result of successful collaborations. It is just a wonderful time to be a statistician now!
Personally, I have been working on a wide array of modern statistical problems, including imaging, functional magnetic resonance imaging, observational studies, time series, and real-world data. In the pharmaceutical industry, I have worked in several therapeutic areas using real-world evidence via observational studies based on electronic health records, claims, and surveys, patient-reported outcomes, as well as via pragmatic study designs. Some are emerging topics that are increasingly gaining momentum in our industry. Therefore, shared learning and research are valuable.
In terms of innovation, here is an analogy to contrast between diligence and opportunity. As a researcher, I wish that I could draw a symbolic card in life that is guaranteed to be highly predictive. As a human being, on the other hand, I treasure little serendipity here and there, which have entered into my life unexpectedly and seemingly "disrupted" my orderly existence — thereby capitalizing on opportunities that would not have occurred otherwise. Innovation not only requires systematic disciplined work, but it also can be non-linear and spark-like.
Thus, fostering a generation of active and creative minds is a key. Individual interactions may help the creative juice flowing, and cross-functional team work can be catalytic.
On Mentorship
Alex Dmitrienko: What do you think about the idea that a good leader is, first and foremost, a good mentor? When is it appropriate to take a mentorship mentality with a leadership role and when not?
Kelly Zou: The key characteristics of an effective mentor are listening and problem-solving skills. Nowadays, soft skills can enhance technical prowess. These are all crucial in business acumen and in leadership qualities in the field of statistics, data sciences, and quantitative analytics.
The Past Chair of the ASA SPAIG Committee and the incoming ASA President, Dr. Barry D. Nussbaum, has encouraged our committee to foster active networking and partners across different career sectors. He spoke highly of the impact of mentorship among seasoned and upcoming ASA members. One of the most endearing mentors to many of us was Professor Ingram Olkin (http://magazine.amstat.org/blog/2015/01/01/ingram-olkin-mentor-to-many/).
Well, mentorship has influenced my career path in a profound way. One day when I was about 21 years old, a mathematics professor made a comment, "Kelly, you seemed to enjoy probability so much. Have you thought of studying statistics?" Until that moment, I had never thought of statistics outside the framework of mathematical statistics. I was intrigued and excited. At that point, an entire world of probability density functions unfolded themselves in front of my eyes and mind. I dived into the library to devour Professors Norman L. Johnson, Samuel Kotz, and N. Balakrishnan's continuous distributions. They tied so well with my undergraduate mathematics research on Fourier series and differential equations. If I had not met my mentor, I would certainly not have had the exposure to the beauty of statistics in the realm of mathematics, other than regarding it as one of the courses that I took.
For those of you who can feel the same passion towards mathematical statistics, please read Professor Edward Frenkel's book, entitled "Love and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality," which won the 2015 Euler Prize from the Mathematical Association of America (http://www.maa.org/programs/maa-awards/writing-awards/euler-book-prize).
Last year, to help with young statisticians, I signed up as a mentor during the last Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM), met with my designated JSM mentee on the night of the opening mixer, and attended the JSM Mentoring Workshop. There was great rapport between us as mentor and mentee, respectively, and we discussed her career goals and current statistical pursuits throughout the mixer. By being a mentor outside the immediate scope of work-related projects, it is more rewarding to listen attentively and provide useful suggestions to the mentee.
My company constantly encourages talent development through mentorship-paring. In fact, there is a mentorship matching process in place within our company, which may be utilized by any colleagues. I have been quite active in participating in the mentorship process, organized by our Global Asian Alliance (GAA) within my company. A thoughtful and caring GAA mentor from another part of the company became a guiding light. Subsequently, through a friendly "On-Boarding Buddy" process for a newly-hired Data Scientist, I have become a mentor myself through the formal GAA-sponsored mentor-mentee pairing process and training. I was quite honored to serve as a GAA mentorship panelist.
Generally, mentors and mentees are encouraged to meet periodically, such as once a month. As important component of mentorship is that mentees should think of the goals they hope to achieve and how mentors could help accordingly. It may be useful to jot down a short list of topics that the mentees may have to seek mentors' input. In our company, besides technical and applied skills, individual development plans becomes a blueprint of short-term and fairly long-term aspirations. It may be beneficial to share in confidence some of these goals with the mentor. Furthermore, mentees broaden their horizons by seeking out different mentors with skill sets, technical and inter-personal, that the mentees may discuss and draw inspirations from.
On Life outside Work
Alex Dmitrienko: What do you do with your free time? What are your hobbies? Do any of your hobbies or activities give you a unique perspective for how you conduct yourself at work?
Kelly Zou: While I was a high-school student, I was a television (TV) show Producer and a Director of the "You and I High School Students" series, which was developed by and broadcasted from the Shanghai TV Station. In addition, I am an oil-painting enthusiast, particularly impressionistic artwork.
Of all interests outside work, I can say that I am a classical music enthusiast. To me, the most favorite composer is Giacomo Puccini, and the most admired Tenor, now a Baritone, is Plácido Domingo. I am an avid movie buff ever since I was invited to be on a movie critique team during my junior-high-school years, and I especially love watching cartoon movies and TV series via computer animation. If I hadn't study math as a major, physics as a minor, before pursuing my doctoral education in statistics, I would probably have gone into multi-media, broadcasting, film, theater, or television business. From time to time, quoting humorously and metaphorically from movie scenes or stage plays becomes a staple of my conversation style.
I recall that my language teacher asked me to join the movie critique team when I was a junior high-school student, and I wrote two pieces a week, following watching two movies. I was a playwright who directly several theater plays on stage, as well as comedies.
Of course, there is always a "math geek" lurking. Tracing back historically and though my own PhD advisor and mentor, Professor W. Jackson Hall, I have literally become one of the academic descendants or off-springs of one of the greatest German mathematician of the nineteenth century, Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855).
For example, music notes make me think of white clouds floating in the air, full of Greek symbols. When music and statistics intersect, the creativity is enjoyable! I admire the professor band, The Imposteriors (http://magazine.amstat.org/blog/2015/05/01/imposteriorsjsm2015/).
My lifelong goals as a mathematics-statistics-data-science-whiz exist across space and time, transcending boundaries and limits. Beyond statistics, I have always hoped for many layers, facets, and dimensions within one's lifetime. Like Brownian motion, little unexpected events would bring out so many facets and colors. One life full of adventures can still be sufficiently satisfying.
In closing, when I have a little free time away from data and deadlines, I am still a dreamer...