Nancy’s Bio
Dr. Nancy Alexi is the Senior Director of Program Management at Rain Therapeutics where she is responsible for project management, portfolio planning, and implementation of strategic, corporate, and operational objectives. Nancy has over 25 years of product development experience in therapeutics areas such as cancer, food allergy, hemophilia, and kidney failure. She has taken several biologics and small molecules through to regulatory filing and approval. Nancy led the Project Management Office, Operational Excellence, Compliance Excellence, and Training functions at Baxter where she was responsible for the biologic and device portfolios as well as enabling strategic outlook, identifying initiatives and implementing work streams that delivered improved business processes to support performance and better results.
Prior to moving to US, Nancy was a hands-on development scientist with a start-up company in Oxford (UK) where she worked on production processes for early phase biologics targeting cancer and HIV. Nancy graduated with a BSc (Hons) in Microbiology from University of Kent at Canterbury (UK) and a Ph.D. in Microbiology from University of Reading (UK). Nancy volunteers with BioPharma PM, a non-profit organization that aims to build project management best practices at a local and global level. Nancy is also a long-standing member of Project Management Institute (PMI), American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and Drug Information Association (DIA).
WITH GROUPS CREATING PROGRAMS TO ENCOURAGE FEMALES TO CONSIDER STEM, WHAT IS THE BIGGEST BARRIER TO ENTRY THAT IS STILL PREVALENT TODAY?
Having mothered daughters, I witnessed numerous teen girls choosing to study non-STEM subjects in college. That choice had rooted itself early on, even before their schooling had started. That early bias had enabled a dark attitude within their psyche that included phrases such as: “I can’t do science”, “Science is so hard”, and “Science is not for me”. We need to do more to expose girls to STEM during the early years by showing them what it is and what it can do. We need to make science fun and relatable. We need to become role models to girls by showing that we are just as good at it as boys are. We need to make females in STEM celebrities by making their names roll off our tongues and talk about their achievements at a drop of a hat. We need to be relentless at it. Only then will we be making a meaningful change.
WHAT OR WHO INSPIRES YOU?
People who work hard for their dreams and strive to break the glass ceiling inspire me to continue towards a path of bettering myself. They show that it is possible to go far and “get there” through hard work and grit.
WHAT IS YOUR PROUDEST MOMENT/ACCOMPLISHMENT?
As an aspiring leader, one of my proudest moment was when my colleagues and direct reports expressed sadness upon hearing that I was departing for another position. That showed me that I am on the right development path.