A Life in Science: Teamwork and resilience in early development 

New in our A Life in Science series, we hear from Eli Leo, Early Development Asset Lead, about how teamwork, creativity, and even failure fuel progress in research. From seeing herself as a conductor guiding scientists like an orchestra to learning from the 98% of experiments that do not succeed, she shows how resilience and collaboration create meaningful breakthroughs for patients.

“I feel like I am a conductor of an orchestra. The violins are the bench scientists, other instruments are regulatory or clinical, and they need to make sure that they play together and their music is something that is good,” says Eli Leo, Early Development Asset Lead at Ipsen. 

For Eli, leading science means orchestrating people and processes as much as experiments. “In my current role, not only I can use my scientific skills, but the best is the ability to make sure that the scientists in my team work together in the best possible way.” 

That teamwork underpins early development, where progress is built on persistence. “In our jobs, unfortunately, the chances of success are very slim. But it’s very important to be able to accept that and also to learn from the failure, because failure is actually a sort of background you stand on and you just have to learn from your lack of success and make sure that the next time you leverage from the learnings that you have.” 

The odds are stark. “Probably 98% of what we do will fail,” Eli says. “But if that 2% works, it’s because… most importantly, you have learned a lot in your past experience with failed experiments.” 

It is a perspective that shows how resilience, creativity, and teamwork are not only vital for research, but also for turning promising science into medicines that can change lives.