At a time of continuous change and increasing complexity, success for life sciences companies will largely depend on how they support, nurture and develop their teams. But even that has gotten more complicated. The convergence of several market forces and challenges — think the ongoing AI-driven transformation, patent cliffs realigning business focus, and global market disruptions — will force life sciences employers to rethink their workforce strategies and reimagine how work gets done, and by whom.

Finding the right people for the right work has certainly gotten more complicated, especially for life sciences companies seeking highly specialized talent for their operations around the world. But it’s not impossible, as I’ve seen plenty of businesses pivot in response to immense change with great results.

One company that comes to mind is a global biopharmaceutical company that has successfully balanced a multitude of challenges while evolving its talent strategy. It’s able to overcome talent shortages by considering how permanent employees, contractors and, yes, AI can best perform the work that needs to be done. By rethinking its approach to talent, the company achieved cost savings of $3.5 million annually, a time to fill rate nearly half of its original goal and just 1% of requisitions older than 75 days.

As outlined below, the ability to adapt to change like this company did will help other organizations reach an ideal state of talent utilization, when faced with growing pressure to maximize the impact of your people while optimizing spend.

Many Factors Driving Change

As always, talent will be a key differentiating factor for life sciences companies. And as use cases for AI continue to expand, it provides new opportunities to augment human work. That’s why more companies find the optimal mix of resources to include AI tools to complement their people, from accelerating drug discovery to optimizing clinical trials and fueling operational efficiency.

But as life sciences companies race to implement AI and take full benefit of the technology across their operations, it also drives the need for even more specialized talent. It’s not just about hiring people with pharmaceutical backgrounds; you also want those experienced with AI, data and analytics, as well as applying technology to life-enhancing products — and who can keep up as the skills you need and technology change constantly.

Hiring such individuals has gotten more difficult, as you must first find the right talent pools, all while juggling costs, skills availability and worker preferences. Consider how the Asia-Pacific region has become a large and growing source of talent for biotech and life sciences, which as a result has driven an increase in wages across the region. For instance, India’s bioeconomy is expected to have reached $150 billion in 2025, driving up competition for skilled talent and in turn increasing compensation by as much as 15%.

‍

Read full article here