You all for being here. Im really honored. Be here with sally susman, whom i will make a very brief introduction and then she will speak very well for herself and for for book. So sally is the evp chief Corporate Affairs officer pfizer. She is the author as, you know, of breaking through, communicating to open minds, move heart and change the world. She spent her early career in government and industry, and she started at the bottom. American express and eventually held senior positions in communication roles with amex, with the sd Lauder Companies. And for the last 17 years at pfizer as a young girl, she wanted to be either an investigative journalist or the mayor of her hometown of saint louis. Theres still plenty of time to do to do those things. When she left for college, she notes in the book, her dad gave her a letter and it said, your reputation is most important asset good thing for your child to be thinking about. They head off to school for the first time. Her dad was a lawyer. Former vice chairman of citi, citigroup global. A big fundraiser and. 2009 was appointed by president obama to be the Us Ambassador to the court of st james, which is kind of a big deal. I think she has a wife, robin carter and a daughter, a grown daughter who lives in new york city. Seven blocks from her, which she describes as being perfect and. I have a daughter who lives 1. 1 mile from me and i think perfect as well. Sally spend a little bit of time in the clinton years ago and so i my former boss Donna Shalala about her and she said if youve ever those youve ever communicated with Donna Shalala, you get like its very few words, punctuation. Its just and so said, shes smart and savvy shes a player with two exclamation points so welcome sally and sally susman. So its one of the first questions i asked sally when we spoke a couple of ago, and then were sitting down earlier today was how did you find the to write a book, right . She got this position that one of the most Important Companies in the world certainly thats been in the news and shes published the book several months ago. So how sally, how did you come to do that . And and find a way to do it . Thanks, joe and first, let me just please thank you for joining me today and to say that it is an honor of a lifetime to be at the miami book fair. So i feel really excited to be here today. The question, how did i find the time to . Write the book is something my boss asked me repeatedly because candidly, id always wanted to write a book. It was a burning ever since i was that little girl you mentioned in saint louis wanting to be a journalist. And id written small pieces, had something in a magazine here or there. But it wasnt until the panda nemec hit that i had two things that made it possible me to write my book. The first was the crisis of covid and working at pfizer on the frontline of trying to roll out this new vaccine in was crystallizing you know i was in the cauldron of all this pressure and you know working every day months on end and yet the ideas that had been just sort of tumbling around in my head they clarified that my book my story was going be about leadership. The leadership i was witnessing during pandemic and the leadership that i had witnessed over four decades working in and in business. The second thing that made it possible, joe, to write the book was i was locked down, i was at home and i would start my day with a long walk. I would work and then i had time. And so i realized that outside or before the pandemic had wasted a lot of time running here, running there, going to wherever i invited to. And one of the things ive tried to take forward is to hold to my time, to hold on, to focus, to be disciplined, even without the horrors of the pandemic. So these two things combined to help me write this book. Great. And were grateful you had that opportunity. You know, the book starts with an from your time at quite recently of the russia of ukraine and Albert Bourla, the ceo of pfizer saying to sally i really to rethink how we react to this typically Companies Involved in health care had really gotten a pass on taking a position on global events and so forth in the health care business. They got it. But but he wanted to step back and reconsider and asked you to do that. Would you talk about that a little bit . Yeah, sure. And of course, you know a lot about health care. So its an inside question. But one of the most interesting things that i do in my work is help people decide when to weigh in on social and how to weigh in and i suspect well get into that a bit more later. But during the ukraine well, the invasion of ukraine, if you remember all the Big Companies were rushing out of russia and making very bold statements against. And as joe rightfully points out, if youre in the medicine business, you have a traditional humanitarian because a kid in russia with cancer is a kid with cancer and need and deserve their medicine as as anybody else. So were sitting there with our humanity an exemption but we didnt right. As if we were just in a business as usual mode or as if were as that people would think we were profiting during this difficult time. So we as you say, albert, my boss, albert ceo, pfizer said we need to think more deeply. This isnt good enough. And so over the course of a weekend, we came with the plan that every penny every rupal that we earned in russia, we would donate to ukrainian relief. Thank you. And and in doing so and we got out and talked it because in this world you have to explain yourself if youre not out on tv or radio talking and explaining yourself, you cant assume people will understand. We explain this and it very well received, but takeaway for me and really relevant my book is that you can usually find way if you are willing to be create give and current courageous. Its not always a yes or black or white. There are nuance ist answers to very tough questions. And sally, let me build upon this. You say in the book that, Senior Executives are expected speak out based on their values and lead with purpose and use their platforms to, steer the global discussion. Weve had our own history in the state of florida in recent years, where with the loss of one of the largest employers in the state, the Walt Disney Company and its former ceo spoke out then spoke out. And then there was a reaction within state government. It, which is still playing out now. So how Senior Executives, when should they went, should they speak out . This is such an important, relevant question and the last several years, social issues are coming. Business leaders fast and furious lee things weve never had to think about. And in my company, its a very metric driven company. We know what do we need to see to advance a compound, our pipeline or what kind return on investment do we need to further invest . But when it came to whether not we should speak out on a social issue and we didnt have a metric and i thought i feared that people in the company would say well its whatever thinks and i assure you whatever sally thinks is not a metric and a good place that i want to be. So i spent a lot of time thinking deeply. I gathered my colleagues, my team, and we came up with a five question framework and its detailed in the book, but i can go through it very. The first question is, does it relate to our purpose . You know, most organizations have at pfizer, ours breakthroughs that change patients lives, that gives us a wide berth to speak out on. Most issues about health care, human health. But not every issue. So theres important issues like the deforest of the amazon, which important but not relevant to purpose and we lose agency if we speak out on everything. So does it relate to your purpose number one. Number two, how does it impact your most stakeholders . So for us, that space agents and employees, but you had to think about who is your particular audience . Question three is how does it relate our values and our values at . Pfizer are courage, excellence, equity and joy. Please know, didnt say how does it relate to our politics . Because companies arent political or they shouldnt be in my in my values driven. Yes paul is politically no the fourth question this one might be my favorite is what are our choices here . Because often people very reactive and defensive. Youve got a reporter calling deadline. You have somebody shoving a petition in your face. You have to sign by 5 00. All the other companies are signing. I reject and ive taken to when theres an issue thats relevant for us sitting down and writing out our own view, in our own, sharing it with employees, posting it on our website. I dont feel like you have to give up control and then the fifth and final question is what is the price of silence . Because i do believe theres some issues violence in schools that silence is deafening and its just not possible for large public thats my framework and its not perfect and im open to interpreting. And its a great its a great framework. Sally one of the points you make throughout the book is that communications is hard skill. Its sometimes times, its seen as being or its of soft. But you say, no, it is just as hard and important as manufacturing sales. So what do you tell us more about what you mean by that . Oh, thanks joe, youve actually hit on the sentence. Thats the entire thesis of the book that ive had the privilege, the honor to to nine ceos, a couple of cabinet secretaries, senators in my career. And theyre all great. I mean, theyre all smart. Theyre hard working. Nobodys into the corner office. You get there because you have really skills. But a few of them have been complete game changers, people who totally shifted paradigm. Youve got Leonard Lauder at the day Lauder Companies, Ken Chennault at American Express and Albert Bourla at pfizer and in my view the difference maker for those is that they valued as seriously as any other skill or discipline in their portfolio so that its not an afterthought its not something they just you know rolled into last minute they practiced they think about it. They they value it and so it is my belief it is my argument that its a big mistake to. Consider communications soft skill that in fact it is a rock hard competency. All right. Let me ask you let me ask you about pfizer and the pandemic, which to be one of the more intense interest periods in anyones career. Certainly was for me at about self. So all right. So albert Bora Bora Bora became pfizers ceo in october. Of 2018 so a couple of years before the pandemic 2019 2019 and in short order issued new purpose for the company he wanted to see breakthroughs that change lives. And i would say when he made that the mantra, he had no idea how important breakthroughs that change patient lives were was about to be so beginning about three and a half years ago, sally lead quote one of the most urgent highest stakes public dialogs of the last century. Your job was to, quote, build in new Life Saving Technology because the goals of the company at the time were find a vaccine and build confidence in big pharma that it was safe to take the vaccine. So tell us about that time. Oh, so much to say about this. Give me a couple of minutes. This one i actually went to work at pfizer because i believe that life saving, the company that makes life saving medicine, had such a terrible reputation. And i knew that big pharma had really troubled reputation. And i thought, you know, im pretty good at what i do. Ill be able to fix this in a year or two for more than a decade. I banged my head against a wall, a wall of cynicism, skepticism and really made very little progress. And so the pandemic came. I thought, this is really my and as you mentioned, Albert Bourla was a new ceo and right in early 2020, he to give a speech in greece and by the time he landed in greece the conference had closed because of covid. And i think you can all remember where you were as things were locking down. I sure do. I was in new york city and when albert flew back, he wrote on a little piece of that we still have in the office that he was going to do three things take of our 85,000 employees around the world because Employee Wellness became a very big deal during the pandemic too that we would ensure the steady stream of medicine around the world. If you remember you couldnt buy a car or get a refrigerator, but the medical supply i think you agree mostly up pretty well all timers cancer, all the terrible diseases didnt take a break during the pandemic and three, we would make a vaccine in months. And this is where i thought, oh, no, its a pandemic. And my boss has his mind because this is a 12 year had been a 12 year exercise that were going to do in eight months. Albert did something ive never seen any other ceo do. He looked around the group assembled to appoint a project. And this was going to be a terrible project. It was going to be night and day, every day for these eight months. And he appointed himself and thats the moment i thought. Huh, maybe we are going to do this thing and we set about working. I felt i needed an ambition as bold as his so my ambition became to break through to reintroduce this company to. Tell the world who we are, what we really believe and what we care about. And i set about doing things very for example our most treasured asset is our intellectual property. I for the intellectual property relative to the pandemic wed on our website the scientists they died when i told them this but we didnt have time to just to fight over issues of transparency. It usually takes three years to fill a clinical trial. We did it in three months because. All of these issues were being handled in a very different way. I also to embed media with us along for the ride, so i had some street journal reporters and a Network National geographic film documentary film crew going with us and many sleepless nights what i thought sally, you are filming the greatest corporate debacle of all time, but also knew that if pfizer failed, wed have bigger problems than a bad news day. We might not even be sitting here together today. So as you know, how story ends that after eight months we did a successful vaccine and we did roll it out at the same time, theres a film now called Mission Possible that runs on youtube. And the day after we announced the vaccine, the wall street dropped six pages. And youre a former journalist. So, you know, six pages is a lot under the headline Pfizer Vaccine craze, easy deadlines and a pushy ceo now pushy is not maybe the word i would have chosen, but it made the point that he was tenacious, is that he was focused and that its all about leaders ship. The other thing that i just want to add to conclude this story is that today pfizer is a top ten global brand, according Fortune Magazines most admired Time Magazine came out with a list of the most Important Companies, and we were number six. So we a scientific transformation we had a reputation transformation. And i had a personal transformation during time in being able to achieve a lifetime dream. To write this. But as someone who has had five Pfizer Vaccines, very grateful. I thank you i thank you for that. Lets move to a lighter topic. So you talk in your book about the the opportunity to use humor at times in communicating. You call it lighten up and with humor and tell the story through an interesting of your dad being named to be ambassador great britain. And so there is this moment where president obamas press secretary, robert gibbs, is standing at the podium and hes talking about these three appointees. Ambassador. And theyre all substantial individuals, you know, and supporters of the Democratic Party and so forth and so press starts to take press secretary gibbs on about kind of the spoils system of appointing ambassadors and and the press secretary says, well, you know, one of the there were three one of the three is is going to be the ambassador to france. And he speaks french. And then he says of your father, you know, hes going to be the ambassador to great britain. And he speaks and. And then and the jaded audience sort of accepted that. And they went on to the next. So when is it appropriate to humor in communicating . You told this story very well. It was ambassador charles speaks french. Ambassador phil murphy spoke german. My spoke english, but the book is divided ten chapters. Each one seeks to solve problem with a simple idea. The chapter on humor was the hardest to write it almost out of the book a million times humor is scary these days. You can so easily be cancel old or you can find yourself in a very awkward place, in a very politically correct world. But i stuck with it because i dont know about you, but i dont want to live in a world humor without joy, without the ability to laugh. Thank you so i thought hard about it. It really isnt about standing up and telling jokes. Its not about shtick or, you know, being a comedian. Its more creating opportunities. Lighthearted moments create opportunities to happy in our lives and to together. As i mentioned, one of my companies for values is joy, which i tell you is, unusual for a fortune 50 company to have joy as one of the four values. And when we ourselves. What does that mean . We say that we want to take our work seriously, but not ourselves. And even that laughter is good medicine to. So were trying to live in this culture thats a little more human, a little more approach, both and in my own team, we have something every year called i guess its a comedy club night, and we put a in our room and. We try to make it look cool. We do it after work and everybody up and shares their biggest goof, the greatest mistake theyve made recently. You know, somebody left a confidential on the subway. Theres all kinds of things we do that are mistakes that ashamed of and we feel shame about making mistakes. But when you share them with others and you realize everybody else is making mistakes, too, and that if can be open about and learn from it, it builds an important resiliency. And we have really great time doing it. I remember now we call it open mic night and open mic night is ju