Alan Salter — Military Service, Servant Leadership & Brilliance at the Basics

Adam Walker:I am Adam Walker, a biometrics consultant, and this is the Pharma Prescribed Podcast where leaders, innovators, and hidden voices in healthcare open up, no sound bites, no spin, just raw insight, one prescription at a time. In an industry driven by data protocols and pressure, we rarely pause to ask the human questions.

Adam Walker:What drives us? What breaks us and what truths live behind the titles we wear?

Adam Walker:Alan Sorter is a professional whose career spans military service, international business and healthcare leadership. A proud US Navy veteran. Alan served with distinction before transitioning into the private sector where he established a management consulting company.

Adam Walker:Caravel International Partners, a strategic venture based in Chicago. In addition, Alan is also president of NRP Nonprofit Resource Partners, which supports companies by providing fractional staffing on a not-for-profit basis. His time in the Navy instilled a deep sense of discipline, resilience, and global perspective qualities that continue to shape his approach to leadership and governance.

Adam Walker:Alan\'s journey reflects a rare blend of service and strategy from navigating the rigors of military life to steering entrepreneurial ventures, he brings a grounded yet visionary lens to the evolving role of pharmacy and healthcare delivery. Alan, welcome to Pharma Prescribed.

Alan Salter:Thank you. It\'s great to be here.

Adam Walker:So nice to speak to you and to have the opportunity to meet you on Pharma prescribed. Alan, you\'ve had an eclectic background and career, and I think that\'s a really good starting point with which we open the conversation. Perhaps for those of our audience that aren\'t familiar with you, could you give us a little bit more of a background to what you\'ve done and how you came to be here today?

Alan Salter:So I think the biggest thing here is, you think way back to the beginning, the Army brat who joined the Navy, right? Okay. Go figure that one out. And my dad, Colonel in the Army, whatever it is, here I am an enlisted guy in the Navy, gets a scholarship, goes to college, comes back as an officer, had an absolutely great time in the Navy.

Alan Salter:Eight years. And then it was like, look, I need to go do something else because. This was the mid nineties. Clinton\'s drawn down services and forces and things like that. And op tempos are absolutely out of control. And so I was gone all the time. I\'m like, I\'m missing my family.

Alan Salter:And so I made the choice get out, went to GE right away.

Alan Salter:Did some sourcing for ge. Then went to Black and Decker because of an old commanding officer of mine called me and said, Hey, I\'m at Black and Decker. Why don\'t you come out to California? From Cleveland, Ohio. That was a tough choice, right? So did that worked at Black and Decker for a while.

Alan Salter:Did a lot of procurement, did operations, manufacturing, plant moves, things like that.

Alan Salter:But then thought, I need another purpose. And, when I think about, I had a great purpose when I was in the military. I knew exactly what I was doing and why I was doing it. And when I thought about, hey, CPG is great but maybe I need to get into something that is.

Alan Salter:Has a bit more of a purpose to it. So healthcare pharmacy, pharmaceuticals, whatever. That all made sense. So I went to a med device company and then did that for a little while down in Georgia, and then picked up the pharmac, the pharmaceutical piece. Went to Wisconsin, came back to Chicago.

Alan Salter:We\'ve been here like 15 years. That\'s my path, but it\'s a path of, manufacturing, operations, sourcing, project management, supply chain i\'ve done a lot of different things. Gives me a really good perspective when I\'m in whatever role I\'m in, right?

Alan Salter:\'cause I can do any of those. But because I\'ve been in all of those roles, when I sit in those roles, I have a better perspective than a lot of people do because I\'ve lived in the other ones and lived through bad decisions of my own, lived through bad decisions of other people. And so that\'s where I am and why I am here today.

Adam Walker:That\'s a lovely potted history and I appreciate you sharing that.

Adam Walker:Clearly your background in the military has defined and shaped everything you\'ve done thereafter. I know when we spoke recently, you talked with such warmth and inspiration around those particular experiences. Is there one particular thing that defined you from that time that then you thought, I can definitely take this forward into another profession.

Alan Salter:Yeah, so it\'s interesting, right? I\'m a third generation military guy. So my grandfather fought in World War ii, my dad was a colonel in the Army. I ended up being a very senior lieutenant in the Navy. But I think the thing I am proudest of and the one that kind of really formed.

Alan Salter:What I did with my confidence and everything else was the last job I did, the Navy, which was, I actually built a ship for the Navy. So I commissioned what they called an LHD, which is, I don\'t even remember what the letter stand for, but basically it was a big ship that looked like a World War II class aircraft carrier.

Alan Salter:And we had 2000 Marines and all their toys, and our job was to get them close enough to the beach. That they could take that beach and get ready for the Army to come in. We built that ship. Put it in the water. I like when I got there, it had been in the water for three months.

Alan Salter:And then we spent the next 17 months putting it together, taking it through all of its qualifications, and then taking it from where it was built in Mississippi to its home port in San Diego. In the end there was a lot that went on, a lot of, little fingers and things like that and a lot of different things that we did.

Alan Salter:But that really built my confidence and just got me to, where I could. Step out from a more structured environment, \'cause the military is fairly structured into an environment that is less structured. But I\'ve got that drive, I\'ve got that. Let\'s get the next step done.

Alan Salter:Let\'s do the things that we need to do. So for me, that was my absolute, crowning. I don\'t wanna say crowning glory, in the military. I loved it. I had a great time.

Adam Walker:That\'s fabulous. Thank you for sharing.

Adam Walker:So do you think it\'s fair to say there are plenty of transferable skills, and maybe you could elaborate on what you think some of those might be in transitioning from forces into pharma and healthcare?

Alan Salter:Yeah. It makes perfect sense, right? And like I said, my first job outta the military, I actually worked at General Electric. I worked at GE Lighting in Cleveland, Ohio. They actually had a junior officer hiring program. So GE went after military guys that were four to eight years.

Alan Salter:Just coming off, their first couple of tours in the military to folks that were about to be, more middle management and senior management in the military. Bring them in. And the thing they really wanted was the discipline and the structure and the drive. And so for me, that I brought all that with me, and that\'s how I got into the real world from the military.

Alan Salter:And that has what has driven me the rest of my time as well. Because you take all those things, the structure, the organizational skills, the leadership, I\'ll give you an example. So I walked onto my first ship. Aircraft carrier. 5,000 guys, out there in the middle of the ocean, doing their thing.

Alan Salter:But I\'m 23 years old. I have just gotten finished with Supply Corps School, six months of going through all the books and teaching how to be a Supply Corps officer, and then they drop me onto an aircraft carrier. Gimme 50 people, \$150 million in inventory. Spread out all over. Aircraft carrier and they said you need to find it every time, no matter what.

Alan Salter:Don\'t make any mistakes. Like I said, I\'m 23. There aren\'t many 23 year olds outside of the military. They get responsibility and expectations placed on them. From the day they start. And that\'s what the military does. They\'re just like, here you go, do your job. We\'ve trained you now go do your job.

Alan Salter:And I think that kind of mentality just drops me into anything else that I do. I, not necessarily fearless, but I sure do not have a lot of, hesitation when I walk into a new situation, I think it\'s made me a really good project manager along the way because when you\'re a project manager, they just hand you something and go, here, just go make this work.

Alan Salter:Or in many cases, I was the fixer. I\'ve been a fixer a lot. Where people come in and say, Hey, this project is off track. Can you get it back on track and get it done? Yes, I can do that. And I do that quite a bit. It\'s much more fun when I start them and finish them as opposed to having to take them over and finish them.

Alan Salter:But I think all that structure and all that expectation really made a difference and has led me through everything that I do today and how I do it today.

Adam Walker:Yeah, I think there are lots of overlaps myself when I\'m thinking about not just some of the companies that. Across the military to healthcare barriers.

Adam Walker:GE being one of them, I did do quite exactly. Yeah. GE Healthcare earlier on in my career around machinery, I seem to remember HPLC and UV and IR machinery was all GE Healthcare. So they do a huge amount of, and have always done a huge amount in healthcare but clearly in the military as well.

Adam Walker:Yeah.

Adam Walker:The people that you came across, have you brought them with you? Have you reenacted some of those teams and groups and experiences into the real world healthcare setting? Did you bring them with you?

Alan Salter:It\'s funny, right? Only on a personal level. So many of the, there are, I\'ll think about, tell you, there are, there is no one that I knew or still know from the military that is in anything that I do today other than just being great friends.

Alan Salter:30 years, deal, right? I\'ve been outta the military 20 years. I was in for about 10. I\'ve got these 30 year relationships and, every once in a while you\'ll pop up and send him a text or whatever, Hey Chris, what\'s going on? And things like that. But the one thing I have found though is.

Alan Salter:There are a lot of military folks in healthcare, and when I first got to Takeda, which was my last company I was honestly a little lost I was like, Hey, it\'s just me. What\'s going on? And then Takeda had ERG, so employee resource groups. And one of them was focused on veterans, and all of a sudden I found an entire group of folks that 11 years on are all still my friends.

Alan Salter:I still talk to them. It\'s something that my dad and I talk about on a regular basis, which is there is a certain type of experience that you get when you\'re in the military that. For people that have never been in the military, they don\'t necessarily always understand it. But if I go up to someone and say, Hey, I used to be in the Navy and they\'re like an Air Force guy or an Army guy or whatever, they may razz me a little bit, but in the end, we are now connected.

Alan Salter:And it makes an instant connection. And it\'s something that I pick up a along the way. And it\'s, you walk around, you see the guys with the veteran hats on or whatever, and you walk up to \'em, go, Hey, thanks for your service. Really appreciate it. And they do. And they\'ll look at me and go, Hey, were you a yes, I was.

Alan Salter:And I\'ll get the same deal. But it\'s an instant connection. And it\'s something what\'s the word? Shared life experiences There it is. That\'s what it is. And it\'s something that\'s a little bit different than the corporate world. It really is.

Adam Walker:You make a fantastic point there about the experiences that connect people together.

Adam Walker:In your introduction, I talked about what you\'re doing these days with respect to having set up your own company.

Alan Salter:Yeah.

Adam Walker:Caravel International Partners, but also we touched around the company that you also set up nonprofit resource partners. Really wanted to ask you about both of those things because it seems to me that you\'ve been very intentional around the things that you\'ve done, not just in setting up your own organization, but beyond that, what I\'d love you to explain a little bit more is about how you give something back and how you do that so uniquely.

Alan Salter:Yeah. No, thanks. I appreciate it.

Adam Walker:It\'s interesting, right? So I,

Alan Salter:funny enough, my give back and the considerations of how the Give back works actually started at Takeda and, I got into this mode with that ERG and, I got into the ERG, I got onto the senior staff at the ERGI was the president of the ERG for a year or two.

Alan Salter:I was the vice president for a year or two. We just traded off and we had a group of folks just ran that, but that kind of started the give back. And As in part of that program, we decided that we were going to, get aligned with a local veteran focused ERG here in Chicago.

Alan Salter:And then I got on their board and became their president and, and just kept going. And while I\'m done with that particular one, I am now doing a different board. I\'m gonna, I\'m the president of a different board. It\'s a furry friends one, we\'re five years old. Our ED is 24. She founded the entire organization. She\'s an absolute rock star. And it just continues to go. And then a friend of mine that I met when I was at the other, when I was at the other nonprofit came to me and said, Hey, I have this thing that I\'ve already started.

Alan Salter:My other partner has. Gone her own way, would you be willing to step in and help me put this organization together? And that\'s what we\'ve done. And so it\'s nonprofit resource partners, and in the end, the idea here is to give, basically temporary staffing, fractional staffing to nonprofits at an affordable rate and make sure that they can do the things they need to do with the money that they have.

Alan Salter:And that\'s the whole idea. So we offer, a couple different types of services, from, you can be, going as an ed, you can be a CFO, you can be a, an executive admin. As a matter of fact, I\'ve got a. Grant writer right now working on a nonprofit that is related to me personally. So that\'s what we do. We are absolutely young. We\'re like a year old here in Illinois and starting to get that traction that we think we see. \'cause everyone says, oh, this is a great idea. It\'s just gotta find the guys to actually, write that check in to put the contract out there and do the things they need to do.

Alan Salter:So that\'s where we\'re with that.

Adam Walker:So what\'s the catch and what\'s in it for both the people who are giving their time as much as how do you perform that connection between those that are looking for support services?

Alan Salter:Yeah.

Adam Walker:But you don\'t know what they need or are they putting out for tender?

Adam Walker:How does that play?

Alan Salter:Yeah, so it\'s, it is a great point. So what we\'ve done is, we, we\'re on LinkedIn and things like that, and we\'re doing the things we need to do there. But what we have done is we have created partnerships with other organizations that do nonprofit style work.

Alan Salter:So whether it\'s a law firm, an accounting firm actually I have a couple of those. And then I\'ve picked up in my work. Now we\'re working through basically an RFP today, and I\'ve met up with several business process outsourcing organizations, so folks that do call centers and things like that. I\'ve now made relationships with them and one of them. Is now feeding leads to us because they don\'t service the nonprofit industry, but they are contacted by nonprofits on a regular basis. And so what they do now is they send those leads to us and we go in and talk to those folks. And as a matter of fact, we didn\'t get this one, but we just got a call from the guy from a nonprofit in Hawaii and they were like, Hey, we need someone to like, answer the phone, 10 to 15 calls a day.

Alan Salter:Went out, looked at our staff and said, we don\'t necessarily do that. Asked everybody, Hey, four people came back and said, we\'d love to do that. And that\'s the other connection piece. So we find the leads, we\'re finding the partnerships that we need. But in our case, when we think about the consultants that we have, they are in the same space as myself and my partner, which is in the gift bag piece.

Alan Salter:So these folks know that this is not a full-time job for them, but when they get called. They can engage and we\'ve been very transparent about that, and that\'s how we make that connection, right? So we find like-minded folks that are like, Hey, we want to give to nonprofits on a part-time basis and do the things that we need to do.

Alan Salter:As a matter of fact, my partner is actually doing an interim executive director job in an absolute. Fire pit. This poor non-profit is having a really hard time. He\'ll come back to me once a week going, oh my God, I made it through another week. He\'s doing a good job.

Alan Salter:He\'s getting it squared away, but it\'s just very difficult. But that\'s what all of us are here for. Jump in, do the things that we need to do, and if we need to stay there for a while, we will. But if we only need to stay for a month, then still be it. We stay for a month and everybody understands that.

Adam Walker:I\'ve got a couple of questions around that, Alan. Sure.

Adam Walker:And they come around, the definition of what you call is a not-for-profit. So in my mind I\'m thinking charities, NGOs, non-government organizations. Are there others that come under that?

Alan Salter:Yeah. So in the, yeah, in the end, the ma in the US it\'s called a 5 0 1 C3, right?

Alan Salter:So it\'s a actual tax identification, right? The one I\'m, on the board with now, it is a 5 0 1 C3. And so that really is the dedication of a nonprofit. If you have that designation, that is who you are and that is how you identify yourself. That\'s how we work through it. When the calls come in from the, lead generation pieces, it\'s the same thing. Okay, what do you do? What industry are you in? They\'ll say, Hey, we\'re a nonprofit. We do this. And as soon as the nonprofit thing comes up, it\'s okay, here you go.

Alan Salter:You\'re gonna, need to go talk to NRP and they can help you. And that\'s how that works.

Adam Walker:So that\'s the definition of what these organizations are, right? My second part of that question is.

Adam Walker:I\'m sensing that there\'s something that\'s driving you to give that back, give back that time, and give back your energy to these not-for-profits.

Adam Walker:What\'s driving you? What\'s your energy? It is,

Alan Salter:It is another purpose. Like I said, I, when you and I talked earlier I told you, I\'ve never had a more. Dedicated, I think is the right way to say that purpose than when I was in the military. I get outta the military, I go into CPG, not a lot of purpose there, making good money that\'s great. But not a lot of purpose. Healthcare gave me a purpose, but. I\'ve been doing this for a while, and in my mind the give back is important. And so for me, this piece of give back gives me another purpose. So I\'m helping the patients as I do my healthcare focused jobs. But now I\'m helping nonprofits.

Alan Salter:I have another purpose and I\'m just, again, it just builds up that thing, \'cause in the end, for me, it is all about service. And even when in my corporate focused jobs, it is about. Service. I\'m a consultant, right? So that\'s what I do. I serve at the pleasure of whoever I\'m working for and in the end, my job is to get that company or that entity or whatever.

Alan Salter:It\'s through the things they need to get through, and get them to a point where they are better than when I got there. And so I applied that across everything that I do, whether I\'m an employee, a consultant, in the nonprofit world, it\'s the things we do. When we get done, make the place better than we\'ve actually done the right thing.

Alan Salter:So that\'s where that purpose comes from.

Adam Walker:What does service mean to you? Because clearly it\'s been very deeply ingrained in your education, in your upbringing, in your family background. What does it really mean to you?

Alan Salter:So it, it\'s funny I actually put this on my LinkedIn, my description of myself is I\'m a servant.

Alan Salter:Leader, and that is absolutely who I am. I will sit down and I will help you. I\'ve done this before, sometimes through my own detriment, where I will do things for you before I finish things for myself. And that\'s just it\'s just who I am. Exactly what you said. I grew up in a military family.

Alan Salter:That was what we did. That\'s how we did it. I joined the military and I brought all that with me along the way. And so for me, service is just, it\'s just the way you live. you asked me what it is. It\'s how I live. How\'s that? Probably the right way to say it.

Adam Walker:Yeah, I think that\'s perfect.

Adam Walker:So presumably that comes from mentors, leaders that showed you that path from a young age. And subsequent to that, would you like to just elaborate around that, if you wouldn\'t mind?

Alan Salter:It\'s funny you say that. So again, third generation military, my grandpa fought with patent in World War II in Europe, tank driver, a tank driver in the second army. Then, my dad joins and, he joined during Vietnam, so it\'s a little bit different. He got drafted and he was in college. And so he went to the recruiter and said, Hey, I\'ve got a college degree. I can go do something else. And he said, yeah, here you go.

Alan Salter:You\'re an officer now you\'re a captain. \'Cause my dad was a pharmacist, I don\'t think you and I talked about that yet. My dad\'s a pharmacist. He\'s got that healthcare piece to him too. That\'s ingrained in what I do and how I do it. When I think about my grandpa and I think about my dad and I think about what they did and how they did it. I look at my role models, those two set. When you think about the Disney movie where they\'re talking about core memories the animated movie, those are core memories for me.

Alan Salter:Because, you think about that. As a matter of fact, I\'ve got all my grandfather\'s World War II paraphernalia. I\'ve got his tanker jacket, all his ribbons and his awards. I\'ve got all his orders, pictures, everything. Because that\'s important to me. It\'s history. But those two things really drove me.

Alan Salter:And, I just found a way to take what I had learned and who I am and apply it to the corporate world. Now I\'m able to take all that and take that service piece and move it into the things that I find important as well, where I think I can make a big difference, which is in the nonprofit world.

Adam Walker:That\'s wonderful to hear, and thank you for explaining that.

Adam Walker:It\'s interesting how we were first introduced actually through a mutual colleague and friend who spoke so highly of you in the manner in which he. Both addressed you, but I think clearly the influence you\'ve had on him as well, we don\'t need to necessarily mention who that person is, but when they\'re listening, they\'ll know who they are.

Adam Walker:They\'ll so you are taking that bat on forward and you are leading and mentoring others and Yeah. Showing people in this industry how to do things the right way.

Alan Salter:Exactly.

Alan Salter:In the end, one of the things I\'ve picked up and I do this all the time, is. If you wanna be really good at what you do, you need to really be brilliant at the basics.

Alan Salter:And a lot of people forget that. They\'re like, oh my God, look at all this great shiny stuff that\'s all over the place. And then they forget that you need to be brilliant at the basics all the time. Because if you\'re not brilliant at the basics, it doesn\'t matter how much shiny stuff you have because it\'s all gonna break down because that\'s all rooted in the brilliance.

Alan Salter:The brilliance of the basics. And so I tend to do that a lot with people. I remind them on a regular basis, Hey, don\'t forget the box. You have to be standing on to make all these other things work because if you forget that you are going to lose your way and you are going to make mistakes and things are gonna happen because.

Alan Salter:Everything you do from an advanced perspective, think about when you open up a program, you\'ve got your settings thing, and it\'s all the basic settings but then there\'s that button on the bottom. It says advanced settings, but if you don\'t get all the basic ones it doesn\'t matter what it\'s in the advanced settings button, and that\'s the reason it\'s its own button.

Alan Salter:So it\'s something I always remind people of. You gotta be brilliant at the basics and don\'t forget, to add one plus one and don\'t forget to do all those things like that because they\'re like, I don\'t wanna do that. You have to do that. Absolutely have to do that.

Adam Walker:There is a podcast I listen to where they talk about world class basics, and I think that\'s exactly what you\'re talking about.

Adam Walker:Yeah. It\'s effectively. As you mentioned earlier, leaving things in a better place, improving upon them, but doing the basics to the very best of your abilities, your physical, emotional and mental ability, and not leaving anything at the door. Yeah, ticking every box on every checklist. Yeah, exactly. Turning every page, initialing and dating, every single thing.

Adam Walker:Old school, don\'t matter what you do.

Adam Walker:I\'m curious because.

Adam Walker:Technology these days doesn\'t really focus too much on world class basics anymore. It tends to focus on, like you said, clicking the advanced button and just going straight to the end game. Are we leaving something behind in that approach?

Alan Salter:I think we can.

Alan Salter:And that\'s always the trip. You have to be really careful of that, which is why I always say be brilliant at the basics. I\'ll give you an example. I\'m a one man show. And I don\'t have anyone working for me in my company. It\'s just me. And I use AI tools today to make my job. Easier, but more effective, I think is probably the right way to say that. And the interesting thing about that is I am more effective. I still have to check the boxes. So I\'ll give you an example. So today I used an AI note taker, and it\'s not it\'s not copilot, it\'s not Gemini, it\'s none of that stuff.

Alan Salter:It\'s a different one. They\'re absolutely great. They\'re based in the UK by the way. And I really like them a lot. But I have to go check the summaries every time before I send them out. I don\'t just. Send \'em out and every time there\'s something that has to be fixed. And that\'s the brilliant at the basics piece of, I was just taking on technology.

Alan Salter:I\'d be like, yep, here you go. Send it out. Thanks. I appreciate it. But being brilliant at the basics is going in and making sure that the note taker actually picked up what you said. And what I would tell you is the one I use is actually really good, but every once in a while. You\'re like, oh, okay.

Alan Salter:Because then I have to go in and I\'ll read every summary top to bottom, and I\'ll go in and I\'ll fix the things that I need to be fixed. And I\'ll also take some things out too. I\'ll be like, yeah, no, that, that isn\'t really right. So I\'ll take that out. I use chat GPT just like everybody else does, but for me it is a foundation because I\'m a better son of a gun i\'m actually better at grading and evaluating something that\'s already written than I am actually writing it from the beginning. So I use chat GPT to give me the beginnings, and then I take what I know. I evaluate everything that chat GPT tells me, and then I put my spin.

Alan Salter:Now the nice thing is I\'ve been using it long enough now that it\'s starting to understand who I am a little bit better. And so it starts writing more my way, which is great \'cause it\'s got all my, Hey, go, okay, go do this, go do that, go that, change this, change that, whatever. And it\'s starting to pick up on all that, but.

Alan Salter:Everything I have to check, and I do that because it even says, check GBT makes mistakes. Yes, it does. And it doesn\'t necessarily always understand where I want to go, but it gives me a place to start. And then I take that, I put my spin on it, and then that goes in an email or that goes in a PowerPoint or that goes into whatever.

Alan Salter:And instead of taking, four or five hours for me to sit down and go, okay, how do I do this? I can do it in an hour and a half. I\'ve already got the base and then I\'m just like, yes, no. Yes. Yep. Good. Copy paste. And we\'re good. So the new technology tools are great, but you have to check them and you need to use your understanding and knowledge to be able to make sure that.

Alan Salter:These tools are delivering your message, not their message. So that\'s where I am with technology. I,

Adam Walker:I would wholeheartedly agree with that.

Adam Walker:And I think the other way I\'ve heard it described is it\'s like having the best pa in the corner to sit alongside you, to remind you of the things perhaps that you\'ve forgotten.

Adam Walker:But actually, I heard a very strong argument the other day talking about the fact that. By using these tools regularly, we\'re actually using less brainpower and dumbing ourselves down, and the effort that we\'re saving now may well create more work for us in the future. That was how I heard it framed, and I thought I might just replay that out loud when we\'re on a podcast because I\'d love to just get your take on that.

Adam Walker:Are we saving time now? Potentially creating a headache in the future? Who knows? I don\'t know. What do you think about that ?

Alan Salter:It goes back to what the points that we\'ve touched here is, as we think about it, if you just say, give me this, and you don\'t evaluate it, and you just send it.

Alan Salter:Absolutely. There is no brain power in that because in the end, the thing I like, I\'ll think about it. So when I, especially now, right? I\'m much more prescriptive when I work with chat GPT, I\'m like, do this, add this, and I\'m actually telling it, I\'m giving it my own perspective, even at the beginning.

Alan Salter:So I\'m already thinking through what I would like to see, and it\'s just putting it together for me, and then I evaluate that. So for me. I\'m not doing that. Meaning I\'m using my brain power to give me the things I want right away. I\'m also using my brain power to evaluate what it says to me, and then evaluating that and making the tweaks and changes that I think need to be put into that to reflect the way I talk, the way I feel, the way I think, whatever it is.

Alan Salter:So if in my mind, if you\'re using your experience and you\'re using the tool as an enhancement. And not as the a hundred percent answer I would disagree with that statement. However, for folks that are just hitting the button and then copy paste, yeah, that\'s a train wreck waiting to happen. And yeah, that\'s not a good thing.

Alan Salter:It absolutely is not a good thing. Use the tools as enhancements, not the a hundred percent answer, and you\'re gonna be, I think you\'ll be better off.

Adam Walker:Yeah I wholeheartedly agree with that actually. And there is no shortcut for experience or wisdom, and I think you\'ve got plenty of that as you\'ve described.

Adam Walker:You\'ve got plenty of wisdom. You\'ve certainly got plenty of life and work experience and whatever we think about chat, GPT. We can\'t download our brains and our personalities and everything. Yet, maybe that\'s coming. I don\'t know. Maybe if we do enough of these, it might learn more and more about us. I don\'t know.

Adam Walker:But no.

Alan Salter:Skynet Adam. Okay. No Skynet.

Adam Walker:I don\'t wanna put myself out of a job here. This is the thing, at the point at which you take humans out the loop, then there might be a bit of a problem for us.

Adam Walker:We\'ve touched on a number of very interesting aspects of your career, your background.

Adam Walker:Is there anything we haven\'t touched upon today, Alan, that perhaps I should have asked you? More importantly?

Alan Salter:I think, in the end you get a feel for who I am and I am who I am. I have done my journeys like a lot of folks have. I\'ve been successful, I\'ve failed.

Alan Salter:I have, I\'ve worked on myself. I think you and I talked a little bit about, the personality evaluations and things like that. I\'ve taken the Myers-Briggs, I\'ve done the color energy stuff, and what I would tell you is that, from my perspective, you have to work on yourself all the time. You\'re only as smart as you are today because that\'s what you\'ve done. But there\'s something you can learn tomorrow. And that\'s the one thing I like about being a project manager and being like a chief of staff or whatever is because you\'re always learning because there are things that you just don\'t know.

Alan Salter:And there are projects and topics and whatever that people can teach you more. Stuff that you can put in the bank and you can use it for something else later. And so for me, you know that journey of. Education and honestly self-awareness. Understanding who you are, what you do, how you do it. Are you doing things the right way?

Alan Salter:That\'s always been one of my challenges is that, as you and I talked earlier, I am an absolutely high red guy. And for the folks that understand color energies, that\'s the director and it can get in my way. But it can also be an absolute rockstar in certain situations. And what I\'ve had to learn to do is moderate that at the right levels and some of it through failure, some of it through success probably more of it through failure.

Alan Salter:When you think about it, the cliche always is you learn more through failure than you do through success. I absolutely live that. I\'ve learned a lot more through my failures that I have. Through my successes. Don\'t be afraid to get coaching. Don\'t be afraid to, do the things to help improve yourself.

Alan Salter:I\'m an absolute seven habit guy. And what\'s the seventh habit? Sharpen the saw. Don\'t forget, always work on yourself. So I think that\'s the one thing you and I really haven\'t talked about here is that I have spent. A lot of time working on myself to get me where I am today. And I\'m still not perfect.

Alan Salter:I still have my moments just like everybody else and it\'s something you always have to work on.

Adam Walker:Thank you for that, Ellen.

Adam Walker:And perhaps if I can just elaborate further on that. When you say work on yourself, I might understand that as meaning One thing, what do you mean when you say work on yourself?

Adam Walker:What does that play out like for you? What does that actually mean?

Alan Salter:Yeah, no, I it can play out a couple of different ways. If that means going to school and, getting an education or getting more education, you can do things like that. For me, working on myself is really making myself.

Alan Salter:Better at the things that I like to do. I love being a pm. I love being a program manager. I love being a chief of staff, but that takes a lot of skill because you gotta be able to read the folks that are in the room with you. You gotta be able to understand how to leverage their abilities and understand what makes them tick, which is a lot of the color energy too, right now.

Alan Salter:Not just understanding who you are, but looking at someone, listening to what they have to say and how they say it, and understanding are they a red, yellow, blue, or green? And then using that to help leverage. How you get them to do the things you need them to do as the PM or as the program manager or as the chiefest staff or whatever it is.

Alan Salter:And that takes a lot of work and I\'m still not the best at it. I\'m pretty good. When I say things like that\'s what I\'m looking at. I have a bachelor\'s degree. I don\'t have an MBA, I don\'t have any of that, but I have spent a long time working on myself to make sure I can do the things that I like to do, which is.

Alan Salter:Program management. Project management. I don\'t mind doing procurement. There\'s a lot of program and project management in procurement and I love being the chief of staff, but you\'ve gotta be able to read folks and you gotta be able to understand how they\'re gonna react and you gotta be able to get that out of them.

Alan Salter:And in many cases, in those jobs, you are leveraging their skills and you gotta be able to put their skills to work without them getting mad at you.

Adam Walker:I appreciate that, Alan, thank you for providing such a rich insight and understanding around that particular point.

Adam Walker:At this point in the conversation, I always like to move on to a quick fire round Yeah, sure.

Adam Walker:And ask our guests firstly, the one piece of advice you would give to your younger self.

Alan Salter:I would say, and I\'ve I\'ve listened to pretty much every one of your podcasts now. I think they\'re absolutely awesome. I had to say that it gave me a little plug. But I\'ve heard this more than once, and I absolutely agree with it.

Alan Salter:I would\'ve told myself to be more bold, and I think I heard it in another one where one of them said, don\'t be afraid of senior leaders. They are people too. You are the expert. You tell them what you want. If I\'d been a bit more bold. I think I would\'ve been in a little bit different place than I am today.

Alan Salter:And I think I, hopefully I\'ve made up some ground there, but in the end, that\'s what I would\'ve told myself to be a bit more bold.

Adam Walker:Yeah. It\'s something that I also would reflect on as well. I wish I\'d been bolder younger.

Alan Salter:Yeah, exactly.

Adam Walker:I think that\'s really the embellishment to that as well. But appreciate you sharing that.

Adam Walker:Thank you.

Adam Walker:What are the top three qualities you value most when building a team?

Alan Salter:It\'s interesting, I got this from a former Marine. Okay, there you go. So the military coming back into what I do, he was head of one of the therapy areas at my last company, vice President.

Alan Salter:Now he\'s the President of North America for one of the pharma companies. But he always talked about the three Cs, curious, connected, courageous, and I use those with my teams all the time. Always ask questions, always know your stakeholders and don\'t be afraid to tell people anything. And there have been a couple of situations where I\'ve had to tell people, folks, and it\'s not what they wanted to hear, that\'s, it\'s the courage piece that really plays out, especially in some of the roles that I\'ve been in where they are support roles.

Alan Salter:And they\'re not necessarily, operational roles and so your job is to support, but at the same time you are absolutely having to tell them you shouldn\'t do that, or don\'t do it that way, or whatever, and just be courageous and say those things and don\'t be afraid to do that. So yeah, those are the three things that I always look for.

Adam Walker:Thank you. I love alliterations and I love rules of three, as my wife will tell you. Yeah. So curious, connected, courageous, not to be forgotten.

Adam Walker:What is your favorite thing outside of work, Alan?

Alan Salter:So interestingly enough my wife and I have gotten into camping and like real camping, not trailer, whatever.

Alan Salter:We have a tent and we hook it up to the back of the car. We throw the pets in and we just take off. And so we\'ve gone twice this year. We\'re gonna go one more time, but I think we\'re not gonna do that. And then we\'re already planning for next year. We\'ve got a basement full of stuff.

Alan Salter:And so that\'s kinda what we do. We are absolute foodies in my house. We love to eat out and we have our favorite haunts and restaurants and things like that. And before the pandemic, we were also movie guys too. We loved to go into the movies. A lot less now, only because you can find it all on the internet somewhere.

Adam Walker:I also love films and I found the same around the pandemic, but actually my wife and I have started going to the cinema again, and yeah, so we love, we\'ve got a lovely local cinema that we went to only the other night and. There is nothing quite like being in a space where there is a enormously big screen and you are totally immersed and you are not distracted by your phones or anything else going on.

Adam Walker:No one\'s talking over it. It\'s just total immersion, isn\'t it? There\'s nothing like it. And actually, it\'s harder and harder today to find yourself in a space for two hours where there is no distraction.

Alan Salter:No there, there are no, sometimes you get distracted by the guy\'s phone next to you because he\'s an idiot, but no, that\'s all right.

Adam Walker:popcorn too loud.

Alan Salter:That\'s me. I\'m the guy doing that. I\'m the popcorn cruncher at the movies. Yeah.

Adam Walker:And finally, your number one golden rule for life and business.

Alan Salter:My number one golden rule for life in business actually has two pieces to it. One of them is absolutely be ethical.

Alan Salter:There\'s no other way to do business, but to be ethical and the other one kind of plays into this theme, but it\'s total transparency. You have to be transparent all the time. Good, bad, or indifferent. Especially with the bad news you have to be transparent. And that\'s where the courage plays into all this too, is when you think about that, you have to be able to deliver the bad news.

Alan Salter:You have to be able to say, Hey, look, we\'re gonna need to take a beat, whatever it is. But those two things are absolutely top of my list when it comes to how are you successful in the business.

Adam Walker:Thank you for sharing that, Alan. I\'ve heard that called ruthless honesty. I dunno whether you That\'s what you\'re talking about, but yeah.

Alan Salter:Yeah. Ruthless

Adam Walker:honesty means just exactly what you said, giving it back but as advisedly as you possibly can. Yeah, exactly.

Alan Salter:Exactly.

Adam Walker:This has been a wonderful conversation, Alan. I fully am. Delighted by the, not just the nature of the conversation, but actually we\'ve covered so many different aspects today.

Adam Walker:Yeah. From your naval background through to your experiences in pharma and in fact finishing and bringing around your values around the not-for-profit work that you do. Yeah. It\'s quite clear that you\'ve led an extraordinary life and an extraordinary career. Thank you. And it\'s been an absolute pleasure to welcome you on Pharma Prescribed Today, and thank you for taking the time to be with us.

Alan Salter:Thanks for letting me come on. I had a great time, man. Thank you so much.