President's Entrepreneurship Lecture Series: Kathy Giusti P'19

The President’s Entrepreneurship Lecture Series with Kathy Giusti P’19

Pursuing your Passion: A Conversation about Careers, Entrepreneurship & the Quest for a Cure

The evening begins at 6:15 p.m. with dinner for the campus community in the Marlo Room in Farinon, followed by the talk.

Kathy Giusti P'19, a multiple myeloma patient, is the Founder of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation (MMRF) and the Multiple Myeloma Research Consortium (MMRC). She serves on the MMRF Board of Directors. She has more than two decades of experience in the pharmaceutical industry, previously holding senior positions at G.D. Searle and Merck.  Since founding the MMRF in 1998, Giusti has led the Foundation in establishing innovative, collaborative research models in the areas of tissue banking, genomics, and clinical trials. These models are dramatically accelerating the pace at which lifesaving treatments are brought to patients and are building an end-to-end solution in precision medicine.  Today, Giusti is widely recognized as a pioneer of precision medicine, a champion of open-access data sharing, and a strong advocate for patient engagement.

In 2016, Giusti was named Faculty Co-Chair of the Harvard Business School (HBS) Kraft Precision Medicine Accelerator. Under Giusti’s leadership, the HBS Kraft Precision Medicine Accelerator convenes best-in-class leaders from science, business and technology to identify and solve challenges slowing the advancement of precision medicine. The Accelerator disseminates best practices and models to overcome these challenges, and, ultimately, enables faster adoption of high-impact innovations.  Giusti has earned several prestigious awards and recognitions, including being named 1 of 3 Top Business Leaders Disrupting Medicine by Fortune Magazine in 2016 and to the Fortune World’s 50 Greatest Leaders list. Giusti was also named one of the world’s 100 Most Influential People by TIME magazine. She has received the Open Science Champion of Change award by the White House and has been honored with the American Association for Cancer Research Centennial Medal for Distinguished Public Service and the Healthcare Businesswomen's Association's Woman of the Year Award.

In 2015, she was appointed to President Obama’s 2015 Precision Medicine Initiative Working Group. She currently serves on the Harvard Business School Health Advisory Board and has previously served on the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), National Cancer Advisory Board (NCAB), and the National Cancer Policy Board (NCBP). Giusti has been featured on the Today Show, NBC Nightly News, CBS Evening News, Fox News, CNN, and Bloomberg. Her efforts have also been profiled by The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, Forbes, WIRED, and Fast Company.

Giusti received her MBA in general management from Harvard Business School. She holds an honorary Doctorate from the University of Vermont.