"Eli Lilly, making the impossible possible"
Since its origins in 2011, Lilly’s Global Business Solutions centre at Little Island has grown exponentially and is now host to over 1,400 employees who deliver diverse enterprise capabilities in Clinical, Medical, Finance, Global HR and much more.
Kay Flynn is Senior Vice President of Finance and Global Business Solutions at Eli Lilly and Company, where she has been an integral part of the pharmaceutical giant’s team for over 30 years.
It’s been a whirlwind career path at Lilly for the Castletownroche native. Her successful progression to senior leadership has been defined by her ability to improvise, overcome and adapt to significant changes and challenges in her roles and responsibilities throughout her career across several sites and markets around the world.
Now one of Lilly’s most senior and influential leaders based in Ireland, her illustrious career has seen her make steady but distinctive progress through its organisational structure — demonstrating diligence, determination, passion and an unwavering belief in her work and desire to help people.
Kay’s career with Lilly has seen her lead the delivery of large-scale capital and capability projects in seemingly “impossible” timelines most notably here in Ireland when the Global Business Solutions campus in Little Island was developed from inception to fully operational in just under nine months.
“Impossible” is a word that Kay takes with a pinch of salt:
“My greatest motivation is when someone tells me something is impossible to do — I like to turn the impossible into possible. I think that reflects everything that we do as an organisation that makes medicines for patients with unmet medical needs,” Kay commented.
“For every one of the diseases that we treat today — at some point in our history somebody said that would be impossible to treat and impossible to cure. If we all had the mindset of not being able to help, if we stopped at the first hurdle, we would not be delivering to the patients we have today. So that always drives and inspires me,” she added.
Though she is now a world away from her starting position in the company, she reflects on those days as if they happened yesterday.
Beginning in 1992, Kay started her career at Lilly working as an analyst in the finance division, having previously studied Commerce in UCC and going on to become a chartered accounted with Ernst and Young.
Hired initially on a contract, she was unaware of the impact she was about to make at the company, with no fixed decisions on where her career path would lead.
She says:
“When I got the job, Lilly was, as it is today, a top-tier company both here and internationally and I couldn’t believe my luck — firstly, that I had a job, and secondly, with a company like Lilly.
From the off in 1992, I decided that I would go in there and absorb, perform, and execute as if I was never going to leave, and that's what I did.”
Much of the '90s saw Kay progress in the company through various analyst roles. Lilly is widely renowned for its mentoring and sponsor programmes — and it was through these that she set about her next move.
Taking the advice of her sponsor, she decided that she would embark on her first foray to the USA, more specifically, to Lilly headquarters in Indianapolis, where she experienced a life-changing three years. This period in her career was pivotal in helping Kay gain a better understanding of a wide range of functions within of the company that she previously had little or no interaction with.
She explains:
“I've never been afraid to take a role that meant going sideways or backwards initially but which led to going forward in the long run. The experience is much more important to me than the title or the perception of the title and at that time the only role that was available to me in Indianapolis, was an analyst role.
“I was a team leader, and when I took an analyst role, people questioned it and asked why I was going backwards. It wasn’t about the role — it was about the opportunity.
“So, when I went to Indianapolis, I was there for three years and I had a particular role that I executed really well, but I wanted to learn more and gain an understanding of the business beyond finance.
“I went to multiple areas in the organisation and asked them if I could join their projects and sit in on their meetings. I wanted a greater understanding of the wider mechanics of Lilly — the likes of research, development, customer experience. I wanted to understand more about strategy and how decisions were made and understand the role and purpose I could play in, not just in finance, but across the lifecycle of our medicines. Those three years were absolutely fantastic.”
In 2004, Kay secured her “dream role” and became CFO for Lilly’s Kinsale manufacturing site, but it wasn’t long before she had set her sights on another challenge — the biggest of her career.
“I would say the catalyst moment for me in terms of my entire career was when Lilly decided to set up Shared Services. At that time, we wanted to take all the financial administration generated by 40 affiliates across Europe and centralise all the financial processes into one site.
At the time, the Celtic Tiger had stopped roaring, and Ireland was perhaps not seen as an optimal location for investment, but Kay was insistent that the project would succeed in Cork if it was awarded to Ireland.
Following a visit of senior leaders to Ireland in June of 2010, Kay’s perseverance paid off as Lilly announced that the shared services centre would be located in Cork. There was just one catch — the timeline to turn it all around.
She says “Lilly’s global CFO told me that we needed to have it up and running by the 1st of April 2011. This was August 2010. I had no office, no legal entity, no bank account, no employees and no process. So, it was a bit like — okay, you wanted it, so you deliver it!” Delivered two weeks ahead of schedule, shared services quickly established a reputation of responsiveness, credibility and delivery, with a customer-centric focus.
When asked how she defied the odds, Kay is slow to take credit, instead recognising the like-minded grit, determination, and diversity of those around her.
Kay added – “It’s always been my belief that people are the greatest asset of any company, and I have been fortunate throughout my career to work with colleagues who were willing to challenge the conventional, willing to take the risk, and bring the diverse skills and perspectives needed to make our vison for “what Lilly Cork could be” a success.
Any boss can get a job done by directing, but as a leader, it’s important that people buy into you, what you stand for, and your vison for what we can achieve collectively through the right attitude, empowerment, and trust. Our people were the foundation on which our success was built and that’s as true today as it was on day one.”
By 2014, shared services had expanded again, this time centralising medical and compliance capabilities.
Today, the Lilly Global Business Solutions centre, is now home to 1,400 employees of 40 nationalities who speak 44 languages where Lilly has also developed new capabilities in the clinical development space whilst still continuing to evolve and innovate in the financial and global services space. With Kay’s leadership and mantra of constantly thinking ahead for “what’s next”, the future looks exciting and bright for the Little Island campus.
Having returned to Cork in 2021 during the pandemic, Kay now heads up the Lilly GBS workforce across sites in Ireland, India, Mexico, Malaysia and the US and steadfastly intimates that she takes “responsibility for those 4,500 livelihoods and careers firmly on my shoulders.”
Lilly’s commitment to Ireland is strong and significant investment in its operations here continues apace with the company now developing a new biologics manufacturing facility at a greenfield site in Raheen, Co. Limerick. But what’s next for Kay?
“I'm a firm believer that you have to keep re-evaluating yourself and your work. What I did in 2022 was great but I’m always asking myself — ‘How can I make it better? Whatever I did today, I can do better than that or, can I do it in a better way. It can be done faster, can be done with more efficiency, or can be done to provide a better customer experience. I never stop. I just keep going forward.
“People have taken chances on me and opened doors for me, so I also feel I have a responsibility to make sure it happens for the next generation and I pay it forward. Lilly has been around for 147 years. It's going to be there well beyond me. So, I do have a responsibility to develop the next generation and make sure that they are inspired to continue building, challenging, empowered to take risks - and long after I’m gone, that everyone in Lilly will continue to strive to make the impossible — possible.”
To find out more, visit www.careers.lilly.com
