Placing my hand on Stan’s arm, I leaned toward him. “Just a second. I want to speak to this woman.”
He nodded, looking tense and taking a step back to give me room.
“Excuse me, Dr. Carlyle?” I moved to intercept the woman, offering my hand. “Hi. I’m Kathleen Caravel-Tyson.”
The whole group stopped, their eyes going wide as they looked between me and their colleague.
For her part, she seemed mildly surprised, but not awestruck. That was too bad. I would have preferred her to be awestruck.
“Uh, hello. Nice to meet you.” She accepted my handshake, giving me a tight smile.
“Can I speak to you for a moment? I’m interested in the work you’ve been doing on ocular AI. I’m on my way to the elevator and I have,”—I glanced at my cell without really noticing the time—“I have five minutes. I’m pushing the board to double funding for the next six quarters and I’m looking for flagship projects. I’d like your thoughts on the focus of R&D dollars moving forward.”
She nodded, now looking more surprised and maybe a little dazed. “Yes. Absolutely.”
Stepping away from her colleagues, she glanced to Stan—who stared back at her, expressionless—then came to my side.
“Please,” I motioned for her to walk with me, “give me some background on your current project.”
Dr. Carlyle glanced at me nervously. “I—since we only have five minutes, I’d prefer to discuss your plans for the new R&D dollars.”
“You don’t think your current project is worthy of expanded funding?” I searched my memory, struggling to remember to which project she’d been assigned after Dr. Branson’s exit.
“No. Currently, I’m working with the ophthalmological regulatory team on obtaining an orphan drug status for a new generic we’ve acquired. It’s pretty straightforward and doesn’t require expanded funding, or investigation.”
I slowed my steps, wanting to prolong the conversation in order to ask her about Dr. Branson. I noted she seemed to be discouraged by her new assignment.
“Well then, where would you like to focus your energy moving forward? What areas of research have been underfunded—or have lost funding—that, in your estimation, are worthy of investment?” I pasted a calm smile on my features, hoping my method of questioning wasn’t too obvious.
Dr. Carlyle glanced at the elevators a few feet away and stopped, turning toward me. “We had a team dedicated to ocular implants last year that was shut down without warning, even though our early results were promising.”
Bingo.
“Tell me more.” I crossed my arms, studying her.
She proceeded to describe in painfully specific scientific detail Dr. Branson’s ocular AI project. My heart quickened as she spoke and I tried to keep up. The truth was, I didn’t understand most of what she was saying, each word contained more syllables and Latin roots than the last.
Her voice raised suddenly—not to a shout, but enough that I could tell she was agitated—and she launched into a tirade, using phrases like, “evidentiary power analysis,” and “split-tailed T-tests.” I did my best to look thoughtful and not lost, reminding myself that scientists often spoke a different language. Likewise, they usually had no idea that most people didn’t know what continuous variables were in reference to a confidence interval estimate.
I had a vague idea, and only because I’d taken research methods last semester on accident.
But then, she said, “The point is, the project was misrepresented. I don’t know how or why, but the results our research manager shared with the executive group were completely misleading. He’d left out—”
“Misleading? Why would your research manager mislead the executive group? What was his name?”
“Dr. Branson was the research manager and,” she shook her head, looking exasperated, “I don’t know. He left out the latest trial information, making it look like we’d stalled and made no progress in the last six months, when in fact, our—”
“Dr. Branson? Which group does he manage now?”
She grimaced. “He left. He was downsized last year.”
“Hmm . . .” I nodded thoughtfully. Very, very thoughtfully. “Do you think you can reach out to him? See if he’ll speak to me?”
Dr. Carlyle huffed impatiently. “Maybe. But, honestly, he’s not critical to the project. I was the PI with the FDA. Actually, co-PI with Dr. Barelvi. We worked with legal to ensure Caravel filed the patent before the project was dropped.”
Despite my efforts to hide my surprise, my mouth parted and I blinked at the woman.