Welcome to Leaders & Legends, the podcast focused on leadership in clinical trial execution. In each episode, we will get to know the individuals who are driving change and influencing the direction of our industry.
Whether you’re a seasoned executive yourself, an emerging leader or simply passionate about clinical trials like I am, join us as we discuss our industry’s most pressing challenges, the future of clinical trials and hear insights and advice from the leaders who are moving our industry forward.
Put the Patient First: Roy D. Baynes, EVP & CMO @ Eikon Therapeutics
Roy Baynes spent the first quarter of his career as a physician scientist — training in hematology, oncology, and stem cell transplantation, and eventually leading the bone marrow transplantation service at the Karmanos Cancer Institute in Detroit. The second quarter he spent in industry, holding senior clinical development leadership roles at Amgen and Gilead before joining Merck in 2013, where he served as Chief Medical Officer and head of global clinical development for nearly a decade.
In this episode, Patty sits down with Roy — now Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer at Eikon Therapeutics — to talk about what drove that career and what he learned along the way. They cover the leadership principles behind more than 140 medicine and vaccine approvals at Merck, including Keytruda®; how Roy and Roger Perlmutter rebuilt Merck's clinical development organization from the ground up while simultaneously racing to develop what would become the best-selling cancer drug in the world; what it actually takes to build teams that execute at that scale; and how to know when to double down on a drug program versus change course. Roy also talks about what drew him out of retirement to join Eikon, and why — after fifty years — the work still feels urgent.
The through line: focus on the patient, and the rest tends to follow.
5 Jun 2026
Getting IRT Right: Craig Mooney, Founder & Principal Consultant @ IRT Advisors Group
Craig Mooney almost became a history teacher. But a scheduling change on a summer job sent him to G.H. Bessler Associates instead — what he'd call the first international CRO — and that accidental entry point put him in the room with the people who seeded the clinical trials industry.
From there, Craig spent three decades building one of the deepest bodies of expertise in Interactive Response Technology. He came up through the early IVRS days when the technology was barely understood, saw the supply chain and logistics side of the business up close at Fisher Clinical Services, moved to the sponsor side at Bristol Myers Squibb — where an MHRA inspection became a turning point not just for his career but for how the industry thought about IRT compliance — and eventually founded IRT Advisors Group to work without the constraints of any single organization's commercial interests.
In this episode, Patty and Craig trace a career built entirely within a niche that most people in clinical trials couldn't fully explain. They talk about what IRT actually changed about how studies are designed and executed, what the industry got wrong about compliance for years and what it took to fix it, and what it looks like to spend 30 years going deeper into one area rather than broader.
22 May 2026
There's Never a Perfect Time: Kathy Bradrick, CEO @ Spark Clinical Research
Kathy Bradrick, grew up watching her father run an independent pharmacy — nights, weekends, calls in the middle of the night. And although she wanted nothing to do with her father's business, she was inspired by his drive and work ethic and always knew she wanted to build something of her own.
In this episode, Patty and Kathy trace a career that started with a blind newspaper ad in the early 90s, ran through the startup years of the CRO industry, and led Kathy to co-found her first company in 2013 before eventually launching Spark Clinical Research. Along the way, they talk about what it takes to build a company twice, what the current funding environment means for clinical research sites, and why challenge and opportunity tend to arrive together.
Who has been a guest on Leaders & Legends
Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.
Michelle Jones
Jeff Smith
Bari Kowal
Margaret Keegan
Coleen Glessner
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
Apple Podcasts (US)
5.0 / 5
1 ratings
Spotify
5.0 / 5
6 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 24 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
36
Social presence
0
YouTube
0
Engagement
32
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Questions about Leaders & Legends
Who hosts Leaders & Legends?
Patty and Patty Leuchten host the show. Published by Diligent Pharma.
How often do new episodes come out?
The show publishes monthly, based on its RSS feed.
Does Leaders & Legends take guests?
Yes. Guests have been identified in episode analyses.
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