Dr Leandro Herrero

Leandro Herrero MD MBA FCMI FInstD

Dr Leandro Herrero trained as a psychiatrist and spent more than fifteen years in medical practice and academia in Spain before moving to the UK where he joined the pharmaceutical industry. He then spent a further fifteen years in senior management positions with major pharmaceutical companies based both in the UK and the US. He held leadership positions in R&D, New Product development and Marketing, and Pharmacoeconomics.

In 2000 he founded The Chalfont Project Ltd, a consulting company of organisational architects, focused on innovation, behavioural change, leadership, and human collaboration. The concept proved very successful and The Chalfont Project Ltd now boasts a broad spectrum of international clients, from Fortune 500 to small start ups.

Dr Herrero consults directly with top leadership teams in major companies and has also personally led major reorganisation and change projects . He is currently leading large scale behavioural change management programmes for several hi-tech companies in the UK and continental Europe.These programmes have particular emphasis on management of change via Viral Change", a conceptual and methodological framework developed within The Chalfont Project Ltd. Other projects currently being led by Dr. Herrero include leadership team development in medium size affiliates and pre buy-out R&D reorganisations.

Moving from academia and clinical practice to the pharmaceutical industry, Dr Herrero developed an interest in the organisational aspects of innovation, creativity and productivity. Although occupying roles mainly with scientific, technical and marketing responsibilities, his major interest became the creation of environments that attract talent and become 'a place to be'. As part of that interest, Dr Herrero completed an MBA at Henley Management College in the UK graduating with A+ grade for his dissertation on "The role of organisational aspects of information management in competitive intelligence". Furthermore, a major R&D reorganisation he both conceived and led during his time in industry is now being used as a case study at two leading business schools, one in continental Europe and the other in the US. In addition to his medical, psychiatric and business qualifications, he also holds a diploma in Bio-engineering.

Dr Herrero has participated in numerous short term executive education programmes including INSEAD's 'Avira' and at the London Business School with the late professor Sumantra Ghoshal. Dr Herrero was Visiting professor, Human Capital Architecture, at DUXX, School of Business Leadership in Monterrey (Mexico). The school, now closed, counted a virtual faculty that included world renowned business school professors, White House advisers, and highly respected professors of Philosophy and Social Sciences. In 2005 Dr Herrero was appointed to the advisory board of the Operational Research Department, now part of the new Department of Management, at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Dr Herrero has written extensively on management and leadership topics. Many items appeared in his monthly column for Scrip Magazine, a worldwide healthcare publication with extensive readership amongst executives in the bio-pharmaceutical industry. Unfortunately, the scale of recent projects has led Dr. Herrero to temporarily suspended his column however, all of his articles can be found on The Chalfont Project's website. Frequently invited to be keynote speaker on management/structural strategic and change issues at major conferences, Dr. Herrero recently spoke at a Financial Times Global Pharmaceutical and Biotech conference and in 2006 was nominated best speaker at two major Sales Conferences. He was also a judge of the Scrip Awards for outstanding contributions to the Pharmaceutical industry. The combination of his behavioural sciences background and hands-on business leadership experience place him in a unique position to bring an unusual and innovative approach to both his consulting, writing and speaking.

In addition to his three books on Psychiatry and various scientific publications, Dr Herrero has also published several management papers and materials for public use, for example 'The Leader's toolkit' (Scrip 2000). His book 'The Trouble with management' (PJB publications, 2002) was a compilation of articles from Scrip magazine. More recently, his book 'The Leader with Seven Faces' (meetingminds 2006) was the first in a series that now includes "Viral Change: The alternative to slow, painful and unsuccessful management of change in organisations", (December 2006) and "New Leaders Wanted: Now Hiring - 12 kind of people you must find, seduce, hire and create job" (July 2007) .

Dr Herrero is Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute (UK) and Fellow of the Institute of Directors (UK). He has been living in England for the last 20 years.