Outstanding Women in Business: Kalk helps spread her love of science

Photo | Matthew Wright Susan Kalk

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By Grant Welker

Susan Kalk was passionate about science growing up in South Africa, but opportunities in the field in her native country weren’t plentiful.

“I was born a scientist because I would do experiments from when I was quite small,” Kalk said.

A career, however, would have to take place elsewhere. She wanted to be part of more forward-thinking pharmaceutical teams, so she and her husband moved to Toronto in 1994.

“Sometimes I think, ‘What was I thinking?’” she said of moving across the Atlantic Ocean. “But I wanted to be part of something innovative and growing, and wanted my family to experience a different culture and environment.”

Kalk later worked for Amgen, a biomanufacturing laboratory in Rhode Island, before joining the pharmaceutical company Sunovion in Marlborough in 2015. Today, she’s one of Sunovion’s senior vice presidents and its chief quality and technical operations officer. Her job entails a lot of meetings: with the executive team, with her own department, and one-on-one sit-downs with staff.

More broadly, Kalk helped develop Sunovion’s Leadership Essentials Program, a mentorship program for employees eyeing leadership roles.

It’s a long way from a girl with a love for science and a dream for a career.

“I worked in a very male-centric environment when I first started,” Kalk said. “What’s changed is that companies, especially here in Massachusetts, are open-minded and value women.”

Not only has Kalk risen to Sunovion’s upper ranks, but her male colleagues aren’t shy about making it clear what a role model she’s become.

“‘I like to tell my daughters about you,’ I hear that a lot,” Kalk said. “I’m very encouraged by how many women are in the field today.”

Her two daughters, born in Canada, are in the industry. More and more women entering the field is bound to lead to more leadership roles, she said.

Linda Arsenault, Sunovion’s chief human resources officer, sees Kalk as more than simply belonging in the group. Arsenault describes Kalk as having deep expertise and a thoughtful and detail-oriented approach to leading a department whose work spans the arc of a drug’s developmentt.

“That work is so critically important,” Arsenault said.

Kalk is an active member of Women in Bio and Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association, two industry advocacy groups, and her outside volunteer work includes the nonprofit Girls Inc.

“This next generation will make such a big difference,” Kalk said. “If they have an interest in leadership, I think they’ll find it less challenging.”

Arsenault said Kalk always says yes to an opportunity to speak to women in the company or girls in school.

“She always takes advantage of giving back to the community, and knows that responsibility, that a woman in the field, that it’s an obligation,” Arsenault said. “She lives the values of our organization each and every day.”