Quality Grind Podcast Episode 9 – Viewpoint Project Journey

Jessica Taylor: [00:00:00] This is the Quality Grind Podcast presented by Medvacon. Conversations that go beyond compliance. Sharing insights geared toward helping you navigate the everyday grind of regulated life science industries. Here are your hosts, Joe Toscano and Mike Kent.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Welcome back to The Grind, everyone. We’ve got a special topic for you today. I’m with Joe Toscano, president of Medvacon and co-host of the Quality Grind Podcast. Today, we thought we’d take a little bit of a detour and tell you about something that’s happening that we’re really excited about here at Medvacon. We’ve been invited to participate in the ViewPoint Project with Dennis Quaid. And Joe’s here to tell us a little bit about that journey, how it all got started and what’s in store for this really exciting opportunity to tell a really neat and [00:01:00] compelling story.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Thanks, Mike. Actually, this journey seems a little bit surreal. You know, it started a few months ago, something that really kind of came out of the blue. We weren’t expecting. I had gotten a phone call and an email from a senior producer from the ViewPoint Project with Dennis Quaid. And like anyone else, I was pretty skeptical as to whether or not it was real.

I listened to the message. I got an email shortly thereafter. So, you know, kudos to them because somehow got my contact information and were able to reach out and get to me. You know, I thought about it for a while, even though I had known the show and have a lot of respect for it, didn’t really think it was kind of real. Why would they be calling us, right?

Decided that instead of calling back, I would just send a nice email and kind of inquire and see what happens, to see if it really was real or not. And, to my surprise, I got a very nice response, thanks for reaching back out, we’d really like to talk to you. [00:02:00] We’re really interested in Medvacon and what you do, and quite frankly, would love to do a show around it. It was really kind of nice. It was surprising, just because, again, it’s not something you expect to get or hear. But at the end of the day, the fact that they had an interest in the organization and at least wanted to have a conversation to see if we could do something together was very flattering.

As the audience knows, Medvacon is a quality compliance consulting company. What the show had an interest in was consumer safety and how we work with the life science industry, and how we partner with them and ensure that what they manufacture is not only meeting the regulations that the federal government has in place, but the products are made at their very best quality, which every company wants. Anybody who produces or makes anything wants to ensure that.

The other area of interest was our talent acquisition team, because we also help companies in hiring, and they wanted to know, “How do we source people? How did we find them? Why were these particular [00:03:00] individuals that we do recruiting for important?” That was also something that we were excited to talk about.

So we made an arrangement to connect by phone. We set up a video call and within a couple of days, we set aside an hour and had a really good conversation. It was really nice to meet the Senior Producer, and talk about what they were looking to do, have them learn a little bit more about Medvacon and what we do, talk around some storylines. And if this was something that they chose to move forward with, and if we had an interest in, to kind of take next steps. And the next step was really, if our conversation went well that day, and we were both in agreement, the Senior Producer was going to bring it back to an internal team and have a conversation to see if there was an interest in pursuing this any further. We decided, you know what, if it goes to that next step, we’d be really excited to have that conversation, as well, since the first one went really, really well.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: And they were still [00:04:00] interested.

Just the excitement level of not just one person, but a couple of people starting to go up the chain at the ViewPoint Project must have really been fulfilling and exciting to hear that, you know, it’s not just one person on the rung, but a couple people are now really interested in telling this story and getting that information out there, right?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: You know, it was, it was really kind of a neat call to get. And I’ll say just because, you know, the fact that a program like this that’s well known had an interest in our organization, as you mentioned. It’s been a huge part of the life science industry, but it’s a huge part that a lot of people don’t know about, especially the public. And what the ViewPoint Project with Dennis Quaid is known for is an educational program, doing programs on companies to offer an educational aspect to the public. And to me, I never thought of it that way, but that’s where the interest lies [00:05:00] in terms of educating people as to the type of work we do within the life science realm and helping companies ensure that the products they make are made in the best possible way, and that they’re compliant to all those aspects of manufacturing in order to produce a great end product. We’re brought in at a lot of different levels, and that’s what they had an interest in. It was a great story for the public to let them know this exists, right? What company doesn’t want to produce a great product? But you know, more importantly, do people actually know this happens? So when they’re taking something, using something, do they understand what’s behind it and the effort and the time and the energy and the expense that goes behind that to ensure that every time that product is made, it’s made the best possible way it can be. That’s where an idea for a possible program kind of came about. There’s a great educational aspect in terms of informing people how this works, what it involves, what [00:06:00] the outcomes are, and why it’s so important.

And to me, that’s what’s so exciting. You know, who doesn’t get excited about telling a story about their company, right? And Medvacon has been around a long time and worked with so many different organizations. We’d love to tell that story and educate people, whether they’re the industry or not, it still touches their lives. And it’s really important.

So for me, to get that first phone call, say, “Hey, we have an interest with your company.” Even if everything stopped there, it was just really nice to be recognized at that level.

But, as I mentioned before, the first conversation went really well. She introduced us then to the Senior Vice President of Programming. What that meeting entailed was at the end of that conversation, they would either make a decision again to present this to the full team. He needed to approve this in order for it to move forward. And either we would or we wouldn’t. Of course they asked if we still wanted to pursue it, and of course we said yes. If there [00:07:00] was an interest, we would love to participate. Who wouldn’t?

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: But had a great conversation there. A wonderful gentleman. I’ll say that my two interactions at this point were fantastic. Really nice people. Went into some detail in terms of what it’s about, how things work, what steps are. We were in early phases. A lot of people still needed to sign off on it, but conversations were at least progressing.

And he asked some questions. But more importantly, he did a lot of education as to, hey, this is what’s going on, what it entails, this is what’s gonna happen, this is where it’ll go. And again, we’ll get back in touch with you and let you know if we’re gonna move forward. And, you know, we enjoyed it up till that point. If it had ended then, it would have been okay. Luckily, they got back to us and they said they wanted to move forward to the next step.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: That’s tremendous. At this point then, I imagine it starts to get even more real, the possibility of [00:08:00] being able to tell that story.

But you mentioned that you had some initial conversations as to what this would entail from a process standpoint going forward. Now, are we talking about, you know, personalized trailers with your name in lights and the star on the door? I hate to think that we’re going to have to deal with that after you get back now, Hollywood stars, right?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: From that standpoint, now you’ve got the initial buy in, there’s a lot more traction to it at this point, where did the conversations go once that initial decision had been made to say yes?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: They got back to us relatively quickly and said, “You know what? We presented this to the internal group. It’s been approved. It’s been signed off on. The production team thinks this could be a great segment and very good educational opportunity. And we’re in a unique space. Apparently we’re going to be the [00:09:00] very first company from a quality and compliance consulting perspective in terms of speaking on this subject that has been ever presented. So for us, it’s a great experience. It’s nice to be invited and to be the first.

And then we spoke a little bit about what might that look like. What happened from here is I was eventually introduced to a Director of Operations who took us to that next step.

What that entailed was not only a lengthy conversation, but then we were asked to do some work. We got a very lengthy questionnaire sent to us that had to be filled out and returned. The questionnaire was straightforward, it was really tell us about your company. Who do you service? What type of services do you offer? What do you do? What are the outcomes? Why is it important? If you’re looking to convey a message to the public from an educational perspective, what would you want them to know? So it was a very thorough questionnaire about Medvacon, and it was mainly so that the production team and everybody who will be [00:10:00] involved at this point moving forward really had a good understanding of what we do, who we are, and how to start to structure that story.

 The other side of that which also was of interest is Medvacon also does recruitment. We’re a full service recruitment firm. So, they kind of had an interest. How do you look for people with these particular skill sets? Because a lot of the folks that we get to work with are highly specialized. There’s not a lot of them, there’s a very small group that’s really talented and do well in this space. We’re fortunate to work with a lot of those individuals or help fill roles within organizations in order to ensure that they have the expertise necessary.

So, it’s kind of like a double-edged story, so to speak, right? Let’s talk about consumer safety. Let’s talk about how we help organizations. Do you, the public, even though this is being done on your behalf? And companies take a lot of pride and invest a lot in order to ensure their products are made the best way possible. But also, how do they source the right people? [00:11:00] Whether it be full time, part time positions or consultants in order to help them with this if they don’t currently have them now.

So for me, it was really exciting that somebody recognized that about our company and the good that we do. And to do an educational piece on that and present it to the public in that manner is really an opportunity that I never thought we would have. We do it one customer at a time as you know, but to get a platform where you could educate a lot of people in one sitting is really kind of exciting.

And I think the industry deserves for people to know that. They do a lot of work, they spend a lot of money, and they try really hard to make sure that what they do every day is the right thing.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Very much so. The people and process sides of things coming together in one forum is priceless to be able to tell those stories.

So after that initial meeting with the Director of Operations, you’ve got a sense of what the process is going to look like, what you can expect [00:12:00] moving forward, how did things proceed from there?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: From there, we were actually passed on to a Vice President of Production. And this is now where things really started becoming real, right? It wasn’t just about let’s talk about Medvacon and what this may look like, and what’s the educational aspect of it and what are the different things we can talk about. Now it’s like, we need to stick a flag in the ground, so to speak, and we need a date for production. We need to say this is when it’s going to happen, this is what’s going to happen, and you need to get back to us, let us know who’s going to be on the program. And they also asked us if we would be interested in inviting a client, which we thought was a fantastic idea. And what was really nice with that is, the first person that we reached out to that came to mind that we would be excited to have part of this, agreed immediately. Luckily it was someone that we have worked with over many years, had brought us into a lot of different settings. And it was really [00:13:00] nice to see on that first phone call to say, hey look, we’ve been offered an opportunity and they said we could bring a client on who may be interested in speaking about their experience. We thought of you and would love you to do it, and they said, yeah, be absolutely happy to.

So, it’s exciting to me that people are that enthusiastic about what we do.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah, you get that vote of confidence right off the bat from someone who has that direct experience and has benefited and can speak to that partnership from their end, it’s got to be a great feeling.

So now you’ve got that stake in the ground. You’ve got your ace in the hole in terms of that client, who’s going to, you know, dump praise on the organization and talk about their experiences, and really what it means to partner with a firm like Medvacon to do what we do collaboratively. And you said the flag got stuck in the ground. Now it’s starting to feel a little bit more [00:14:00] real, but I get the sense that there’s probably maybe more conversations. This is a big, big production. It probably doesn’t stop there, does it?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Oh, no, no, there were a whole lot more people to meet.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: I’ll bet. I’ll bet.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: You know, again, and I say this with all sincerity, it was really just a great experience. The interaction we had with every level of individual that’s involved with ViewPoint was fabulous. I mean, accommodating, easy to speak with, very interested in making sure that it worked not only for us, but for them. Very collaborative. I can’t say enough nice things about the experience and the involvement with this organization as we’ve been working with them.

 But from there, you know, we met with a Senior Vice President of Marketing and also Vice President of Media Development, and just had some really good conversations around what this looks like from a media perspective, [00:15:00] where this goes, who’s going to see it, everything that’s involved from a promotional perspective in terms of the show, getting it out there and getting it seen by viewers. And again, just a great conversation. It was really nice to understand how they pursue this aspect of it.

One of the things that actually came from that conversation which really excited me, and it’s not something they often do, but they offered to actually launch a press release about they inviting us, Medvacon, to the show. And to me, that was really kind of cool. A lot of companies will issue the press release themselves who are being invited. The fact that ViewPoint Project with Dennis Quaid wanted to issue a press release saying they invited us really gave us a lot of excitement here.

To me, it said hey, wow, this has some legs and it could be a really, really great program, especially if they’re willing to put a press release out there and tell the world that we’re doing this together. [00:16:00] So that recently just came out a few weeks ago. I did meet a couple of other individuals who were involved in getting that out and putting it together, which was again, another great experience.

But now it’s becoming more real, right? Not only do we have a production date in place, now we have a nationally launched press release, a lot of people are seeing and hearing about it. We’ve promoted that as well because we’re excited about it. It’s just, it was really nice to be invited.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: So at this point, you’ve got the press release out. That’s available on social media and we’ll provide that for you here. That puts ‘real’ in all capital letters, doesn’t it, Joe? There’s no turning back at this point from really moving forward.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: You know, now we have a production day. We’ve met with an awful lot of senior leadership within ViewPoint, and had great conversations. There’s a lot of excitement around this from both sides and something we’re really looking forward to. But now it needs to happen, right? And [00:17:00] now we have a date that it’s actually going to occur where this episode is going to be taped. And to me that is still kind of making its way home in terms of saying, wow, it’s been a lot of fun up until this point. But there is an end point here where all this kind of needs to occur.

And a little bit of excitement and a little terrified, but you know, it’s not something that we do here often in terms of being in a professional production studio with lights and cameras and staff. And even though we produce a podcast, Mike, it’s usually just you and I on our respective studios and that’s pretty much it. If nothing else, it’ll be an exciting experience. Something you could say, “Hey, I got to do that!”, and check a box. It’ll be a lot of fun. And you know what, I’m a big fan of do something that you’re not comfortable with, do something new, do something that you didn’t think you ever would, ’cause life’s too short. You might as well have some fun with it, right? And we do [00:18:00] really good work here and we have great people on this team as you know, and it’ll be exciting to tell people about them and the great things they do every day. So, yeah, it’s real.

The way production is going to work is we’re going to get in a day before. We’re going to be traveling to their studios, and then we have a full day of filming basically set up.

The last person that we’ve met, and there’ll be more behind this, is we were introduced just last week to our Director and Producer. Great individual, has done hundreds, if not 1000 shows similar to this. And I know we’re in very good hands. It was kind of fun to hear how the day will be set up, what will happen once we get there, how the shoot will be structured, which isn’t confirmed completely yet. There’s some moving pieces. There’s a couple of different things that can change that around, but at least knowing that within a day we should be able to do everything that we need to for them in order to put [00:19:00] the show together. I highly recommended they take two days because the three or four of us in front of camera might need a little bit more time. We’ll see what happens with

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Well, hey,

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: we’re.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: don’t give them my… don’t give them my number as a reference on that. Okay. Because you’ll be down there all week.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: So, you…

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: I’m just kidding.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: No, no, but you know what’s kind of funny here is, we’re going to be the first quality and compliance company in the life science industry that a show will be done on, which is really exciting. I don’t want to be the one that has to do it in two days. Because that’ll be a first, too.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: I’ve been rest assured that we’ll be fine and the day will be really great. And again, the team that I have been dealing with there, I cannot say enough positive things. They’ve been wonderful, and I can’t imagine that the day that we’re going to be doing this, we’re just not going to have a [00:20:00] great time in doing so, and putting something really good together.

But you know, that’s kind of where things are at. We know who we’ll be working with that day. A lot of the people that I’ve met along this journey will also be in attendance, not all of them, but at least I’ll get to meet some, which is really going to be neat to say hello in person and not over a video call and really just looking forward to it. I think it will be an incredible experience and I’m grateful we have the chance to do it.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: And one of the things that we wanted to do as part of the Quality Grind Podcast is provide a behind the scenes to the behind the scenes sort of roadmap for this journey. As Joe said, Medvacon’s the first organization like this that has been tapped on the shoulder to tell this part of the story, and we’re excited about that. And a really unique experience for us at Medvacon. We thought it’d be interesting to give you a [00:21:00] sense of how this is going from our perspective and to talk with Joe, and maybe some other folks as well, to give you a sense of how this really works, how these programs come to your television screen or your computer screen, and what goes on in the minds and part of the process to make all of this happen from our vantage point.

So what we’ll do is we’ll check in every once in a while with Joe. We’ll break him out of the normal topics with the Podcast to talk about hey, how are things going with the ViewPoint project? Where are you? How are you feeling? What’s happening next?

We want to make sure that you have the ability to understand and view the finished product when it gets out there. Having a little bit more context as to how that all came about can make hopefully that viewing a lot more informative and a lot more educational. So, we [00:22:00] hope to have little updates periodically between now and the end of the year.

I guess the last question that might be on everybody’s minds at this point, Joe, is what are we looking at in terms of after that filming? And after that studio session, how does the post production and launch process work? We want to get people excited about when they may be able to see this.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah. So, Mike, right now, you know, once we’re done filming the segment, a lot of work goes in post-production, as you can imagine, in terms of putting a program together. That usually could take us several months for that to occur because we’re also not the only one that they’re working on, right? They have a schedule, and things have to be done in order. But what we’re hoping for, and what we’re told as of right now, we’ll have updates as we know, is probably January of 2025 is when the program will actually air.

 I know to me, I never really knew how a lot of this [00:23:00] worked and it’s really been fascinating to understand the steps and the people. And there are so many people who are involved in bringing things to you. I don’t care what program you’re watching on TV, the amount of work effort that goes on behind the scenes and conversation and planning is really quite incredible. Mike and I got a taste of that when we started the podcast, but this is another level beyond what, anything that we’re currently doing.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Clearly, clearly.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: And, yeah, it’s been a lot of fun to see the inner working. So, we thought it would just be fun to share that with all of you, because like you, I didn’t really know how that worked. And now being a part of it and experiencing it, it’s actually a lot of fun, met some really great people and I’m kind of looking forward to the journey. It’s been great.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Yeah, and for me, one of the exciting parts of this process is being able to bring all of you along on this ride, because while [00:24:00] it’s Medvacon and what we do and how we interact with folks that’s going to be the primary focus, we realize that we are a part of a much larger community of professionals and people that are engaged in making sure that products are safe and effective.

And so part of this, at least for me, as somebody on the sort of the sidelines of this, is an opportunity. And I’m really excited to be able to share this with all of our colleagues in the industry that put all of their energy, time, blood, sweat, and tears into this, as well. And us being a vehicle for all of those stories to be told about all of the people who dedicate their professional life’s work to these sorts of activities. And for me in a global sense, that’s really exciting to be able to be a part of that and be able to be the voice for that.

No pressure, Joe, [00:25:00] no pressure whatsoever.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Appreciate that. No, but honestly, well said, because at the end of the day, this is an area, which is why there’s so much attraction to doing a program on it, that a lot of people don’t know about. And we said this on our very first episode of the podcast, right? Why are we doing the podcast? Because we get to work with really great people on a regular basis that nobody has any idea how they’re working towards their well being, right, and the important work that they do, whether they’re in industry or whether they’re on our side from the consulting perspective.

And you’re right, this is kinda, even though Medvacon’s being featured, kudos to everybody who does this every day, because they do important work, they really do. They help organizations and they help ensure that products are made the way they should.

And it’s not because organizations aren’t doing that, they are. What they’re always doing is they’re improving their processes, and that’s where we help. But, again, we’re excited because even [00:26:00] though it’s Medvacon, it really represents everybody here who works so hard to make this happen.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: Very much so. So we invite you to stay tuned for future updates and we’ll provide that in our normal advertising and posts on social media to make you aware of when those updates are going to come down. Periodically mix in our updates on the ViewPoint Project with our everyday episodes of the Quality Grind Podcast.

Thanks very much for watching, and, you know, I… who knows how much luck I’ll have in doing it, but if I can get some behind the scenes footage, at least on production day, maybe Joe sitting in the makeup trailer or something like that before he steps out onto stage, who knows? So maybe that’s something I’ll work on incognito completely, because that would not go over well with the higher ups at Medvacon, would it Joe?

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: Never gonna [00:27:00] happen, Mike. Never gonna happen.

mike-kent_2_08-23-2024_141717: I don’t believe in never, but we’ll see what happens. So thanks everyone for joining us on this different episode of the Quality Grind Podcast. And we’ll see you next time, here on The Grind.

joe-toscano_2_08-23-2024_141717: If Medvacon can help you and your organization, we’re happy to do so. We specialize in the following areas: Quality and Compliance, Validation and Qualification Services, Project Management, Tech Transfers, General and Specialized Training Programs, Engineering Services, and Talent Acquisition. If you have general questions as well, feel free to give us a call at any time.

We can easily be reached at 833 633 8226 or via our website at www. Medvacon. com. Thanks so much, and we look forward to speaking with you.

Jessica Taylor: Thank you for listening to the Quality Grind Podcast presented by Medvacon. To learn more or to hear additional episodes, visit us at www. Medvacon. [00:28:00] com.