Innovation inside many of these companies is characterized by strong teamwork across disciplines, business units, and professional functions. There is a very widespread idea that innovation is driven by a lonely genius, a specific department, or a very special group of innovation champions, but this does not appear to be the case in these high-performing cultures.

With the new reality of pharmaceutical R&D, companies must deliver impact and value. This paper explores how ethnographic research can fill that role in early stages of pharmaceutical clinical trials.