A Greek chemistry student arrived in America with little English and a dictionary. His journey through Harvard and three pharmaceutical giants now meets its most curious problem: teaching machines to read the chemistry that living things have spent eons writing.

Across 26 years at Lilly and seven as Neurocrine's chief medical officer, Eiry Roberts learned that drug development is less a straight line than a chain of judgment calls. Her next chapter puts that operating memory to work in the boardroom.