Dr. Francis Collins recently announced his retirement from the federal government after a long and distinguished career in service. Many people have already written about his illustrious career. I had the great fortune to work for Dr. Collins, so I thought I would share some of my memories of him.
While I was working as a post-doctoral Intramural Research Training Award (IRTA) fellow at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) in the mid-1990s, I was invited to apply for a staff writer position at National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI). How I transitioned from bench science to writing is a story of the sharp-elbowed, audacious New Yorker in me, and I’ll save that for another post.
I began my staff writer position when Dr. Collins was the Director of NHGRI and the Human Genome Project. This was back in the days when we were sequencing the human genome and doing battle with the private sector. Having come fresh from graduate school and a post-doc, I was accustomed to working long hours, and I typically arrived at work very early and stayed very late. No matter my hours, Francis was there when I arrived and still there when I left. In addition, I could not help but notice the 2am timestamps on his emails to me and began to wonder if he ever slept. But somehow, he always seemed cheerful and energized at work, even at our crack-of-dawn meetings before others arrived at the office.
When I was hired, I was the only staff writer in the Office of Press, Policy, and Communications, under the supervision of Dr. Kathy Hudson. I was assigned to work on press releases, backgrounders, white papers, appropriations testimony, budget justifications to Congress, FAQs and PSAs for the public, policy articles, and fact-checking Dr. Collins’ speeches and articles — As a young pup, I was thrilled that he thanked me in his NEJM Shattuck Lecture. Given his myriad accomplishments even at that time, I was intimidated by working closely with Francis on these projects, especially given that I was coming straight from bench science to this writing position. But FC was always warm and kind, and patient with my learning curve. I learned so much from him about how to consider what matters to an audience in describing impactful research, and especially about how to construct an effective plea for funding – I helped pitch oral and written appropriations testimonies to Congress, which is probably why NIH grantwriting came naturally to me years later.
I have always been particularly impressed by his ability to communicate complex scientific concepts to a variety of audiences, particularly politicians. He is fearless in speaking the truth to policy makers on both sides of the aisle, both during the Human Genome Project and later during the pandemic. He is a person of extraordinary integrity.
While I was working at Genome, I happened to have suffered a particularly devastating personal tragedy. At the time, Francis and his wife Diane were incommunicado, on their honeymoon in France. Yet very early one morning, when he knew I’d be the only one in the office, he phoned me from France to express his condolences and check in on me. I was so moved. I can’t count how many people have stories like this about him.
I consider myself extraordinarily lucky to have had the privilege to work directly with Dr. Collins. I have carried his example of integrity with me throughout my career. We are lucky in the NIH community to have had his skilled leadership for so many years.
