Flagship Pioneering Announces Appointment of Steven Baert as Chief Human Capital Officer

Cambridge, Mass., October 6, 2021 - Flagship Pioneering, the bioplatform innovation company, announced today that Steven Baert has joined the company in a newly created role as Chief Human Capital Officer. In this role, Baert will bring his significant human capital and talent development expertise to lead and grow human resources, talent development, and pioneering culture across the more than 1100-strong team comprising the parent company Flagship Pioneering, Flagship Labs, and its 30 operating companies. Baert will be responsible for HR and talent development across this enterprise, and his team will build out the leadership and scientific teams for the 6-8 new companies that Flagship creates each year.

“Steven is a proven leader in building excellence and taking an innovative approach to HR and diverse and inclusive talent development,” said Noubar Afeyan, Founder and CEO of Flagship Pioneering. “He will be a critical partner in expanding and implementing a strategic talent development approach for our growing Flagship enterprise. His appointment demonstrates our commitment to attracting top talent across our ecosystem and to building a culture of talent development in line with the scale and demands of our expanding platform innovation and company creation activities.”

Baert spent fifteen years at Novartis where since 2014 he served as Chief People Officer, a member of the Executive Committee and an advisor to the CEO and Chairman. While at Novartis he led a 2500 person HR team and oversaw people and governance matters, facilitated a CEO succession and hiring of a new executive team, and implemented a data-driven approach to talent development while championing diversity and equity throughout the organization. His prior experience includes leadership roles in HR and people development at Bristol Myers Squibb and Unilever.

“I am delighted to join the exceptional team at Flagship Pioneering,” added Steven Baert, Chief Human Capital Officer, Flagship Pioneering. “People are critical to building and sustaining a culture of innovation, and I look forward to working with my Flagship colleagues to create a best-in-class talent development and HR function that draws a diversity of talented, passionate, and disruptive minds in life sciences and company creation and supports them in their pioneering efforts to make advances in human health and sustainability.”

About Steven Baert

Watch and listen to Three Questions with Steven Baert to learn more about why he’s excited to join Flagship Pioneering, and how to build a diverse and inclusive company culture.

Steven Baert has over 20 years of leadership experience in human resources and talent development within the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries. He spent over 15 years at Novartis where he served as Chief People Officer and Member of the Executive Committee since 2014. In this capacity he led a 2500 person HR team, oversaw all people and governance related matters around multiple mergers and acquisitions, developed reskilling programs for thousands of employees, introduced a data driven approach to measure people impact on business performance, and led efforts to increase diversity and build an equitable and inclusive culture. His earlier work at Novartis included serving as Global Head of HR for the oncology division, Vice President of HR for the US and Canada, VP of HR for emerging markets, and Head of HR for global and corporate functions. Prior to joining Novartis, Steven worked as HR Director for the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Belgium for Bristol-Myers Squibb. He began his career at Unilever as a People Development Manager.

Steven is on the Board of WeSeeHope USA, a charity focused on empowering children in Africa, and is a Non-Executive Director of the Pharming Group NV. He received his Bachelor of Law from Katholieke Universiteit Brussels, his Masters in Law from Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, and his MBA from Vlerick Business School in Belgium.

About Flagship Pioneering
Flagship Pioneering conceives, creates, resources, and develops first-in-category bioplatform companies to transform human health and sustainability. Since its launch in 2000, the firm has, through its Flagship Labs unit, applied its unique hypothesis-driven innovation process to originate and foster more than 100 scientific ventures, resulting in over $212 billion in aggregate value. To date, Flagship has deployed over $2.5 billion in capital toward the founding and growth of its pioneering companies alongside more than $19 billion of follow-on investments from other institutions. The current Flagship ecosystem comprises 42 transformative companies, including Axcella Health (NASDAQ: AXLA), Codiak BioSciences (NASDAQ: CDAK) Denali Therapeutics (NASDAQ: DNLI), Evelo Biosciences (NASDAQ: EVLO), Foghorn Therapeutics (NASDAQ: FHTX), Indigo Ag, Kaleido Biosciences (NASDAQ: KLDO), Moderna (NASDAQ: MRNA), Rubius Therapeutics (NASDAQ: RUBY), Sana Biotechnology (NASDAQ: SANA), Seres Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MCRB), and Sigilon Therapeutics (NASDAQ: SGTX).