Dave Hine - AVP, Financial Services, Suvoda

What could clinical research learn from an industry where nothing ships until every system works perfectly in tandem with one another? Dave Hine, AVP of Financial Services at Suvoda, brings a deep background in rigorous systems engineering to today’s episode of Impactful Breakthroughs. Suvoda is a global clinical trial technology company which provides a unified software platform to manage complex and time-sensitive clinical studies. In today’s conversation, Dave speaks with host Zach Gobst about what an aerospace engineer noticed when he walked into clinical research and could not stop noticing. Dave studied aerospace engineering, worked flight test and computational fluid dynamics software for the Navy, and joined Greenphire in 2018 as its only sales engineer. Today, he leads the team focused on site payments and budgeting. The two of them get into interoperability and why it stalls in clinical trials, using military technology as the counterexample. Despite having parts manufactured by a handful of private agencies, each element of an F-18 is federally mandated to work seamlessly together. They also cover how COVID was the moment the public finally understood what a clinical trial was, and what survived from the decentralized trial wave. The throughline is a habit most listeners can use directly: treat every process, vendor relationship, and team decision as one system, then ask who is accountable when a piece of it fails. That is the lens Dave brings to site payments, and it holds up as well in a study budget as it does on an aircraft. Timestamps 00:00 Episode Start  01:40 Dave’s journey to aerospace engineering 02:55 Nine years of deep systems experience  04:10 What brought Dave to clinical trials in 2018  05:20 The importance of interoperability 08:45 Why Dave stayed in clinical trials  10:50 COVID as a turning point for the entire industry  12:50 Assume best intent, in both directions  16:40 Delegation, standards, and leading a team  23:30 Where AI helps and where it should not  26:20 Advice, mentors, and thank yous Key Takeaways Systems thinking would be an enormous win for patients and clinicians. Dave learned to design for interoperability at the Navy, where every part had to work with one another, regardless of manufacturer. Clinical research has many buyers and no one willing to carry that risk for competitors, and Dave is blunt that incentives often run the wrong way. Risk assessments need to be accessible. Despite being required, Dave points out that risk assessments are still rarely understood well due to overcomplication. In his work today he strips risk down to high, medium, and low, color coded, enabling anyone to get the whole picture from just a glance.  "I would rather have AI edit my summary than me edit an AI summary." Dave uses AI note takers constantly and says they save real time, but his objection is to the order of operations. He argues for writing client-facing summaries yourself first and treating AI as the editor, keeping critical thinking with the human. Assume best intent, in both directions. Dave describes himself as loud and opinionated, and says he now apologizes proactively when he suspects he has landed wrong. This experience has also taught him about the inverse, and he now reminds himself that someone else's decision comes from a different set of experiences, not bad intent. Guest Shoutouts Andrew Sutton, VP of Business Development, Conquest Research Benjamin Mell, Director of Site Sales, CRIO Jim Murphy, Operating Partner, The Riverside Company Wayne Baker, Chief Revenue Officer, ValGenesis Kyle Cunningham, Chief Product Officer, RealTime eClinical Solutions Justin Vega, Head of Solutions Consulting, Financial, Suvoda Heather Horville, Solutions Consultant, Suvoda. Andrew Gerrard, Solutions Consultant, Suvoda. Resources Connect with guest Dave Hine on LinkedIn Check out Suvoda Connect with host Zach Gobst on LinkedIn Check out Leapcure