Creating a culture that fosters creativity, collaboration and a sense of community

Our 2024 win for Best Engineering Team reflects the work our product teams do each day to help researchers and healthcare professionals advance science and improve health outcomes for the benefit of society.

This year, we launched Scopus AI, an intuitive and intelligent search tool powered by generative AI (GenAI) that enhances researchers’ understanding and insights with unprecedented speed and clarity. Recently, Yoshiko Kakita, Senior Director of Scopus Product Management at Elsevier, shared her experience working on a product that was helping researchers advance an area of science that was personally meaningful to her:

“I recently lost my father to lung cancer, and reducing his pain was my family’s top priority throughout his treatment. We were extremely grateful to the medical professionals because we saw a big difference compared to the pain my grandfather went through decades ago.

“Hearing from researchers who have advanced the research that greatly helped my father — and hearing that Scopus AI can help these researchers advance the research even further — is really motivating.”

Along with doing meaningful work, we help people at Elsevier shape their careers in meaningful ways. Dr Erin Hill-Parks, Senior Product Operations Manager for ScienceDirect and Co-lead for the Elsevier Gender Equity Network, described how she developed her career through Elsevier’s Developing Talent for Gender Equity leadership program:

“The program identifies rising leaders and provides the tools and skills they may not yet have to help them on the journey of leadership. When the first cohort was open for application ... I wasn’t sure if I should apply.

“I then reflected on what it means to be a leader, looking at the women around me and the different ways we can all lead. Encouraged by my mentor, I successfully applied to the program and found the confidence to lead in multiple areas.

“Nurturing, celebrating and promoting a community of women leaders makes Elsevier a more dynamic, inclusive and creative place to work. When we promote each other we promote all — and we succeed together.”

Our awards wins for Best Company Culture in 2023 and 2024 reflect the passion and commitment of our employees. People at Elsevier are committed to supporting each other, as well as finding ways to support the communities we work with.

Earlier this year, Dr Maria Botcharova wrote about her experience finding ways to support researchers in Ukraine.

“As a Ukrainian living in London since childhood, I was shell-shocked by the scenes streaming from Ukraine in February 2022. Although I had not lived there since I was 5, it’s the place I spent all my summer holidays before university — in Kyiv and at my grandmother’s summer house, or dacha. It’s a place where I have a lot of family. And in a way that is more difficult to define, it’s a place I feel intrinsically connected to. When they bombed Kyiv, it felt like a physical pain.

“Since the start of the full-scale invasion, I had been searching for opportunities to support Ukrainians in any way I could. I offered to translate for Elsevier employees and their relatives, who the company moved to safety from our office in Kharkiv at the start of the war.

“I was blown away by Elsevier’s generosity in providing this support. I went to Warsaw over Easter to direct refugees through the city and onto their destinations in Europe or elsewhere. I volunteered at the Ukrainian Welcome Centre in central London to help new migrants with the basics: securing residence permits, signing up for a doctor, filling in school forms for their children, claiming benefits. All simple tasks, but a minefield of complexity for those who don’t speak English.”