Papatya Tankut

Mattie Simmons was the owner of a small independent pharmacy in Laurel, Md., when she gave Papatya Tankut, then 16, her first pharmacy job.
Today, it’s Tankut who does the hiring.
She is vice president of pharmacy professional services for CVS Caremark, in charge of the company’s national recruiting operation. But she has never forgotten Simmons.
“Challenged with adversity in her life, [Simmons] continued to be an admired and respected businesswoman, always focusing her time and attention to the needs of her patients. To this day, her passion for the role shapes the way I practice pharmacy,” Tankut said in her 40 Under Forty application.
With a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy from the University of Maryland, Tankut joined CVS in 1994 as a pharmacy team leader. In 1999, she became the manager of professional and college relations, responsible for hiring pharmacist candidates for Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia. From 2003 to 2005, she was in charge of pharmacist recruitment activities for 6,300 stores in 40 states and Washington, D.C. She became vice president of pharmacy professional services in 2005.
Tankut enjoys watching the progression of undergraduate interns as they advance within the company.
In addition to national pharmacy recruiting, Tankut oversees the regulatory compliance and quality assurance departments at CVS Caremark, and she leads the clinical services department that works to create innovative pharmacy outreach programs. She is a licensed pharmacist fluent in three languages, English, Turkish and French. •