Pharma Veterans – Concept and Practice – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1015

Pharma Veterans – Concept and Practice – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1015

Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1015 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans Blogs are published by Asrar Qureshi on its dedicated site https://pharmaveterans.com. Please email to aq.pharmaveterans@gmail.com for publishing your contributions here.

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Preamble

Pharma Veterans is a group of senior pharmaceutical professionals which came together to form a core group under the umbrella of ‘Pharma Veterans’ in 2019. Pharma Veterans domain and blogs were launched in 2017 by Asrar Qureshi and had been continuing since. All group members are full time working professionals who take out time occasionally to meet and discuss the industry situation and what may be done.

Pharma Veterans Fundamentals

Vision

Build and Run a Vibrant, Inclusive, Evolving, and Growing Platform for Pharma & Healthcare Industry Veterans

Mission

1. To project and celebrate the achievements of Pharma & Healthcare Veterans

2. To pay it forward to younger pharma professionals with knowledge and wisdom

3. To work for the welfare of Pharma & Healthcare Industry Veterans

4. To advocate for the causes and concerns of Pharma & Healthcare Industry

5. To spread greater awareness among public about Pharma & Healthcare Industry

Core Values

• Mentorship

• Comradeship

• Leadership

• Advocacy

Pharma Veterans' Premises

I. Pharma Veterans shall have a Core Group at its center, comprising of 15-20 C-suite executives from diverse functions of Pharma & Healthcare Industry.

II. Core Group shall work without formal hierarchy. There shall be no Office or Office Bearers.

III. Core Group membership is voluntary and lifetime. Members may opt to leave on account of personal reasons.

IV. Core Group or a smaller designated committee shall decide about new admission into it, whenever a vacancy becomes available.

V. Core Group shall preferably meet every eight weeks. The agenda will be circulated before the meeting and brief minutes shall be prepared after the meeting and shared.

VI. Core Group shall decide about its policies, contributions, subscriptions, venues, events and all that comes under its purview.

VII. Pharma Veterans shall never align with any political, pseudo-political, religious or any other pressure group. Limited Collaborations may however be considered with other related groups in the interest of certain causes.

Long Term Outlook

Great projects start from ideas which may seem small in the beginning but have the possibility to grow and expand. 

As you look at the basic concept of Pharma Veterans, the roadmap outline is actually just a brief outline. The possibilities of adding more ideas are quite big. 

Beside core team, more people are invited to come, join, collaborate, and contribute. The contributions can be in multiple forms.

Urgent Action Area

The area which needs most urgent attention is people development. Over time, pharma companies have reduced investment in this critical segment. There are apparently two major arguments put forward against people development. One, people may leave for better jobs after developing, leading to wasted investment; two, current business landscape has reduced reliance on people while increasing reliance on other promotional tools. I shall try to address both concerns here.

Turnover

There are multiple reasons why people leave. Bosses are #1, environment is #2, and lack of development is #3. The companies need to take a holistic view and address all factors. Turnover in pharma sales and marketing is quite high as compared to other industries and it is causing a huge wastage. 

Gallup® which is leading the ‘Employee Engagement’ campaign for over two decades, developed a 12-question questionnaire for gauging employee engagement; 6 out of 12 questions are related to development. The thesis is that employees remain engaged and do not leave even in tougher circumstances, if they know they are learning and developing. 

The bottom line is that developing people will help reduce the turnover, rather than increasing it. There will be occasional departures and those should be accepted gracefully as contribution to the industry at large.

Marketing Landscape

Without going into detail, the industry people know that the current pharma marketing landscape is bursting at the seams. The cost of selling has shot through the roofs and out of reach of smaller companies. The current model is not sustainable though many companies shall keep beating the dead horse. 

Pharma sales was inherently personal selling, and it still is. Other tools should have been employed to reinforce personal selling, rather than replacing it. However, to make short-term gain, long-term benefit was compromised.

India has a similar situation, but advocacy groups have already filed petitions against the practice. A report from an advocacy group states, “In fact, as many as 80% of physicians in India may accept inducements, an issue made easier by a lack of regulation and a failure by professional societies to promote ethics, the Support for Advocacy and Training to Health Initiatives found after interviewing several sales reps, doctors, and industry executives. With some 20,000 drug makers doing business in India, companies are placing less emphasis on training sales reps to provide scientific information and are more concerned with ensuring doctors promote business goals by any means”. 

Pakistan may also see such movements sooner than later.

Sum Up

Pharma Veterans shall contribute to training and development of pharma people, particularly the young middle and senior managers. Everyone else who wishes to contribute, is welcome to join the effort.

Concluded.

Disclaimers: Pictures in these blogs are taken from free resources at Pexels, Pixabay, Unsplash, and Google. Credit is given where available. If a copyright claim is lodged, we shall remove the picture with appropriate regrets.

For most blogs, I research from several sources which are open to public. Their links are mentioned under references. There is no intent to infringe upon anyone’s copyrights. If, however, it happens unintentionally, I offer my sincere regrets.