Pharma Veterans

Strategies to Help Fulfil Commitments – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1024 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1023 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 our contributions here. Credit: Binti Malu Credit: Michael Burrows Credit: Mikhail Nilov Preamble Recently, I read an article by Michael Blanding in Harvard Business Working Knowledge which led me to study which inspired this blogpost. The findings of study, or rather set of studies’ have been reported by the researchers Ariella Kristal and Julian Zlatev. The report is titled ‘Going beyond the ‘Self’ in Self Control: Interpersonal Consequences of Commitment Strategy Use’. It raises some very important points, just a few of which I shall share. Being copyrighted, I shall not reproduce from the study but shall take the primary idea and present in my own words. Commitment The dictio...

Learning to Say No – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1019 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1019 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 our contributions here. Credit: Jep Gambardella Credit: leo Credit: Yan Krukau Preamble We, who live in Asian societies are particularly prone not to say No. Even when we say it, we do so with great difficulty. So, we say yes to things we cannot do, or do not want to do, and we land in difficulty. In Pakistan, it is extremely common to hide behind a litany of excuses and unattended phone calls when promises are not kept, and jobs are not delivered. This behavior is causing uncertainty, confusion, mistrust, bad relations, and poor work environment across the country. We not only yes, but add InshaAllah also, a suffix which has sadly become associated with the intent to not honor the promise.  Le...

Why Most Plans Never Materialize and What to Do? – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 991 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 991 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. Image Created with Microsoft Designer Image Created with Microsoft Designer Image Created with Microsoft Designer Image Created with Microsoft Designer The basic concept of this blogpost is taken from the book review of ‘Sidetracked’’ written by Harvard Professor Francesca Gino. The content is mine. Plans often go awry due to various internal and external factors that can interfere with our intentions and ability to follow through. Understanding these factors and developing strategies to cope with them can increase the likelihood of achieving our goals. This is seen most often in individual, personal plans. Corporate plans also get derailed and det...

The Case for Business Growth – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 960 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 960 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. Credit: Antonius Ferret Credit: Ketut Subiyanto Credit: Pavel Danilyuk All businesses wish to grow and become big, some actively do things to grow, most do half-hearted measures. The other dimension is that achieving profitable and sustainable growth is even more challenging because various factors keep arising on the way. There are two major restrictions to growth: market, and competition. Any market, be it electronics, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, food etc., is the sum of all players in that market. The market expands because of two factors: addition of new products, and addition of new consumers. However, market expands at a slower rate in this way. The second rest...

Why Strategies Fail to Deliver? – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #836 Dear Colleagues!  This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #836 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans aims to share knowledge and wisdom from Veterans for the benefit of Community at large. Pharma Veterans Blog is published by Asrar Qureshi on  WordPress, the top blog site. Please email to asrar@asrarqureshi.com for publishing your contributions here. Photo Credit: Alena Darmel Photo Credit: emre keshavarz Photo Credit: Sora Shimazaki Pharmaceutical industry is quite fond of making strategies. Most strategies are focused on business growth; however, some strategies may be aimed at organizational development, culture transformation, and change management. Once in a while, there may be strategies for expansion and/or software installation. The success rate of most strategies is quite poor. Marketing strategies do not deliver desired growth, HR strategies do not bring about organizational change or development, and culture ...

Tired Organizations – Reasons & Cures – Part 9 – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #768 Dear Colleagues!  This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #768 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans welcome sharing of knowledge and wisdom by Veterans for the benefit of Community at large. Pharma Veterans Blog is published by Asrar Qureshi on  WordPress, the top blog site. Please email to asrar@asrarqureshi.com for publishing your contributions here. Photo Credit: fauxels Photo Credit: Ivan Samkov Photo Credit: Ivan Samkov Continued from Previous…… After having looked at the appearance, symptoms of the tired organizations, and the reasons why these are so, we now come to the cures. Turning around a tired organization will take serious, concerted, and consistent effort, but it is quite possible and viable. In many ways, it is still better than establishing a new enterprise. The enterprise is already there, revenue stream is there, the enterprise in earning some profit, functions are clarified, staff...

Entrepreneurship within the Pharma Industry – Last Part – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #705 Dear Colleagues!  This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #705 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans welcome sharing of knowledge and wisdom by Veterans for the benefit of Community at large. Pharma Veterans Blog is published by Asrar Qureshi on  WordPress, the top blog site. Please email to asrar@asrarqureshi.com for publishing your contributions here. Photo Credit: Andrea Piacquadio Photo Credit: Andrea Piacquadio Photo Credit: Yasin Gündogdu Suggestions for Making and Running a Successful Enterprise  We have seen various types of entrepreneurs and we have seen a host of reasons that contribute to failure of enterprises.  Let us say again that over 90% entrepreneurial ventures fail, some even after five years. Two inferences must be drawn here. An enterprise is established after great endeavors against odds, and an enterprise is not safe unless it attains a certain size. Anything can ...

Gender Bias V – Pakistan Landscape – Blog Post #384 by Asrar Qureshi Dear Colleagues!  This is Pharma Veterans Blog Post #384. Pharma Veterans welcomes sharing of knowledge and wisdom by Veterans for the benefit of Community at large . Pharma Veterans Blog  is published by Asrar Qureshi on WordPress , the top blog site. Please email to asrar@asrarqureshi.com for publishing your contributions here . In this concluding part, we wrap up discussion on Gender Bias while looking at situation in Pakistan. Gender Bias runs in our social fabric, our chemistry and our biology. The major reason, in my view is our Hindu background. Muhammad Bin Qasim is considered to have brought Islam to this part of the world. Prior to that, the entire community in what is now India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka was Hindu and Buddhist. Buddhism flourished after Ashoka embraced it and made it official religion. Hindu system was based on severe caste and gender restriction...

  Learning Hubs – Blog Post #372 by Asrar Qureshi Dear Colleagues!  This is Pharma Veterans Blog Post #372. Pharma Veterans welcomes sharing of knowledge and wisdom by Veterans for the benefit of Community at large . Pharma Veterans Blog  is published by Asrar Qureshi on WordPress , the top blog site. Please email to asrar@asrarqureshi.com for publishing your contributions here . Many people have set up various learning hubs in various disciplines. In fact, learning today is extremely accessible because huge resources are available at literally no cost.   I mentioned Khan Academy ( www.khanacademy.org ) in the last blog. It is such a resource that it deserves separate presentation. Khan Academy is a non-profit educational organization created in 2008 by Salman Khan. The objective was to create a set of online tools that help educate students. Khan Academy produces short lessons in the form of videos. Their website includes supplementary practice exercis...