Pharma Veterans

Widening Chasm Between Senior and Middle Management– Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 1133 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post 1133 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans Blogs are published by Asrar Qureshi on its dedicated site https://pharmaveterans.com. Please email to pharmaveterans2017@gmail.com  for publishing your contributions here. Credit: cottonbro studio Credit: PNW Production Preamble In modern organizations, middle managers are the glue that holds together strategy, execution, people, and process. Yet increasingly, they are feeling disconnected from the very leaders they report to—senior executives. My last blog post was on this subject. This widening gap—often referred to as the “leadership chasm”—has created frustration, disengagement, and even organizational dysfunction. Middle managers feel overlooked, unsupported, and under pressure, while senior management often perceives them as resistant to change, lacking vision, or slow to execute strategy. Why is this...

The Middle Management is Squeezed and Struggling – Why and What Should be Done – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1132 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #1132 for Pharma Veterans. Pharma Veterans Blogs are published by Asrar Qureshi on its dedicated site https://pharmaveterans.com. Please email to pharmaveterans2017@gmail.com  for publishing your contributions here. Credit: cottonbro studio Credit: Mikhail Nilov Preamble In the corporate hierarchy, middle managers have traditionally been the bridge between strategy and execution, vision and action, senior leaders and frontline teams. They are the interpreters, implementers, buffers, and stabilizers. But today, middle managers find themselves in an uncomfortable, often unsustainable position. With mounting responsibilities, increasing ambiguity, and little recognition, they are the most squeezed layer in modern organizations—and many are burning out.  What’s changed in the role of middle managers? Why the pressure is...

Why do Senior Managers Keep Repeating the Same Mistakes? Part III – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #946 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #946 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: Alena Darmel Credit: Alena Darmel Credit: Karolina Grabowska Credit: Tima Miroshnichenko Continued from Previous …… The team assigned to KK was doing well in sales. However, their portfolio consisted of mostly older products, few of which were cash cows also. The older products were entrenched in their market segments but grew quite slowly. KK thought it was a great opportunity that he had established products; he attributed their slow growth to lack of focus and targeted work. KK asked his marketing team to extract IQVIA data of the marketed products for the last three years, and he asked them to do it ASAP. It took so...

Why do Senior Managers Keep Repeating the Same Mistakes? Part I – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #944 Dear Colleagues! This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #944 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: Andrea Piacquadio Credit: Belle Co Credit: Markus Spiske KK started his career in pharmaceutical industry fourteen years ago as Assistant Product Manager. He had an MBA degree from a well-reputed institution which was known to prepare their students well for job market. His beginnings were therefore better than others. He was received well, he was given somewhat better treatment, and he got more freedom to work.  Over the years, KK grew steadily, although he was not mentored much. This is one common issue with boys and girls coming from elitist institutions. Their senior managers treat them with somewhat more deference ...

Evolution of Management Thinking and Practices – Modern Contributors I – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #918 Dear Colleagues!  This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #918 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. Abraham Maslow Douglas McGregor Credit: Olena Bohovyk The purpose of this series is to show how major changes evolved in the management thinking and practices.  I understand it is presenting a very large subject in a digest form, and is particularly for those who believe in understanding management, practicing it, and experimenting to develop new ideas for better performance. From the beginning of 20th century, interest in management increased further because of rapid technology changes, greater academic research, and higher...

Crowds, Herds, and Mobs – Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #857 Dear Colleagues!  This is Asrar Qureshi’s Blog Post #857 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. Credit: Alotrobo Credit: Life Matters Credit: Pixabay Several years ago, I noticed a book on display at an airport, the title of which intrigued me. It read, ‘The Wisdom of Crowds’ written by James Surowiecki. I got the book and read it. The book presents the thesis that a crowd of ordinary people can display wisdom which may be better than the wisdom of experts. However, conditions apply. A crowd may be defined as a group of ordinary, diverse people who do not relate to one another. The primary conditions for qualifying as a crowd are that they should neither be rebellious nor bli...

CEOs at Work – Part 3 – Time Spending vs Effectiveness – Pharma Veterans’ Blog Post #540 by Asrar Qureshi Dear Colleagues!  This is Pharma Veterans’ Blog Post #540. 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. Continued from Previous…… There is a huge body of work on CEOs, on their role, leadership, style, time management, effectiveness, inspiration, and much more. The reason for extended focus is because the role of CEO is extremely important. In today’s post, I shall present to you some findings from a survey published in Harvard Business Review in October 2017. [Link appears at the end] The survey was conducted by Oriana Bandiera, Stephen Hansen, Andrea Prat, and Raffaella Sadun. They have done plenty of work on this subject and we referred to one of their r...