One of the ongoing challenges facing the pharmaceutical company is the attraction, motivation, management and handling of key salespeople. After all, the company has built a great position for itself in the market and has put a lot of effort into developing its product line and polishing its reputation. Every organisation is, of course, very dynamic and its ongoing success will depend on the correct, but complex interaction of many moving parts, on an ongoing basis. Most notably, the all-important clients must be handled very carefully and certain key account management policies and techniques must be developed, so that mature relationships proliferate.
Much will hinge on the success of key account management training and an organisation may be stringent in the development of policies and procedures and very clear at the senior level about its objectives. This element is so important that much attention should be given to communication with sales staff through pharmaceutical sales training, with the result that further communication, two-way, between the company and its client is always fruitful.
So important is the level of communication, that relationships between the buyer and seller can hinge entirely on this element, as tenuous as it might be when based on interpersonal and effective relationships between two key people — the client representative and the key account manager at the pharma company.
When it has been established that an account must retain “key” status, the pharmaceutical company must define the nature of this relationship very clearly and must communicate the appropriate elements of this definition throughout the company through good pharmaceutical sales training. This will ensure that any responses are always well engineered and stable. Not all parts of this policy can be automatically rolled out as we have to remember that human foibles can often interject. Never put so much attention on a certain individual at an interface, so that the relationship breaks down if something goes wrong. It is much more preferable to build a variety of different tiers of communication between the company and client organisations, be they informal or formal, thereby negating the effects of catastrophic failure.
As over delivery is so important, the pharmaceutical company should set up and maintain a regular process of planning, review and maintenance, so that the relationship is fully serviced.
When an important relationship is in the process of development, we should remember that financial considerations are not the only motivators in question and both parties should see the dissemination of confidential information as an important ingredient, going forward. In this respect, it is critical that the pharmaceutical company identifies the all-important receiving role within the client organisation and the individual who fills this role, so that a sharing of information can be facilitated. The challenge is to establish a sophisticated level of interpersonal relations and communication, without placing too much emphasis on the importance of any one individual within either organisation. In this way, should one “key” individual be removed or depart for whatever reason, ongoing function may be retained.
Alan Gillies is the Director of L2L Consulting, an elite pharmaceutical consultancy firm which specialises in Strategy Development and Implementation Excellence for prestigious multi-national organisations.