What if I was to go back to Sales?

After nearly 20 years in the Pharmaceutical Industry and undertaking various sales, management, training and coaching roles, I ventured out into the scary world of self-employment in 2001. Now eight years later, I can look back at my recent business experiences and outline what I would do differently if he were to go back to being a sales executive in the industry. 

I started out at a sales executive in January 1982 and ‘repped’ for seven years before entering into regional sales management and sales coaching before finally leaving the industry in 2001. I can look back now at those early years as a sales executive and see what mistakes I made in attempting to run my territory.  If I was to go back tomorrow (and there are times when I have been tempted!) then I would do some things a bit differently than perhaps I did all those years ago. 

In this blog piece I would like to outline a few areas that I believe Pharmaceutical sales people should take note of when attempting to run their territory and ensure that the hit their business targets.

Mindset.  It is very easy to start to think that once you are in a company then the company will support you in every facet of your role. It won’t!  You are accountable for your territory and although you will get support with materials, training and ongoing coaching support from your line manager, the vast majority of the time you will be on your own and left to deliver the business against set targets. Do not get complacent. Just because you have a regular salary coming in it doesn’t mean that you can afford to sit back and hope the sales flow in. As someone who is self-employed then if I don’t get out of bed every morning and are motivated to build the business then I would simply not last any length of time and would be bankrupt within a very short time. I must attempt to make money at every opportunity, whilst at the same time deliver excellence for my customers. You should at every opportunity think and act like you were self employed and always have it in the front of your mind that it is your business driven by you for the benefit of your customers. Ultimately you and your customers will benefit.

Relationship with Manager. When I first started out I very much looked up to my manager. I was ‘old school’, and as such started calling my manager, Mr ‘such and such’. He quickly put me at ease and it was soon ‘first name’ terms which is the norm nowadays.  However, I then had a series of managers who weren’t as approachable as my first manager and as I am a bit of a ‘rebel’ and usually stand up for myself, I soon found my relationship with some managers deteriorating.  Part of this was own inexperience in managing stakeholders and as a coach I have learned to manage business relationships more carefully through effective contracting. If I were to go back one of the first things I would do is sit down with my manager and have an open discussion about how we were going to work effectively with each other. What were his or her expectations of me? I would hope they would reciprocate and ask me what my expectations were of them. Good managers will always do this. The manager:rep relationship should be a strong and motivational partnership.

Activity and Customers. I used to run about seeing virtually everybody I could in order to keep high activity levels. I knew some customers would never deliver business but they were a contact and another name to put down on a report. I cannot afford to do that now. I refuse to waste time and money on people who are not important to my business and whereas I used to be indifferent to targeting and segmentation, I very carefully now look at my customers and ensure I am targeting the decision makers. I now also keep pretty good reports on my customer activity so that I can review recent calls and ensure that I have specific objectives for each call that I make.  It is a lot different from when I used to record simplistic notes such “Good Call” or “Difficult Customer”! Also the rage of customers that I would now have to call has increased dramatically since my repping days so careful analysis of who the key customer contacts are and what impact they will have on my business would have to happen. The days of simply calling on GPs, Hospital Physicians, Hospital & Retail pharmacists alone is over!

Skills and Knowledge. I certainly have to keep abreast of new ideas, techniques and skills as well as keeping up to date with the marketplaces that I work in. I need to be seen as an expert in the fields that I work or else I become ‘one of crowd’ and business will then dry up. As a sales executive I used to struggle to keep up with own and competitor product knowledge and as for keeping up with clinical trial papers, then I really did struggle. Maybe that was why on occasion I was found wanting in front of challenging hospital consultants. Now, I keep ahead of the game, not merely playing catch up! The same goes for skills and although I always looked to develop my selling and customer engagement skills I would certainly do a lot more if I were back in the Pharma sales role. The Pharmaceutical salesperson should be seen by their customers as an expert in their own products and should be able to converse on the same level with their customers in relation to the therapeutic areas they are selling in.

Planning & Performance Review. I am not the greatest planner being more comfortable with a ‘cigarette packet’ approach as opposed to detailed plans. However, nowadays, if I don’t have a fairly detailed plan, stakeholders such as the bank (not to mention my business associates) would not give me a second look!  The old adage, “fail to plan, plan to fail” certainly is true in my business and if you are managing a multi-million pounds ‘product’ territory then you will have to plan effectively. In terms of reviewing performance, I now look critically at the plan and how we are doing against the plan, and I do this virtually weekly as opposed to quarterly and in some cases half yearly when I was a rep! I believe it is important to take some time out in order to review objectives and performance and better doing this than chasing after another ‘deadbeat’ customer contact.

Team-working. As a sales rep, I cannot remember ever working effectively within an effective sales team. It was certainly never ‘all for one, one for all’! It was more ‘everyman for himself’ and in the early days, with league tables, then there was very little sharing of learning or mutual support from colleagues. However, I would now never consider operating without a support network of associates, and at present I am building up a team in order that the business grows as intended. If I were to return to Pharma sales I would certainly ensure that the sales team I was a member of was pulling together and that there was a spirit of co-operation and support and within which I fully played my part. Although I see the manager as the catalyst to this, I would now never wait for a manager to make it happen and I would certainly play a pro-active role in ensuring the team was together in all aspects of the plan.

Networking. This is vital for the self-employed. If you don’t network, then you will never be known. It should be the same for Pharmaceutical Salespeople and you should to attend as many networking events as you can, making sure that there is a relevance to your role and industry. Although some organisations like the local Chamber of Commerce or the various sales institutes are composed of people from different industries it is amazing what you can learn from some of the networking events.

These are just some key areas in which I would look to change my previous habits and focus and if a sales person can get these right and have a self-employed attitude then they will go a long way to improving results and decreasing the pressure on themselves.