Sales Force Short Version

BEST PRACTICES,®

LLCCopyright© 2006

Pharma Sales Force Effectiveness:

Increasing Productivity Through Streamlined Communication

Strategic Benchmarking Research Presented by Cameron Tew

Copyright© Best Practices®, LLC BEST PRACTICES,®

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About Our Guest SpeakerCameron Tew is Executive Director of Research for Best Practices, LLC, a global thought leader in the field of best practice performance improvement for companies in the bio-pharmaceutical and healthcare sector.

#1 On Amazon.Com Reader Ratings –

Customer SatisfactionPHARMA

BIOTECH

CRO’s

COMMER-CIAL / R&D

HOSPITALS

MEDICALDEVICES

GROUPPROBLEMSOLVING

Client Sectors

E-mail: [email protected] E-mail: [email protected] (Ph)(Ph) 919-767-9246919-767-9246


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Benchmark Participants Provide Insight

This drill-down study further probed these critical sales communication issues and opportunities. District managers and sales specialists from 10 different bio-pharmaceutical companies provided insights and observations.

Benchmark Partners

n=18

Q. What therapeutic area do your reps work in?

Cardiovascular21%

Analgesics10%

Growth hormones

6%

HIV/AIDS6%

CNS / Mental Health disease

states6%

Contraception11%

Osteoporosis6%

Anti Infective11%

Ophthalmology6%

Respiratory11%

Cholesterol6%


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High Performance Communication

Why don’t fish swimming in schools ever collide? Schools of fish are the ultimate in fast response. Their communications are instantaneous and travel across multiple sensory channels. Sales organizations must act similarly to achieve the same fast response.

Source: James C. Liao, Department of Organism and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University. (Photo by Laura Farrell)


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Internal Communications: The “Sleeping Giant” of Bio-Pharma Field Sales ProductivityCommunication is a two-way street, involving a sender and receiver. The best sales people are excellent receivers, or listeners. But they also need to be excellent senders, or presenters in order to strengthen corporate sales.

Where can communication break down?Where can communication break down?

CO + RM + DM + SR = FFPCO + RM + DM + SR = FFP

Corporate OfficeCorporate Office

+Regional Manager+Regional Manager

+ District Manager+ District Manager

+ Sales Rep + Sales Rep

= Field Force Productivity= Field Force Productivity

Pharma Co. A


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The client’s annual Productivity Survey indicated that 51% of the U.S. Sales Organization

received too many redundant or unnecessary communications.

27 22

0% 20% 40% 60% 80%

“I receive too many redundant or unnecessary e-mails and voicemails

(Communications).”

Source: Internal Sales Productivity Report

100%

51

UnfavorableNeutralFavorable

Study commissioned to examine field force communications dynamics.

Recommendations to improve field effectiveness and efficiency, increase selling time, and enhance work-life balance.

Sales Communications Case Study


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Insight #1: Sales Forces Face Communications Overload

Field sales communications is a powerful catalyst for productivity gains or losses.

Key Findings

• Reps spend on average 13.7 hours a week managing internal communication (i.e. email, checking voicemail and cell phone calls). Of this time, 4.4 hours (or 32 percent) are perceived as unnecessary.

• Among a group of surveyed district managers, the average time spent per week managing internal communication was 36.5 hours. The District Managers often find themselves processing and filtering unnecessary communications from both corporate and locally from reps.

“You have to think about retaining District managers too, our family time gets cut out with all this communication,” said one interviewed district manager.

• Most managers indicated that unnecessary communications result from redundant messages – the same information communicated through different forms, regional sources, or corporate functions.

• Seventy-four percent of participants estimate that 8 percent or more of the emails their reps receive are redundant in content alone.


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Annual Cost of Poor Communication Shown below are the extrapolated costs of 4.4 hours a week of unnecessary communication for each rep over the course of a year.

•Assuming the average rep loses 4.4 hours a week due to unnecessary communication, that loss adds up to 221 hours per year, per rep. For every 1,000 sales reps a company has, this time lost equals 88.5 full time sales reps.

•Labor Cost of poor communication = 88.5 reps x $80,000 (average fully loaded rep salary) = $7.1 million per 1,000 sales reps

•Sales Opportunity Cost of poor communication = 88.5 reps x $3,500,000 (average yearly sales per rep as reported by benchmarked DMs) = $309.9 million per 1,000 sales reps

$7,083,479

$309,900,500

Labor Cost Sales Opportunity Cost

Annual Cost of Unnecessary Communication per 1000 Sales Reps

For a company with 5,000 sales reps, the

total impact of 4.4 hours a week in

unnecessary communication could

be as high as $1.55B in potential sales lost.


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Hours Spent on Unnecessary CommunicationManagers estimate that their reps spend on average 4.4 hours a week managing unnecessary internal communication. The majority of this time can be attributed to email and the cell phone.

n=15

4.4 hours

Average Hours Spent per Week per Rep on Unnecessary Communications

Email Voicemail Meetings Cell Phone Direct Mail TOTAL

1.2

0.70.5

1.7

0.4


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Insight #2: Small Improvements Do Matter; So Track and Monitor Them

Small productivity changes can produce large gains across time and across the entire field force.

Key Findings

• Clarity of Email and Voicemail Messages: All emails and voicemails should be prefaced with clear and concise headlines such as:

• FYI vs. FYA, Urgent and Action Required

• Shorten Emails and Voicemail Messages:

• Email messages should not require too much scrolling. Summarize when possible.

• Voicemail messages should not exceed 1-2 minutes. Strip out multiple introductions on forwarded voicemail messages. Each message should have no more than one introduction.

• Limit volume and frequency of Emails and Voicemails to the field force. Set a maximum limit on daily or weekly emails and voicemails can be set. The frequency for sharing field success stories can be streamlined with weekly or monthly emails or voicemails to maximize impact.


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Weekly Communication Time

5.5 Hrs

4 Hrs

6 Hrs

2.5 Hrs1.5 Hr 19.5 Hrs19.5 Hrs

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

E-mail Voicemail Cell Phone Meetings Direct Mail Total

20

About 80% of Total Time

Front-line Field service and sales staff spent 50% of their time each week mired in communications.


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Voicemail Effectiveness:1. Voicemail Effectiveness

• Remove all serial introductions

• Clear summaries guidelines

2. E-mail Effectiveness• Remove reply to all• Clear instructions

3. Training support• DM training on

communications• Reposition

communications as productivity tool in corporate culture

BrevityBrevity

Clear Actions or Meaning

FocusedFocusedMessageMessage

Clarity of MessageClarity of Message

Well Planned Introductions

Simple Changes Have Giant Impact

Piloted Changes

From more than 40 improvement observations from field work, we piloted a few simple changes to build the case for change to a $25 billion “economic engine.”


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Table of Contents

IntroductionExecutive SummaryAssessment of Internal Communications

• Introduction•Time Spent per Week on Internal Communication•Sources of unnecessary communication

• Under-Communicated Content• Analyzing Communication Flows From Regional vs. Headquarters Sources• The cost of poor communication

The Role of the District Manager• Filtering, prioritizing and synthesizing Field Communications• District Managers: The “Air Traffic Controllers” Who Direct Field Communications in A Team Environment• Communication Effectiveness Techniques

•Limit the use of broad-group emails and lists for non-essential business issues.Training Reps to Communicate Effectively

• Overview• Train Reps on Communication Rules of Engagement

How Corporate Can Make a Difference• Overview• Redirecting Information Delivery• Headquarters coordination role to reduce redundancy• Planning and coordinating information delivery and requests

Technological Support for Effective Communication• Sources of Communication in the Field• Aligning Technology, Training and Messages For Communications Effectiveness• Email: Managing A Powerful Tool That Can Steal Time From Field Activities• Phone, Voicemail, and conference calls: Orchestrating Effective Voice Communications

Appendices


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Best Practices, LLC is a research and consulting firm that works with clients based on the simple yet profound principle that organizations can chart a course to superior economic performance by applying the best business practices, operating tactics and winning strategies of world-class organizations.

If you would like to know more about our benchmarking products, databases, memberships and research services, please contact us:

Best Practices, LLC6350 Quadrangle Drive, Suite 200

Chapel Hill, NC 27517919-403-0251

www.best-in-class.comCameron Tew – 919-767-9246

[email protected]

About Best Practices, LLC

Sales Force Short Version

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