What shall we discuss today children? Hmmmmm, let me begin Factoid Sales numbers are flat for 2018. Some blame contracting erosion or SCG or the market trends of today's healthcare crisis. Some say it's a lack of innovation and stronger competition. But some blasphemes might just say, it's the "LEADERSHIP TEAM", as they call themselves, which like the marketing team, are primarily driven only to get promoted. A teaching moment presents here. There are two sure fire ways to move it on up in this organization Either have a relative in power or, and I quote, "kiss a member of the LEADERSHIP TEAM'S ass, pursue getting an on-line piece of shit MBA from anywhere college USA, and study and practice the interview questions. Those actions will immediately get you promoted. At which time you will then earn LTI which stands for long term incentive, aka stock rewards. But SHHHHHH!! Do not speak of this amazing and mysterious golden chalice! It is for us, those in the club which can utter these three letters. All others shall not speak of it, yet all are eligible for it every year! But do not speak of this please. Ok now that you have earned LTI and been promoted to your ambiguous new job, where measuring real results is almost impossible, do not work much at all. Then proceed to getting fat. For which you will then get promoted again and earn more LTI. Throughout this process remember to kiss the "LEADERSHIP TEAM"S" ass. And learn the very hard physical task of nodding your head, while at the same time smiling and saying nothing. This is key to higher promotions and to what matter most; your portfolio. It is not about patient care or hard work or real results. But I digress, so back to the main point. Some say the reason our sales are so flat is because of the front line managers. Many of which are scared to talk to doctors and their consultants, for fear of being made known of what little they know or do. Do Managers even work with their reps anymore? There was a day when managers fought for their local customers and reps, some of those evil people were fired or left. There are a few still around thank god. It is appalling at how many managers today are taking credit for sales success at an account they do nothing for! Nothing! You hear me, nothing! Nothing I say. Yet upper management will be sure point to their key role in that success. OOOOPS!! I forgot an important step to the getting promoted action plan. Take credit of other peoples' success. Because no one will investigate why the great result really occurred; you simply need to claim it. Facts are irrelevant. Simply you need to say the success is because of you. Our company's best self promoters, even put it in an email so its gets posted on Huddle and are sure to include marketing or SCG or their boss as to show how it was such a team effort. What a joke.! All valid but I say more! I decree, it is culture! It is culture! It is culture! A culture of promoting and praising the Marketing posers! Marketing you think you are hot because you come in for a dinner and read a canned presentation on a single product you study everyday? The doctor came because the Synthes rep asked her to come, not you. It is the doctors' favor to the reps for being served well for so long. It is the reps relationship and trust which brought the already converting doctor in this day. It was the reps dedication every weekend and weekday night which opened the door, and not your weekday happy hour or gym jog at the club Sat Morning before Starbucks It is the reps ability to handle 5 complex traumatic cases of differing anatomy at once, and not your simple task of understanding one product and then repeating a canned presentation on it. Make no mistake, acclaimed Marketing pro, remove you from your job for the wrong reason and no business is lost, because the customers do not know you . But remove a strong Synthes trauma consultant for the wrong reason and that business is gone, if they so choose. Note, "if they so choose" is the right phrase is of crucial importance. Because it is the character of the great Synthes rep that won the business in the first place. And character like that is not vengeful. But that glass is about full. The force can only take so much of this disregard and lack of respect, and for yesterday's hard earned wins.. The value placed on honesty and character is sinking from an anchor of self promotion; and then so is our sales results. Marketing does not have real power to convert, yet somehow J&J values marketing fluff over sweat and tears. So the dollars and money and praise default to marketing initiatives, and not where it is needed, which is in the field. Marketing people are the best at changing jobs and becoming experts of nothing. Hard to really evaluate worth if your job changes every two years. Juan Jose To this day, I still have no idea what he said. They put a mouse of a man that cannot speak English in charge of the champion Synthes sales force? Of course he is gone. I'm only surprised that someone noticed and acted upon it. Well done. The Synthes trauma rep works harder than all others and are the most committed to patient care of all medical device reps. I love when some of our new leaders say, "Synthes reps are just case coverage reps" It points out how ignorant they are. Anyone that says that should be fired immediately. Should I go on? Yes I know you want me to. But I can not because my buddy just walked in and said its time. About two hours ago he texted me this, "Hey we need you a gunshot femur and a bad car accident with multiple lower extremity fractures pelvis OR Staff is weak now and trays are a mess from a very busy day come play!" so off I went nothing else matters
Your a douche bag.....Synthes sales are flat for a reason. Same reason when I started we had over 65% market share and now around 45%. JnJ ended a great company once upon a time. End of story. By the way. Your not that good. You can be replaced. And prolly will be. And that Doc is not your friend. Good night
Actually, this original poster is 100% correct. I agree with every word. Synthes was a great organization run by its excellent Sales Team. DePuy historically was and remains an organization run by its Marketing Team. Two completely different philosophies. DePuy Synthes, current state, does not value the importance of the Rep/Customer relationship. Many of their great sales talent has left and taken those relationships with them. This has, among other factors for sure, cost them millions of dollars...and I too couldn't understand a word JJG ever uttered from his mouth.
Not a DePuy backer by any means.....but do "great organizations" get Warning Letters as often as Synthes? Asking for a friend.... The acquisition and subsequent merger has been a disaster. The response of continuing to pump $$$ into the dying spine business is insanity.
You are 100% correct...great organizations do not, and the merger has been a complete disaster. A case study will one day be written and taught in Business Schools across the country on this calamity. The Spine business is in utter ruins. Is it even possible to bring it back? I actually do not think so. JNJ must be considering divesting this portion of the business.
Who is next? Rid the company of all the excess garbage. All the managers who do nothing are on the chopping block. Could not happen to a bigger group of losers. What they have done to the once great Synthes is deplorable. Fire them all.
Kudos to all. This is the best synthes cafepharma thread of all time. It is beyond over. JNJ should have "tweaked" the synthes business model rather then blow it up completely. Only a complete band of idiots pays $20B for a business with $4B in sales and $1B in after tax profits and blows it up thinking they can do better.
The “leaders” are the biggest problem. When you’ve got RM’s that never sold Trauma, you’ve got a problem. You can get by with AVP’s that don’t know Trauma because once you get to that level it’s very process oriented. But to have 1st line managers (RM’s) that don’t know a thing about the business that generates 80% of their revenue, that’s a dumpster fire. Originally Synthes thought that as long as they stayed away from plugging in the Ethicon RM, they’d be fine. But they miscalculated by thinking mitek idiots could transition into good Trauma leaders. These guys from mitek are just as clueless and couldn’t tell a femoral nail from a humeral nail, complete joke
While 80 per cent of the business is Trauma, the majority of people in the trauma field are nothing short of glorified baby sitters who have to hand hold their surgeons hands at each case to fixate a few screws and a plate. Big Whup. They can't sell to save their butts because they don't need to. Synthes should have just dumped the CMF and Mitek business to competitors who would have developed them rather than casting them aside. It is a company doomed to fail because competitors are stomping all over them
While 80 per cent of the business is Trauma, the majority of people in the trauma field are nothing short of glorified baby sitters who have to hand hold their surgeons hands at each case to fixate a few screws and a plate. Big Whup. They can't sell to save their butts because they don't need to. Synthes should have just dumped the CMF and Mitek business to competitors who would have developed them rather than casting them aside. It is a company doomed to fail because competitors are stomping all over them
If they’re just baby sitters and you don’t have to sell, then why has their market share dropped off a cliff in almost every territory where the tenured “baby sitter” left? Think about that for a minute, hotshot
Not only are Synthes consultants the best in the business they are obviously educated ( with the exception of KC) and well spoken. The first post in this thread is 100% correct. Every hater out there wished at some point in time they were a Synthes consultant and not a monkey that only Gallup can identify. Competition is one thing, product another but the great equalizer has been corporate profit driven by mediocrity and the law of big numbers. I was a sales consultant for 13 years ( some of the best and most meaningful) then a manager for 5 ( a mistake I regret). Ultimately all of you should know that loyalty means nothing in corporate America, you won’t sell forever, care for patients, make money, compete and don’t trust any of the climbers. Respect to all who take call, hold prices and work with integrity.
Below were my exact thoughts when I left this once great company 3 years ago. RM, without a clue, AVP even more clueless. There was no way i would any longer put up with the abuses they brought on to me, or my customers. Once I felt the ASC had it down, I was gone. 3 months later so were most of the surgeons.
In my view most of the OP's opinions are true. Not sure why he/she is so bent on marketing, though I never really saw the need for it either. Synthes did great without a much of a marketing group. Probably because they let the highly educated (in the device field) Reps handle all things sales related. Let's face it, Spine sales were flat long before JnJ bought us. It's the reason Huggins was pushed down to Spine Pres. once golden boy Orsinger took over as COO. Same goes for Hans Emch being fired as Spine Pres., and Steve Murray not advancing Spine either. How David Paul grew Globus to $300M in the time he did is beyond me. Pricing perhaps. As for Trauma, once Wyss and the BOD decided to sell (which was long before June, 2012), product investment was cut to increase profits which drove up the value of the company. As for how the field has been treated by JnJ, never would have happened with Wyss. He understood that with qualified/motivated reps you don't need marketing and all the other margin eroding functions JNJ attaches to their operating companies. As a non-sales guy who recently left after 20+ years with Synthes/Depuy, this is how I see it.
Just because they were great baby sitters didn't mean they could sell. They were just likable baby sitters, a-hole
drops mike - walks away seen the above many times you know how the POs get processed when the tenured guy / gal leaves ?? answer : they don't
