IS leadership eliminated

Both Bob and Paul made too much money and knew too much about the account space. They were threats and thus removed.

You have a choice. Stay in IS and get taken out or go to vaccines and have your bonus and salary frozen for all time.

We are Pfizer!

 

I've been in PC my entire career and don't think anyone is looking out for anyone but themselves. Bottom line is there is no loyalty and you better be able to fake the activity trackers to survive.

 

I too was very unimpressed by his email and his replacement decisions.

We should never forget we're all just employees and only your family really cares about you. So do a good job but don't sacrifice your family time or your personal time or get caught up in the "extra call", "work harder" bullshit. Because that's exactly what it is, bullshit.

 

our "performance" is 98% dependent on chance. i am going to see the people I can see and fake the rest of the calls to get the numbers that HQ wants. we are all just numbers to most and it is a complete joke what we typically do on a daily basis. we will continue to be eliminated on a yearly basis and should never be surprised when the next layoff occurs. All of us understand that we only have a couple more years of this fake work before we have to go get a real job.

 

I'm not a rep but I hear this all the time, and I wonder whether this is accurate or just bs. What, exactly, is the problem? Is it management who can't see healthcare for what it is? (It's not 1980 anymore, but some companies act that way.) How much can a good rep move the needle if they are calling on an IDN with relatively rigid centralized decision making (and whose decision makers are creating protocols and doing it half a state away)? Where do you start? The rap I hear from managers is that "Our reps don't call on the right people. They are still calling in the pharmacy director when they have to call on the C suite." They all talk about matrix teams but each member of the team has his own performance metrics that don't necessarily encourage collaboration.

The real problem is that someone somewhere, long before launch, has created revenue projections based on a naive view of the market, and once set, those projections must be met, whether they are achievable or not. That rock starts rolling down hill and doesn't stop til it crushes a few skulls along the way.

 

The model is dead. The reality is that reps have less and less influence every year. Let's say you have great relationships with your accounts. What happens when they write for you and it's not covered. Prior Auth--maybe one in a hundred will do it occasionally(until they get rejected also). What happens when the practice he's in is sold to a hospital (or he/she sells the practice). Hospital closes the practice to reps-what are you going to do.....wait in the parking lot. This career is dying a slow death. The smart reps are gone and on to other careers. If you're close to retirement-hang on. If you're less than 50-get the hell out.

 

I agree with the poster above, the model is dying. The frustration comes from the fact we as a company don't really know what to do in order to be more relevant and effective AND be compliant.

It's not just all about us either, our customers are going thru major changes too, so that complicates the situation. We evolved last year with some great programs in IS (it was called IBM) but our customers weren't ready. They didn't know what to do with our offering.

Even now, we have good useful programs to be more relevant to customers (IDNs) but they're too busy to pay attention.

 

This is true. I heard one exec say this bluntly at an industry conference. If you don't have a message for me that's going to help me manage big-ticket medical costs in diabetes, CAD/HF, or asthma/COPD, don't even bother. He was so busy trying to retool his IDN that he couldn't think of anything else.

 

So the model may not terminally ill. It's in as much transition as our customers, and we're just suffering through it with them.

 

You have got to be kidding about evolving with programs like IBM. We had nothing to offer, and could not, would not or did not understand the needs of the customers to offer collaboration that was customized to their needs vs. the cookie cutter BS that was only in our best interest, not the customer. Lie, Lie, Lie telling them that Pfizer wants to change how we do business, but never be able to offer what the customer really needs. A sloppy, waaay too simplistic antibiotic tracker that had to group classes of antibiotics for compliance reasons. How does that help a customer identify resistance trends??? All talk and no action on working with EMR systems. We had one IT person for the whole country who was dedicated to another division. Outdated education information. IS reps. did not even have anything professional to hand to the customer. We can't even correspond through email and say anything. C-suite requires a level of sophistication and communication that Pfizer does not want to adopt. Now we have a slew of KAMS, VAMS, IS reps. trying to all call on the same few c-suite who will see industry, who only the IS reps. know/understand (and most of them not that well). Does anyone have to think what is wrong with picture. Its a disaster in the making. We don't even know what our customers needs are as a company.

 

You make some good points. IBM never got off the ground. And you're right, we never got anything to show to engage the customer. I would also agree we don't know our customers' needs. Hospitsls are restrictive and complicated environmens. TS doesn't understand hospitals and he'll be gone before he does.

 

customer needs are simple. it involves outcomes in the cheapest way. This is the exact opposite of what we can offer. someone coming in trying to sell an idea-not based upon any evidence that is solid-at a price that is beyond ridiculous isn't something someone wants to listen to. KAMs, VAMs, IS, etc have little to work with. We are in pharma sales and really have no business going into these places and wasting their time.

 

Prevnar brings great value. To pfizer. OPA!!

 

You don't need reps to sell it if a directive comes from up top to use it is established. OPA

 

I don't think you've spent any real time in hospitals, as it relates to "getting and implementing" that "directive" you think is so magical.

There is no "automatic" selling in hospitals. You think that if the top level says "do this". That all the hospitals just will?? Think again. I'm sure this makes no sense to you.

 

Don't the VAMs call on the ID's and decision makers in the hospitals?

 

Yes, when the IS rep calls and asks them for help, and then makes the appointments with the right people. In my experience, the VAMs have large territories, with a narrow focus to only top accounts. They're too busy to see every hospital, much less spend enough time at each one to develop relationships and access to the people they need to see.

 

The VAMs that can get in to see IDN decision makers are those that are nice to their IS reps and have them get appointments. Otherwise, they just send out emails about public sector nonsense.

 

So VAMs are basically useless? What else do they do?

 

I don't think the VAMs are useless, but you have to ask a VAM what else they do.
Or maybe one reading this will make a list.

I'd take a list like that from a KAM too.