Week three of sales training just ended, and all of us sales-reps-to-be head home for a week of regional field travel, where we'll get to visit actual physicians and practice the theory and techniques that we've been learning in class. I'm excited to finally use the Jedi mind tricks, and especially the cool Vulcan death grip, should a physician prove more stubborn than I expect.
Actually, there's been none of that in training at all. And therein lies the dilemma I am now facing. I'm starting to understand what this is all about. I'm starting to see how little I knew about the business of selling pharma, and how hard it really is. I'm starting to appreciate my fellow sales reps, and am beginning to be humbled in their presence - some of these people are tremendously hard workers, and care deeply about improving patient lives, even if it means facing up to an ignorant doctor. And that's the most surprising transformation of all for me. I'd never have used the word "ignorant" with the word "doctor" before, but a big part of the charisma and mythology surrounding physicians is turning to dust right before my eyes.
I'm starting to realize that there are a lot of doctors out there who stopped learning once they left med-school. That there are simply too many demands on a physician's time to keep up with all the research that can direct them to patients in the best manner possible. That even those doctors who got "C" grades in college and barely cleared their board exams truly believe that they know everything, but that I, a mere sales rep, am better informed about the cardiovascular disease state and the best cholesterol treatment algorithms.
I'm also beginning to see that somewhere along the way things went horribly wrong with the US healthcare system, and with the process of selling medicines. Sales techniques got out of hand, doctors began to abuse favors provided by the reps, and the reps began to bend over backward to provide the most unethical of benefits to physicians that were willing to prescribe their products. There is a reason we are hated and treated like dirt. But as with all systems that swing too far in one direction, there is a reversion to the mean. Abbott has a zero-tolerance policy and FDA oversight means that now there is no leeway for reps to do the things they used to be able to do (i.e., take doctors out on all expense paid cruises).
It'll take a while before our reputations are restored. And maybe one day this system of selling is going to have to be done away with completely. But for now this is how things are. And if I want to change any of it in the future, I must spend time in the ditches, learning the ropes.
This sales rotation is going to be more of an eye-opener than I ever thought that it would be.
Friday, September 21, 2007
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Sales Training
Ok, yes, so I've been bad about blogging for a while, but it's because I've been wrapped up in the excitement of starting a new job, and making sure I work hard to impress everyone. I must say, though, that at times I feel like I'm back in business school, which is disturbing. Allow me to elaborate.
Given that I've entered Abbott Labs's rotational program for MBA grads, I get to choose where to spend my first year-long rotation. The natural place to start is Sales, where you get to see at the most basic level how a pharma company generates sales for its products. However, this means swallowing a humility pill, and becoming one of the unwashed - a sales rep.
Yes, go ahead, stare - I don't mind. Really. Ok, well, just a little bit. Alright, I want you to stop staring now. Seriously.
I will agree that pharma reps generally generate the same warm fuzzy feeling that do used car salesman. When I told my cousin Ahmer, who is a doctor, what I would be doing for the next year, she flat out refused to believe that I had spent $150,000 on my education to get to this point (she then told me how much she hated sales reps - don't worry Ahmer, we're coming after you). For that matter, my father still doesn't completely know what I do (although he suspects - shhh, don't tell him). My friends know simply that I am in a rotational program. Finally, I myself have had to suppress major doubts before jumping into this situation. But slowly I am beginning to understand.
Part of this enlightenment has come from the last two weeks, where I have been sequestered in a hotel near Chicago, undergoing Sales training and cramming my head full of medical knowledge. Because I will be working with cholesterol medication, I've had to learn the ins and outs of cardiovascular diseases, their causes, their diagnoses, their treatment algorithms, and the competitive landscape. For eight hours a day I join fellow MBA grads to sit in class, listen to lectures, and study. And take exams. Which I have to clear at a 90% or better. I'm allowed to fail a test once, but I have to retake the test the next morning and pass at 90% or better. Or I'm fired.
When was the last time you felt pressure like that? When was the last time YOU scored a 90% on anything? I know mine. I was in 5th grade and I got a 95% on my math test. Heck, even scoring high wouldn't be that big a deal if it wasn't for the fact that my livelihood depended on it. I'm competitive, and studied hard to get an "A" just as much as my fellow student throughout my school years. But at the end of the day I could always go home even if ended up with a "B" grade. Not here buddy. This place isn't for the weak of heart. The pressure, as they say, has been on for two weeks. And I will be the first to admit that I failed my first test, but I will just as quickly add that I recovered, and passed the makeup test with flying colors. I also feel better knowing that fellow students also tripped just as I did - the picture below was surreptitiously captured on my cell phone camera, and shows the review session that was held for all those individuals who failed the first exam. As you can see, I am hardly alone (I have blurred faces to protect privacy, for now - you know who you are and you better play nice.)
Still, suffering through the equivalent of a semester of med school every week would be ok if it weren't for the other individuals in the class with me (in addition to the ten or so MBAs) - the 160 or so sales reps. I am surrounded by happy, energetic people. Type A personalities. Energy levels are so high that were anyone to consume ANY caffeine I'm convinced they would explode. Everyone applauds everyone else all the time. No instructor question ever goes unanswered. I am never left to myself, because someone is always approaching to engage me in a conversation. By the end of the first two weeks I have found myself withdrawing and becoming "the quiet guy." It's crazy. The whole situation is like being in b-school again, but with super-high energy, happy, energetic people who would put the competitive b-school type to shame.
It has, in other words, been a rough start.
Given that I've entered Abbott Labs's rotational program for MBA grads, I get to choose where to spend my first year-long rotation. The natural place to start is Sales, where you get to see at the most basic level how a pharma company generates sales for its products. However, this means swallowing a humility pill, and becoming one of the unwashed - a sales rep.
Yes, go ahead, stare - I don't mind. Really. Ok, well, just a little bit. Alright, I want you to stop staring now. Seriously.
I will agree that pharma reps generally generate the same warm fuzzy feeling that do used car salesman. When I told my cousin Ahmer, who is a doctor, what I would be doing for the next year, she flat out refused to believe that I had spent $150,000 on my education to get to this point (she then told me how much she hated sales reps - don't worry Ahmer, we're coming after you). For that matter, my father still doesn't completely know what I do (although he suspects - shhh, don't tell him). My friends know simply that I am in a rotational program. Finally, I myself have had to suppress major doubts before jumping into this situation. But slowly I am beginning to understand.
Part of this enlightenment has come from the last two weeks, where I have been sequestered in a hotel near Chicago, undergoing Sales training and cramming my head full of medical knowledge. Because I will be working with cholesterol medication, I've had to learn the ins and outs of cardiovascular diseases, their causes, their diagnoses, their treatment algorithms, and the competitive landscape. For eight hours a day I join fellow MBA grads to sit in class, listen to lectures, and study. And take exams. Which I have to clear at a 90% or better. I'm allowed to fail a test once, but I have to retake the test the next morning and pass at 90% or better. Or I'm fired.
When was the last time you felt pressure like that? When was the last time YOU scored a 90% on anything? I know mine. I was in 5th grade and I got a 95% on my math test. Heck, even scoring high wouldn't be that big a deal if it wasn't for the fact that my livelihood depended on it. I'm competitive, and studied hard to get an "A" just as much as my fellow student throughout my school years. But at the end of the day I could always go home even if ended up with a "B" grade. Not here buddy. This place isn't for the weak of heart. The pressure, as they say, has been on for two weeks. And I will be the first to admit that I failed my first test, but I will just as quickly add that I recovered, and passed the makeup test with flying colors. I also feel better knowing that fellow students also tripped just as I did - the picture below was surreptitiously captured on my cell phone camera, and shows the review session that was held for all those individuals who failed the first exam. As you can see, I am hardly alone (I have blurred faces to protect privacy, for now - you know who you are and you better play nice.)
Still, suffering through the equivalent of a semester of med school every week would be ok if it weren't for the other individuals in the class with me (in addition to the ten or so MBAs) - the 160 or so sales reps. I am surrounded by happy, energetic people. Type A personalities. Energy levels are so high that were anyone to consume ANY caffeine I'm convinced they would explode. Everyone applauds everyone else all the time. No instructor question ever goes unanswered. I am never left to myself, because someone is always approaching to engage me in a conversation. By the end of the first two weeks I have found myself withdrawing and becoming "the quiet guy." It's crazy. The whole situation is like being in b-school again, but with super-high energy, happy, energetic people who would put the competitive b-school type to shame.It has, in other words, been a rough start.
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