What really killed a very good P&G Pharma?

Discussion in 'Procter & Gamble' started by Anonymous, Sep 25, 2009 at 10:52 PM.

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  1. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    When Procter & Gamble Pharma had the foresight to pick out Prilosec before it went OTC and run the numbers up through great selling all before it went OTC was a good example of a company that was on top of things. Even after P&G took Prilosec over the counter the sales force at that time still ran with the old Norwich-Eaton personality....it was shortly after that phase that the wheels began to come off...I think the big problem was the bringing in of non pharma people from inside P&G which began to really change the basic philosophy of the group...The initial phase of bringing the two companies together was well done. The trip to Atlanta to integrate the pharma unit with P&G was really a worthwhile exercise, and convinced many of the old liner salesman within pharma that P&G was really a worthwhile operation and many were proud to be "in the fold"...Then management began to really screw things up; they brought in the biggest bunch of idiot managers the business has ever seen! I remember getting kicked out of offices because my ops mgr made some really dumb and rude comments to the doc. Their overall managing abilities were POOR, very very poor! That is when everybody's attitude began to slip - badly. To me, one of the best things that was positive was the using of newly purchased numbers to rank doc's by the number of rx's they were writing. Once many of us learned how to do that easily, we started to see some great numbers start to pile up...quarter by quarter the big doc's began to write the big numbers! Then we slipped badly back to the other P&G bad management practices by continuing to bring in bad, inexperienced ops managers that continued to erode the good feelings that were built up earlier in the "marriage"...Then after all the promises of new products we ended up with Actonel. Don't get me wrong! A great product, but not a Prilosec! Not a blockbuster by any means, but Actonel was a very hard sell due to the education that was required of both patient and docs. Our great pharma organization continued to be dismantled at the same time...Morale really began to slip due management coninuing to promise support and new products that never quite made it....a losing proposition, to say the least...Now there is really nothing left but a bunch of people that don't really deserve to sell pharmaceuticals and are just trying to cover their collective asses to stay alive. It could have been saved, but top management in P&G didn't have a slightest idea on how to save what really could have become a very profitable organization!!! Lastly, this DIVERSITY thing was really a divider of people!! I could not believe how such great company could ruin morale to the point that many people didn't even want to get out of bed in the morning cause they knew everything they did would be foreshadowed by diversity decisions that none of us had ANY control over. If anything was said, off to Alaska they would go! (that is almost a literal statement!)...The diveristy groups would hold meetings about 4 times a year and stay at the best hotels in the nation, whilst the rest of the group would be in field wondering whether they would have a job next week. This was the nail in the coffin! With this said, I can hardly wait to hear the shit start to fly!!!
    For the W/C group I can only say that the existing sales force of P&G pharma is still an organization that can stand next to you! They are well trained and come from "good roots" !!
    So don't get too cocky as you might have your head handed to you!
     

  2. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Diversity is pervisity. It killed the pharma division. I remember when Rick June said a t meeting years ago that they were at Florida A&M recruiting black pharmacists. Or another
    high level manager stating that "Diversity needs to be part of our DNA." PGP used minority highering as a way to meet their diversity goals as an organization.

    These acts were racist and wrong. It killed a pharma division that had some promise early on.
     
  3. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    So nice to see an intelligent post here from time to time. I agree with everything you said. I tell all the young people I run into not to work for a fortune 500 company, because you will be held back and made to do the work of the minorities so the corporation looks good. The best thing is to go into your own business or to work for a mid size company that rewards people for their hard work and doesn’t use them to cover their diversity issues.
    This division was damaged by all the points you mention. But many have no idea just how bad it will be under W/C. Make no mistake about it, the culture will be different and not in a good way. Most will run for the door inside of a yr. or sooner.
    The OTC reps life will change too. Different rules and expectations. The product managers have high goals and their careers depend on it, so look for a surprise to come. I know, but can’t say. Very hush hush for now.
     
  4. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    You ignorant fool. Opporunities were given to people who worked hard and were over looked in the past. There are many reasons why PGP failed. Poor upper management choices and actions were primary. They deserve most of it. Quit blaming diversity for everything, idiot!
     
  5. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Wow, really? "highering?" My goodness.
     
  6. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Yes. Show me where in PGP diversity worked? It's final legacy is failure.
     
  7. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    You pick diversity as pharma's failure, but I feel that the ops put in place were the reason for the divisions failure. Some of the people couldn't manage their way out of a wet paper bag, let alone manage people and heaven forbid lead a sales team. Dita Ledbetter is a prime example of an incompetent given an ops roll. What a waste. She failed her teams and P&G at every turn, time and time again, and for multiple teams. She cost the company a lot of money. As a share holder I am livid that such a useless employee was allowed to fail again and again. It is because of Pharma people like Dita Ledbetter (among other failed desicions by upper managment) that pharma went into the crapper. Let's face it, it were she resides.
     
  8. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Another diversity hire gone bad!
     
  9. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    It's nice to see an intelligent post and I agree with much of what you said. My career spanned Eaton Labs, Norwich-Eaton and PGP, so I'll add my two cents.

    Norwich-Eaton had estabilshed a tremendous rapport with urologists over many years with Furadantin, Macrodantin, MacPac and Macrodid and at one time had a superior urological film library for urologists. I thought that P&G dropped the ball by not pursuing additional urological drugs. In addition, N-E had great rapport with OBGYN's and should have pursued more OBGYN drugs. The great thing with both specialities is that we had great access. Instead, P&G went after cardio drugs for very serious cardio problems and none of these came to market. While, the PGP sales force did a good job with Ziac for hypertension, placing a very complex cardio drug indicated for life and death situations in the hands of the PGP sales force struck me as a very poor decision. Thankfully, PGP never got these drugs.

    I do give credit to P&G for Actonel and that drug has been a billion dollar blockbuster, but,as we all know, new competition, generics and MC formularies have taken, and will continue to take, a severe toll on Actonel sales.

    While P&G attracts an abundance of very talented people to their corporation, their training focuses on selling the vast array of OTC products. Unfortunately, P&G never seemed to understand that the OTC market is far different from the RX marketplace. As a result, too often....OTC selling strategies were brought over to the RX side and more often than not....they failed. Also, too often...P&G personnel were rotated from OTC to RX and back to OTC. In short, PGP found itself competing against pure RX drug companies that had far more RX experience at every level then PGP.

    In addition, I felt that PGP training, too often, fell far short in preparing new reps for the real world of pharmaceuticals. Reps hit the streets unprepared for the everyday difficulties in selling RX drugs and often suffered morale problems and turnover resulted.

    Although, co-marketing has been used for a number of years throughout the RX industry, I never liked it....because it muddied the waters as to which rep was pulling his weight. It was far better when reps had individual territories in which they were solely accountable.
    In addition, co-marketing strategies resulted in too many reps seeing physicians too often resulting in increasing access problems..... as physicians got fed up with reps in their office selling the same drug far too often. IMO, this was a huge mistake by pharma....as they dramatically increased sales forces. Now, we are seeing a huge downsizing.

    For many years, N-E and PGP only promoted reps to mgrs after at least 5 years in the field. All of that has changed in the past 10-15 years as too many reps were promoted with too little experience and poor managerial skills.

    As far as Diversity goes.....I think most everyone values diversity as long as it treats everyone equally. I had the opportunity to work for two very solid and competent African-Americans.....the were a joy to work for. However, I also saw a number of minorities who were treated to a different standard in training and in the field. No company can hold any employee, whether they are white, black, brown or purple, to a different standard without creating morale problems among other employees. All companies have an obligation to make certain that there no favortism.....that all employees will be evaluated and judged by the same standards.....unfortunately, that is not hapening in far too many instances.

    The overall answer to your question is that P&G failed in pharma because P&G is a consumer company that simply would not turn over the PGP division to very experienced RX management and leave them there. As a result, poor decisions were made in too many instances that simply couldn't be overcome. Having said that, P&G is a highly successful company and I appreciated the opportunity to work for them. I thoroughly enjoyed most of my many years in the industry, but the golden age ended many years ago. Everything changes and now the entire RX industry is going through massive changes. Time will tell what it will eventually end up looking like, but it is obvious that there will be far fewer reps throughout the industry. I wish everyone well that remains in pharma.
     
  10. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Says the black women who just received a fat promotion and an increase in salary since the involuntary packages went out in June. P&G has obviously taken to dark chocolate, I hear it's better for te heart! Still whatever... the black community still crys over their ancestors being slaves and how the white man held them down. Held them down long enough to employ them or make sure they have free everything from food, healthcare and even paying living expenses such as electricity! P&G claims diversity for every situation hence the reps complaining about it now!
     
  11. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    If Norwich-Eaton was that great, and it was predominately white males with a good ole boy network, why did it fail? P&G had to rescue them before all the good white boy were thrown in the street. What PGP was left with was a bunch of overpaid old white guys.

    Quit blaming diversity for everything. Last I checked, the board of directors is mostly white males. Blame them you moron!
     
  12. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Norwich-Eaton was a small pharma company with a terrific sales force of 350. N-E was very successful for many years in promoting the various nitrofuran drugs....and a variety of other RX drugs over the years of which many....such as Tricofuran....are no longer around. N-E had very limited monies for research and unfortunately a couple of promising drugs never made it to market. As a result, in 1982 N-E sold out to P&G that had no RX division.

    For you information, pharma was virtually all white males until the 80's when more and more women were hired and other minorities. You obviously have zero info or understanding of the past history of N-E or PGP.....and your agenda appears to trash white males as overpaid non-productive reps. It is a false and totally unfair picture. Those white male reps at N-E were on salary plus commission and were solely responsible for their own territories. I was immensely proud of the N-E sales force.....it was a crackerjack sales force that went toe to toe with much larger sales forces and more often than not....we won!

    PGP didn't fail because of diversity, but too often holding minorities to different standards certainly doesn't benefit any company because all employees want to be treated the same.
    It is a fact that PGP in recent years hired and promoted individuals that were not deserving.
    I don't think it's too much to ask that regardless of color, ethic group or religion that all employees be held to the same standard. Unfortunately, that is happening less and less in America today!
     
  13. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    It seems like diversity doomed both Norwich and PGP. When companies over-emphsize diversity disease the culture and quality declines. That quality goes from top
    to bottom. As both of these organizations looked to diversify thinking it was meeting the demands of the market, a brain drain of quality occured.

    You made some good points of other reasons. But each time diversity was considered an improvement and failure was the result!
     
  14. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Starts and ends with poor management and bad management decisions. And WC gets to inherit many of them.
     
  15. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Might want to read “The Bell Curve”. “ Minorities get equal pay for unequal work.” Companies don’t have an option because of the federal laws. The best and the brightest people will and are leaving the US. The best years of the US are behind it now because of this.
     
  16. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    You must be one of those "Wimpy White Guys." Compromised and unwilling to stand up and speak out.
     
  17. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    1. Norwich Eaton never failed, nor did they force diversity.

    2. So you thought a soap guy could lead RX?
     
  18. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    barbie/stache boy under the sheets in --thats a POA
     
  19. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    As a minority female, I had to prove myself twice as much as the rest of my white team to my white managers. One had no pharma experience and the other, just as bad as a manager, but was promoted because he was able to move to Cinci for two years.That seems to be the requirement for a management role at PGP. It's a shame that management promotions depended on whether you could uproot your family to move for a promotion, regardless of whether or not you were qualified. And, PGP fostered discrimination; so no, diversity was not its downfall! They just swept it under the rug. To this day, they harbor managers who are unqualified and continue to discriminate against minorities and working mothers. Believe me, I know! And, I know other women who suffered the same. The demise of PGP, poor management!
     
  20. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    I am a white guy who spoke up at a meeting several years ago. during a break, my manager asked if I was trying to get fired. I learned right there to not say anything during diversity topics and women's group discussions. I would just sit there and bite my lip. You may call that being a wimpy white guy, but I wanted to keep my job. Never once did I hear a woman or minority stand up and say,"I don't think this is right". We had womens group meetings, separate lunch for minorities, opportunities to mingle with management etc., and not one person said this is unfair?