Characteristics of real sales job

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Anonymous

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1. First and foremost, your manager is typically a sales manager and that is their title. Not some other goofy acronym that leaves out the word sales, for good reason I might add.

2, Your manager may only ride with you once or twice a year, if at all. None of this once/twice a month charade or multi-level management (ie 3-way) ride-along bullshit. So in essence, you will not have a babysitter to insure you are working.

These are my top 2. Feel free to post others that demonstrate we are not really in a true sales job.
 






I have had four ride alongs in three weeks with different levels of Merck. My counterparts are falling over each other, overlapping programs, backstabbing, confusing customers, everyone going off in different directions trying to "bring value". I have never seen a bigger waste of recourses in my life or so much effort to provide this "value" while forgoing doing something that will actually drive sales. I have not had a new clinical or new meaningful resource in at least five years. WTF?

No, this is not sales. In real sales, you actually have something to sell and know you've sold it or have an action step when you leave the call. We are PR people with no direction besides doing what we can to prove our competencies to our CTLs and DCOs (who, BTW, do not give a crap for anyone except covering their own asses and getting in a game of golf.) The elephant in the room is that our customer left it long ago and we are still standing there talking! I give this company maybe another five years of actual survival and then it will crumble under so much dead weight, especially with the scramble for new R&D. The speculation on earnings is way too high, while more middle management groups continue to be added that really do nothing to support sales with the exception of give us another test to take.

Hey, but they (account managers, HSCs, etc.) are out there talking about transitions of care, partnering, supporting grants and customer initiated research. Our customers don't care! They have their own people for all of it. They do not need a drug company to "help" them with their business. All they ever wanted was our money and to know how to use the products correctly. Our people listen to a couple of vendor lectures (bought by Mother) and suddenly we think we're the experts on healthcare performance! Get a clue. Stupid.
 






heard that a consulting company formed by ex-military mucky-mucks has been hired by
Mother to advice a group of "higher ups" as to future direction of this company - running more smoothly and more efficiently.

I say too little, too late.
 












Anonymous said:
heard that a consulting company formed by ex-military mucky-mucks has been hired by
Mother to advice a group of "higher ups" as to future direction of this company - running more smoothly and more efficiently.

I say too little, too late.
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This IS the problem. A military group telling a science-based research organization how to conduct business is a bad idea all the way around. That would be like a gourmet restaurant calling in a group from McDonald's to help them learn to cook and attract new customers. What exactly would anyone think military people could do to help a company learn to be creative, innovative, sales oriented and go back to creating worthwhile products? It is again, management covering their asses by paying outside organizations to pat themselves on the back and take some report to the stockholders and board that will "look" good so THEY have jobs. Is everyone around here just plain fcking nuts? I guess this is what lawyers do when given the power and the purse strings - deflect, deflect, deflect from the real problems/criminals and point the finger at something else/the bottom. Mark my thoughts. The next speech by our president will point the finger at us not being able to sell. I see PIPs in the future for 1/4 of the saleforce followed by termination and contract people in their place. This will be spun as a way to save the company money because the products are great, the marketing is outstanding, management is perfect so the problem has to be crappy salespeople who have no clue! Oh, and the ride alongs will double which will just cause our customers to close even more doors to industry. LOL
 






Anonymous said:
I have had four ride alongs in three weeks with different levels of Merck. My counterparts are falling over each other, overlapping programs, backstabbing, confusing customers, everyone going off in different directions trying to "bring value". I have never seen a bigger waste of recourses in my life or so much effort to provide this "value" while forgoing doing something that will actually drive sales. I have not had a new clinical or new meaningful resource in at least five years. WTF?

No, this is not sales. In real sales, you actually have something to sell and know you've sold it or have an action step when you leave the call. We are PR people with no direction besides doing what we can to prove our competencies to our CTLs and DCOs (who, BTW, do not give a crap for anyone except covering their own asses and getting in a game of golf.) The elephant in the room is that our customer left it long ago and we are still standing there talking! I give this company maybe another five years of actual survival and then it will crumble under so much dead weight, especially with the scramble for new R&D. The speculation on earnings is way too high, while more middle management groups continue to be added that really do nothing to support sales with the exception of give us another test to take.

Hey, but they (account managers, HSCs, etc.) are out there talking about transitions of care, partnering, supporting grants and customer initiated research. Our customers don't care! They have their own people for all of it. They do not need a drug company to "help" them with their business. All they ever wanted was our money and to know how to use the products correctly. Our people listen to a couple of vendor lectures (bought by Mother) and suddenly we think we're the experts on healthcare performance! Get a clue. Stupid.
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Merck will never crumble...they have more money than G_D...what will happen though is the only people that will benefit will be management (who rarely lose their jobs around here) and the sales force will continue to be tossed away like rotten garbage...your post is very good...you captured the total absurdity of what Merck has become very well....
 






Military skills used to be all about how to most effectively and efficiently break and destroy things in order to defeat a defined enemy. Who/What is Merck wanting to break and destroy these days? The "sales" force? Trust and value what? Merck once was about innovative products that our customers could trust and value. Trust and value came from MERCK products and the company's ethics that accompanied them, not some consultant partnering bullshit. Seems Merck is desparate to change this formula. Little wonder Merck seems to have and identity crisis. Little wonder Merck has been listed as one of the top 10 companies in greatest jeopardy from loss of customers.
 






All positions are important. They all take a different skill sets. One is no greater or less than other. Someone in R&D would not do well at sales and vice versa. It’s a symbiotic relationship. The all have their good and bad days.
 












In REAL sales careers, all that matters is results. It doesn't matter how you get the sale. They don't roll-play you to death, because it is on YOU to earn your own commission. Most importantly, REAL sales has a small base or draw, and a HUGE potential for uncapped commission. Pharma ISN'T REAL sales, because most reps float on compensation that's heavily weighted by a base. There's very little motivation to make those extra calls because the numbers are ambiguous anyway, and the benefit will only be icing on the cake.

Few would ask for this, because they like the big base/little bonus. But Merck should have a small base with potential of going WAY above the $100,000 mark. THEN you'd see solid reps succeed and stay, and you'd see those that coast disappear!

The fact that few reps would go for that says they aren't real sales people.
 






In a situation as you described above, small base plus uncapped "bonus" opportunity. how would you suggest that the sales be captured?

Unfortunately, sales are hard to capture accurately down to the rep level.
(More like impossible...)
There's the "X" factor which supposedly smooths out the data accounting for unreporting pharmacies, there's US mail order, mail order from Canadian pharmacies, managed care tiers favoring one region over another..etc etc etc.

I agree with you, that this is the way Pharma Sales should be, but it can never happen within our current health care system.

My suggestion - take the "sales" out of it, because we no longer can "sell" .
We should just be representatives. With a moderate salary, good benefits, car, no bonus whatsoever, unless you want to base it on how well the company does as a whole and gift us a bonus based on overall sales/increased profits falling to the bottom line.
 






We should always be called, "Professional Representatives". As others have pointed out: there are many factors affecting sales that are out of a rep's control. There are too many situations where sales cannot be properly credited back to the rep's level. We in reality call on the customers, representing Merck, and build goodwill and ask them to use our products. We are more or less a lobbyist or a PR person.
 






Anonymous said:
We should always be called, "Professional Representatives". As others have pointed out: there are many factors affecting sales that are out of a rep's control. There are too many situations where sales cannot be properly credited back to the rep's level. We in reality call on the customers, representing Merck, and build goodwill and ask them to use our products. We are more or less a lobbyist or a PR person.
Click to expand...

You should all be called parasites, not sales.
 












If pharma reps knew how lowly they are looked upon by other sales industries, they would want to separate themselves from the tag all together. I'm no longer with Merck or the industry, but I can tell everyone about THAT look in the interviewer's eyes when you talk about your pharma experience. They know what an increasing number of reps have come to know. This is not a serious career for someone who is serious about his/her career. Someone who is very mature from the beginning wouldn't ever consider this route. Others like myself (admittedly) had to grow to the realization that there is nothing "professional" or "meaningful" in pharma sales. They develop a sense of self-esteem and move on.

I simply feel sorry for grown adults who continue down this road. They have come to have no expectations of themselves.
 












I am no longer a rep - I am still in pharma. Have had other roles within pharma. What I will say is that my rep experience was probably some of the best experience I had in my career and experience you can't learn from a few field rides here and there. You can learn how to manage projects by managing projects, but you need to actually carry the bag and work a territory and do it day in and day out to actually know that job and to fully understand the commercial process.

You can all sit here and talk about is this real sales, is it valuable experience, etc. If you stay in pharma, yes, absolutely.
 






Anonymous said:
I am no longer a rep - I am still in pharma. Have had other roles within pharma. What I will say is that my rep experience was probably some of the best experience I had in my career and experience you can't learn from a few field rides here and there. You can learn how to manage projects by managing projects, but you need to actually carry the bag and work a territory and do it day in and day out to actually know that job and to fully understand the commercial process.

You can all sit here and talk about is this real sales, is it valuable experience, etc. If you stay in pharma, yes, absolutely.
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Yes, especially when we only had 1 or 2-rep max per territory. You have to know about everything and work the territory. You became part of the system. You were the hospital, specialty, long-term care, specialty, managed care reps all rolled into one. You initiate a project and you are the only one responsible for its success or failure. Now they have a f**king rep for everything and it is all screwed up as our customers don't exactly remember them. We cannot say much as all these "special reps" report back to someone above about all well they are becoming movers and shakers (in their own twisted minds).
 






Bottom line for me - ALL the fun that was once a part of the pharma rep's job has been take away. The job was rewarding when one could work with a degree of autonomy and effectively individualize the job to fit one's strengths that would achieve desired results/sales. When Merck abolished this in favor of mass standardization and a cookie cutter approach with little if any room for representative work style DIVERSITY, I left. Merck can talk diversity all they want except for where it really has an impact.
 






Anonymous said:
Bottom line for me - ALL the fun that was once a part of the pharma rep's job has been take away. The job was rewarding when one could work with a degree of autonomy and effectively individualize the job to fit one's strengths that would achieve desired results/sales. When Merck abolished this in favor of mass standardization and a cookie cutter approach with little if any room for representative work style DIVERSITY, I left. Merck can talk diversity all they want except for where it really has an impact.
Click to expand...

I was part of a diversity council. The questions we raised were too sensitive. A tenured manager volunteered himself/herself to be the liaison whose purpose was to filter out everything before presenting the results to the director. Eventually all the members were replaced with brand new reps and mostly recent college grads from privileged backgrounds. I still chuckle whenever Merck posts a photo of the director of the diversity dept., a black gentleman because we know he is a token minority and all our questions were tossed away for those years I was on the council. Looking back I realized Merck wanted to create all these diversity councils to appear to be sensitive but really want us not to take it seriously nor make any suggestion at all.
 






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