Medical sales executives continue to lead the way in the pay stakes, but how do they continue to defy remuneration odds?

A recent Channel 4 documentary exposed just how sensitive the issue of salary is in the workplace. Employees at a leading plumbing firm in London were asked, face-to-face, to reveal their salary to their colleagues. The outcome wasn’t pleasant. Employees working alongside each discovered they were, in some instances, paid tens of thousands of pounds less than the person working only a few feet away from them. Whilst employees’ pay was eventually brought in-line with their unsuspecting workmates, the moral of the film highlighted just how much people dislike being short-changed – especially in their wage packet. 
The Pf Company Perception, Motivation and Satisfaction Survey – now in its 11th year – again highlighted the importance of salary to those working within the medical sales industry. It’s of little surprise that in an era of austerity salary came out on top as the main motivating factor for respondents. While the significance of money is there for all to see, the satisfaction respondents feel when they open their wage slips is somewhat surprising – despite being paid well above UK average. Satisfaction ratings showed salary placed as the 13th out of 18 options.

Figures from the website Payscale.com show that the average salary for men in the UK is now a slightly more than £30,000. For women it’s around six thousand pound less. Short change when compared to figures from the Pf Survey where the median salary from men is £45,000 and women £40,000. Despite nearly all pharmaceutical companies announcing plans to tightening its belts, employees in the medical sales sector are clearly still extremely well paid.

Overall figures from the survey show that annual remuneration packages range from £11,000 up to a wallet-busting £107,000. The median salary for full-time workers travelling from job to job around their territories was £43,000. Even those on part-time hours earned a medium salary of £26,702 – with the highest earner working reduced hours taking home a cool 54k.

The going rate
A career in the medical sales industry pays. The median salary for respondents who have less than six months’ experience within the sector was £23,000 - see Figure 1. One individual began their career within the industry taking home £58,000 per year! The median salaries of those with additional years of experience continued to rise with those clocking up eight years or more earning an average of £45,000. 
Age also plays an important factor.  The median salaries of those aged 25 and under continue to rise to respondents aged between 45 and 54 years old. Individuals in that age bracket reported a median salary of £45,000, yet those aged beyond their 54th birthday saw their median annual wage fall by two thousand pound. With an ageing workforce, has the medical sales industry targeted this age group to make savings?
Patients may suffer as a result of the postcode lottery but it also seems that medical sales executives do as well – see Figure 2. Median salaries ranged from £42,125 in Scotland up to £47,000 in London. The south east, south west and Wales all clock up median salaries of £45,000 with the north east and Midlands/east slightly behind.

Individual roles
Pharma’s switch in methodology away from a traditional headcount approach to a key account model is reflected in the survey with the median salary for Key Account Managers being £10,500 more than that of a Primary Care Representative (£33,000). Primary and Secondary Care representatives reported a slightly better median salary at £38,880. However, that figure is almost doubled by the median salary of second-line managers at £74k. At the other end of the pay scale, nurse advisors reported the lowest median salary at 30k – as highlighted in Figure 3.

Although public sector workers may have had to endure pay freezes, the same can’t be said of medical sales executives. For the second year running respondents have again reported hearty pay rises – one lucky individual banked a £20,000 rise! Overall, the median salary increase was slightly more than a thousand pound. Key Account Managers reported £100 on top of that figure with second-line managers again enjoying the largest slice of the pie, after receiving a median rise of £2,778.

On top of generous salary increases, respondents also enjoyed bonuses the majority of workers from other sectors – banking aside – could only dream of. In total, the survey found that sales executives received a median bonus of three thousand pounds. The maximum bonus was £50,000. Key Account Managers saw their bonuses fall in line with the average median figure, primary and secondary care representatives were rewarded a thousand pound less than everybody else, and first-line and second-line managers again enjoying generous gratuity sums.

However, very much like salary, respondents were clearly unimpressed with their bonuses. In the satisfaction stakes, only share scheme finished behind bonus in the minds of respondents. It would seem, much like pharma’s shareholders, medical sales executives are a difficult bunch to please – despite enjoying above-inflation rewards.

Stephen Whitehead outlines the ABPI’s latest initiatives to facilitate collaboration – and how sales professionals have a key part to play .

This year the ABPI is launching a Regional Partnership team to help the industry establish and develop sustainable relationships with the NHS at a regional level. The team, deploying experienced industry professionals in each of the four regional SHA clusters, aims to promote and facilitate collaborative working as a means to improve patient outcomes. Its key objectives are to identify and remove existing barriers to accessing innovative medicines, to help develop regional partnership projects and to share best practice across the country. The initiative reflects the growing recognition that improving patient health in a constrained financial environment will be best achieved by adopting a more collaborative approach. And there is an increasing consensus across both parties that, after years of developing adversarial relationships, the direction of travel towards NHS/industry partnerships is the right one for patient care.

But progress is an incremental process. The perceived cultural barriers that have historically plagued the relationship and impacted access will not be overcome overnight. “Trust and reputation has widely been acknowledged as an issue for industry – but it’s getting better,” says Stephen Whitehead, CEO at the ABPI. “In fact, it has dramatically improved. You can 12 see that from the Innovation, Health & Wealth (IHW) review: the NHS really wants to partner with pharma. In turn, as an industry we know that we are operating within restricted NHS budgets, and that we need to make it clear that we are not always there to sell something. Joint working is not about developing something that can help companies achieve a sales target on a quarterly basis, it’s about establishing a new way of working that will redefine the relationship between us and the customer. That will take time.”

In an evolutionary process, the ABPI appears determined to take the lead – to trail-blaze the concept of partnership working from a top-line strategic position and help ease the concerns of more anxious NHS customers. “The driving platform for joint working from the side of the industry should be the ABPI,” says Stephen. “We established the joint working protocol with the DH, and have developed the code of practice and regulatory infrastructure to enable it to happen. We’ve therefore created the headroom to allow partnerships to be established. Most parts of the NHS have understood and grasped this. It’s now up to us to lead, and for companies to take the opportunities within that.”

IMPROVING ACCESS

With access to NHS customers a perennial problem for UK pharma, the battle to develop the joint working agenda is a challenging one for individual companies. Medical sales professionals are tasked with advancing discussions, but attempts are often stymied due to diminishing levels of customer access. The ABPI believes its NHS Partnerships initiative will play a major part in raising awareness of partnership working, and overcoming access issues on an industry-wide basis. “NHS Partnerships will help industry
engage with key NHS stakeholders in England and ensure partnership conversations happen at a regional level. It’s not about individual products – we will not be talking about those – but we will be a facilitator of dialogue around joint working, aligned with the partnership principles set out by David Nicholson. We will be looking closely at the national issues on uptake and access, and any policy that emerges around that – and reinforcing it locally. Critically, NHS Partnerships isn’t the creation of ‘talking shops’, it’s about being able to facilitate on the key issues – which are fundamentally about access and uptake of innovation.”

NHS Partnerships has already been welcomed by the Department of Health, whose Director of Innovation & Service Improvement, Miles Ayling, said: “The ABPI partnership team will help build stronger links between industry and the NHS, as described in IHW. Beyond medicines, we are also looking at how all concerned can share skills, expertise and knowledge to improve the health of UK patients and help transform lives.”

REPUTATION

The long-standing issue of industry mistrust does, at long last, seem to be fading within the NHS. This was reflected in the ABPI’s seat at the top table of discussions around IHW last year, and has been reinforced by Stephen Whitehead’s involvement on the IHW Implementation Board. In addition to the partnerships initiative, the ABPI (along with ABHI) has also established a series of pilot projects with the NHS Confederation to look at how joint working can make a difference in selected disease areas. Pilots are already underway in mental health, circulatory diseases, diabetes and long-term conditions. “This is about providing examples of best practice within the NHS so customers can understand what we mean and establish that there is nothing for them to be worried about,” says Stephen.

“We have a strong status, but we’ve not yet fully utilised it in the context of joint working capability. That’s what these initiatives have been set up to do. This is a whole new world and a very exciting one – ten years ago we could never have had these relationships. But now that we are here, we need to approach customers gently and appropriately, and work with the NHS collaboratively and co-operatively to ensure that we dispel any of those old misunderstandings.”

And so, in the new environment, what role will sales professionals and Key Account Management play in NHS engagement? “The role of sales is evolving quite rapidly,” says Stephen. “Sales engagement is increasingly about liaison, as well as detailing around a product. It’s about facilitating collaborative working – and the salesforce has a key role to play in this.”

Maxine Vaccine considers the motives of politicians, clinicians and the pharmaceutical industry and concludes that no matter what direction you approach it from, health is never a simple issue.

My last blog, ‘Life in the balance’, provoked some interesting feedback. I had argued that the current government’s application of free-market principles to the NHS would encourage those doctors who saw what they do primarily as a business rather than as a service. An industry expert commented that a series of health policies over the past two decades, from GP fundholding to QOF indicators, have promoted the same mentality.

This of course is true. Not only are New Labour’s fingerprints all over the current phase of NHS reforms, but the medical profession has never been unified in its perspective on the relationship between health and financial priorities. Different doctors have different attitudes – or have various attitudes in different proportions. Where important decisions are concerned, most of us have mixed motives.

However, it’s rather in the nature of blogs, Twitter feeds, press releases and Parliamentary statements that we pretend otherwise. “Only one thing matters to me” is the opening clause (explicit or implicit) of almost any public statement. “I’m torn” would be bad business, bad politics and bad bedside manner... but it would, almost every time, be the truth.

So let’s be clear that when doctors say “We are motivated only by clinical priorities” it is not necessarily the pure truth. They are motivated to succeed at a professional and business level, and that may extend to practice finances. When the BMA decided to oppose the Heath and Social Care Bill it was not only on clinical grounds, but because the business proposition did not appeal despite its lucrative potential. Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ is a relevant concept here: the fear of losing control may override the desire to increase your income.

And when politicians say “Our priority is only to improve services” that is not necessarily the pure truth either. Most comment on the NHS reforms has focused on whether the Government is right to believe the new system will deliver better patient outcomes. But is that the only issue? Politicians are not doctors, and – as recent events have proved – they don’t even want to listen to doctors. It’s not cynical to see NHS reform in terms of wider political priorities for society and the economy: that is precisely how politicians see it.

There’s no doubt that Andrew Lansley would like to see patient outcomes improve. But his sense of what can achieve that does not come from expert medical opinion: it comes from the political ideology that assumed privatisation would make the rail service cheaper, safer and more reliable. At least as important, from his viewpoint as health secretary, is the priority of breaking down the national and public sector employment basis of health workers, so that local employers can set their own terms and conditions.

As for the pharma industry – well, it depends on who you talk to. Your CEO will tell you (and the media) that everything your company does is driven by a passionate commitment to making a difference for patients. The public largely believe that everything your company does is driven by the need to make a difference for shareholders. The truth is that even a humble field representative is motivated by a complex blend of factors: short-term targets, longer-term business growth, customer relationships, clinical success, public reputation and the need to laugh once in a while.

Like mixing a drink, medical sales is all about finding the right balance – and not losing your own.

Maxine’s views are not necessarily those of Pharmaceutical Field.

Tracking and responding to NHS change in a highly competitive Olympic year will be a test of endurance for medical sales professionals. In a light-hearted article, David Round examines why winning a place amongst the medals will depend upon getting your preparation right.

It’s a well-worn cliché that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. But as the UK pharmaceutical industry heads into an Olympic year when the pace of change amongst its NHS customer-base will undoubtedly increase, medical sales professionals will need to demonstrate more than a little knowledge to achieve a podium position for their products. The Health and Social Care Bill may still be some way from the finishing line, but as the health service continues its transition towards the seemingly inevitable, changes on the ground are already taking place. And the implications for pharma are huge. The industry cannot afford to sit and wait – it needs to act now to ensure its sales and marketing communications are reaching the right customers, with the right message at the right time. For pharmaceutical sales executives, it’s about developing more than knowledge: it’s a question of intelligence. And the answers may be right at their fingertips.

It has been widely documented that the NHS is working its way through a period of unprecedented change – both in its working practices and, of course, in its organisational structure. As a result, pharmaceutical companies – often criticised for being ‘data rich but information poor’ – will, more than ever before, need to maximise their data assets to deliver a more customer-centric approach to selling. And sales professionals will need to draw on all the information at their disposal to develop and deliver relevant and robust value propositions that satisfy customer need.

The noise-driven, share of voice model of pharmaceutical sales and marketing has become like Monty Python’s parrot: it has ceased to be. Today’s approach, which relies on a reduction in call volumes, is less linear, more selective and much more sophisticated. Key Account Management is leading the industry pack. But whilst the approach is, in theory, more measured, making it work requires quality customer data as a platform to identify ‘key accounts’ and, crucially, the ability to translate that data into meaningful market intelligence. Companies are becoming much smarter in segmenting their key customers – but faced with moving targets across a changing NHS, maintaining the accuracy, and in the process the efficiency, of the approach is not easy. It is, however, imperative.

The race to reform
The transition towards the new environment is already well under way. Last year in England 152 Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) were reorganised into 51 PCT Clusters of variable size, while the ten Strategic Health Authorities (SHAs) were restructured to form four large regional clusters. By April 2013, PCTs and SHAs will be extinct and Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) and the National Commissioning Board will spearhead the commissioning of NHS services under a new-look structure. If you throw into the mix the onset of Clinical Senates, Health and Wellbeing Boards and new Commissioning Support units (which may well emerge as private organisations and therefore new customers), it is easy to see that an already complex customer matrix is set to become even more complicated. And that’s simply the start line.

Critics of the reforms claim that the situation on the ground is fast approaching chaos within the NHS, as the wider organisation struggles to implement changes even before the Health and Social Care Bill has achieved Royal Assent. But in the interim period while the health service readies itself for the inevitable, UK pharmaceutical companies cannot afford to let their sales and marketing operations become similarly chaotic. Tracking and more importantly responding to change throughout the transition period will be vital for medical sales professionals if they are to support their customers through the metamorphosis and, in the process, meet their own commercial objectives.

Access to quality data that can not only enable Account Managers to make the right targeting decisions, but can also help them engage in the most appropriate customer dialogue, will be critical to success. It is not simply a case of knowing who to target – understanding why and how they should be approached is equally important. It is this understanding that separates knowledge from intelligence. And separates winners from also-rans.

Keeping on track
Sales professionals not only need to identify their ‘key accounts’, they also need to understand the varied environments in which these individuals operate. What challenges do they face? What are their key priorities? Do they carry out more than one role – or sit on a variety of boards and committees in addition to their main job? If so, how does this impact their spheres of influence? How pivotal are they in driving service redesign, influencing formulary decisions, or facilitating joint working within their local organisation? Where do their roles and their needs overlap with your product or service?

This is standard market access. And it’s vital. Pharmaceutical sales professionals need to define how they engage with the NHS and why their customers should want to engage with them. They need to establish how they are going to deliver value and improve outcomes for the health service and its patients. And to achieve this, they must understand their local health economy, its priorities and objectives, and identify the key stakeholders whom they can help support to meet those needs. What is the structure of the local organisation? What is its indicative budget and its strategic plan? Who is responsible for commissioning in your disease area? What areas are emerging Commissioning Support Units going to be supporting commissioning in – and what are they not? As PCT clusters evolve and CCGs take shape, which customers are most relevant today, and how relevant will they be tomorrow or indeed in two years’ time? Only by tracking customers in real time as they make their transitional journey towards the new NHS can sales professionals be sure that their interactions are aligned with that change, and be prepared to respond accordingly when required.

Technology in a team sport
The Key Account Manager in the modern market must, therefore, have the mental preparation of an Olympic athlete – but work on the basis that the race is never won. The NHS is a dynamic marketplace where change is continual. The Key Account teams that are best able to track, capture and share intelligence will be best placed to emerge victorious. The role of the Key Account Manager is, after all, an individual pursuit in a team sport.

The tools to support ‘informed’ Account Management are already here. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems that help capture and share vital customer intelligence have been in common currency across the UK drug sector for many years. But never before has their value to the medical sales professional been so important. Industry surveys suggest that CRM usage amongst front-line sales professionals could still be improved – and this is essential. CRM systems are only as good as the data that is put into them. But when collected and shared properly, that data is there to help medical sales professionals. In a fast-evolving customer environment that will almost certainly intensify as the NHS continues its inexorable march towards a new structure, key account management can only be enhanced by the knowledge and intelligence a good CRM system can help deliver.

In fact, the sheer volume of likely NHS change in the next 12 months could provide a catalyst for 2012 to become the year when CRM finally comes of age. And those sales professionals who recognise its potential to significantly support customer interactions – and make for a more intelligent and appropriate engagement – will undoubtedly reap the rewards.

But the time to act is now. In an Olympic year, the fast track is the only option. After all, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

David Round is UK General Manager, Cegedim Relationship Management.

New Year’s resolutions around the country are currently been broken as employees again forget to send their CV off to one of the various internet jobs board – or even Pharmajobs.co.uk  – and apply for that new job which will make everything better in 2012. Except, in all likelihood, it won’t.

Figures recently released from the Office of National Statistics confirmed what the majority of us already know: the jobs market in the UK is extremely fragile and looks set to remain so for the foreseeable future. The risks of applying for a new position at another company and leaving behind a stable job far outweigh the benefits it would seem.

But is there another way of increasing job satisfaction without having to write a resignation letter and go through another morning of introductions and cautious welcomes by new colleagues? The answer is yes. With companies cautious to approve widespread salary increases more are turning to improving satisfaction and moral in the workplace.

Employers such as Carlsberg – probably the best – BT and The Police Service of Northern Ireland have all introduced employee well-being programmes which have resulted in driving performance levels and delivering business success. But this approach is nothing new for pharmaceutical companies.

Using Pf’s annual Company Perception, Motivation and Satisfaction Survey disgruntled medical sales staff have been venting their frustrations and revealing what they believe is the good, bad and ugly side of the pharmaceutical industry for the past ten years. The results not only give respondents the chance, behind the shield of autonomy, to have their say about what they’d change in their company, but the opportunity for employers to make the changes staff say will improve moral and satisfaction.

So, instead of building up frustrations at your company’s substandard bonus scheme or moaning religiously at an uneven work-life balance, have your say today on the topics which matter the most. It may even work in your advantage!

Available online at www.pharmasurvey.co.uk or in this month’s issue of Pharmaceutical Field, for every completed questionnaire 25p is donated to a register charity.

As 2011 draws to a close, it's clear that the world of the medical sales professional continues to change. In an environment increasingly dependent upon proving value, it's pleasing to discover that on a global scale, the work of the drug representative is valued by more than 90% of physicians. Undoubtedly however, the number of representatives in the market place has fallen dramatically in the past few years. In the UK, commentators estimate the collective field force now totals somewhere between 6,500 and 7,000 - a significant reduction from the heyday of some 12,000-plus less than a decade ago.

A key article in this month's Pharmaceutical Field moves beyond the rhetoric of a changing field force and, in an all-too-rare moment of clarity, presents some actual real world data that shows how both contact rates and face-to-face calls with GPs have incrementally fallen in the last ten years. 93% of global physicians may well value the information exchanges they enjoy with industry representatives, but in the UK, access to GPs continues to be a major challenge. In a changing NHS, starved of resource, this will only continue. The fall in contact rates may, of course, simply be due to the industry's wider transition towards a KAM approach – and the fact that newer customers and influencers may be even harder to access than the traditional GP.

One further area of change for sales professionals is the incremental move from traditional detailing methodologies, to more digital means of presenting information using mobile technologies. Between 2006 and 2009, only 16% of new marketing initiatives in Pharma was being developed for mobile devices. By 2010 this global figure is now around the 50% mark – and many of these developments are being placed in the hands of sales representatives via iPad and other mobile devices. Developers and, more importantly, customers claim such presentation is more engaging and memorable – but crucially, the delivery of information to GPs via mobile technology still requires human interaction to bring it truly to life. Digital detailing is there to support the work of the 'rep', not replace it.

So there is much to look forward to as medical sales moves into a new year. The landscape is changing and the challenges don't get any easier – but the value of human-to-human interaction in the exchange of key medical information remains as strong as ever.

The countdown to the Pf Awards 2012 has officially begun. The most exciting awards ceremony for UK medical sales professionals has now launched and is open for entries for what promises to be yet another competitive and compelling occasion.

The Pf Awards are unique. Not only are they supported by the ABPI, but all candidates entered into the process are nominated by their company and not the customer. This ensures that only the industry’s top performers get to take part – guaranteeing competition of the highest possible standard.

The awards are now in their 12th year and continue to recognise high achievers within the industry. They have evolved and been developed over this period using feedback from the industry, judges and an independent advisory board.

As always, our purpose and vision is to deliver a cross-industry awards programme which rewards excellence in pharmaceutical sales in a variety of categories. With this in mind, three new categories have been added to the selection of accolades to be presented in 2012; Sales Team, Joint Working and Customer Recognition Awards.

In the coming months we will be taking a look at each of the categories and outlining key criteria for potential candidates. We begin by examining the Joint Working, Medical Representative and Account Team Awards.

Joint Working Award

The new Joint Working Award has been introduced to recognise where a working relationship with a customer has made a meaningful difference to patients, or patients’ services. There is no set length of service required to be nominated for this category, although compliance with the ABPI Code should be demonstrated. To be considered, there must be positive feedback or endorsement from a customer and both parties must have a vested interest in the joint working initiative. Candidates can be in either a field-based or office-based role. During the assessment, candidates are required to give a short presentation outlining their joint working venture.

Medical Representative Award

The New Medical Representative Award, which has been a longstanding category at the Pf Awards, has been renamed as the Medical Representative Award. Candidates should have up to five years experience in a primary care role within the industry at the point of entry. An ABPI examination pass is also required. Candidates will be asked to participate in a company product sales call, complete a written case study and also present a pre-prepared presentation.

The Pf Awards 2011 winner of the New Medical Representative Award was Claire Carr (pictured) of Astellas. The award was Claire’s first as a medical sales professional and although she found the process to be demanding, it was also something she relished and embraced. “The experience was a challenging one from the initial nomination all the way through to the application process and then assessment day and presentation,” she said. “It was a tough, but very enjoyable day.”

Account Team Award

Key Account Management is currently playing an important role in the sales and marketing strategies of most UK pharmaceutical companies. Consequently, the Account Team Award is arguably one of the most relevant categories. Candidates need to demonstrate working to a clearly defined account plan. Teams also need to have a clearly defined account management structure in place and must work across multiple disciplines within the account. They also need to implement a degree of autonomy to select practice accounts and stakeholders.

The Assessment Day will be held on Wednesday 14th March 2012 at the King Power Stadium, Leicester – formerly known as the Walkers Stadium. The Pf Awards Dinner takes place on Thursday 22nd March 2012 at the Lancaster London Hotel.

How can I enter?

If you or a colleague would like to know more about the Pf Awards, the categories, criteria, and how to enter, please visit www.pfawards.co.uk.

Medical sales professionals are well paid. But they are still not happy. Pf Editor Chris Ross wonders why the traditional ‘drug rep’ wants to shake off the stereotype, but seems happy to live it.

So it’s official, money can indeed buy happiness – at least that’s what a recent national survey by data company Mintel would like to have us believe. According to the poll, almost six in ten (58%) of those earning more than £50,000 are happy with their lives. But equally, as if to prove the cliché that there are lies, damn lies and statistics, the same survey shows that almost half of people who earn less than £15,000 are happy too. In fact, despite the current climate of job losses, pay freezes and the rising cost of living, more than half of the nation is happy with its lot, with only 20% dissatisfied with their current state of play.

All of which seems to prove that, far from being the answer to all our prayers, money is not necessarily the root of personal contentment.

So what does this say about medical sales professionals? Pf’s annual survey of satisfaction and motivation among UK pharmaceutical sales executives shows the profession to be well-rewarded. In 2010, the median salary for medical sales professionals was more than £40,000 and the top-earner in the sample picked up in excess of £72,000 a year. In both examples, these figures excluded bonuses which, in many cases, are not inconsiderable. Yet despite this, many across the industry remain dissatisfied with their remuneration. This year’s study showed that whilst respondents were mostly motivated by salary, huge numbers claimed that their employers were failing to satisfy them in this area.

The pharma industry has, for many years, been trying to shake off a poor reputation. It has long been derided for alleged profiteering at the top, and for encouraging apparent opulence amongst its collective workforce. It has been accused of over-indulgence in its promotional strategies, with sales and marketing expenditure often perceived to exceed R&D budgets. And trust in the industry among both the general public and sections of its customer-base has generally appeared to be (unfairly) low.

The image of the drug industry is, in the media and (all too often) on an average evening out, symbolised by the description of the stereotypical ‘drug rep’. For example, the blockbuster movie Love and Other Drugs painted the life of the rep as decadent, adrenalin-fuelled and materialistic – characterised by fast cars, loose women and loose morals. Fiction or otherwise, it did the image of the industry in general no favours and the reputation of the drug rep in particular no good. It pandered to a stereotype that the pharmaceutical industry is desperate to shake off, and it continues to work tremendously hard to achieve it.

So, in a global economy where jobs are falling by the wayside at an alarming rate, where job security is scarce and a pay-rise seems a pipedream, do UK medical sales professionals really need to conform to the stereotype? “Pay me more, give me more.” Medical sales is a well-paid job in a market that has demonstrated greater stability than many others. It provides the kinds of benefits many other professions would die for and, in its purest form, operates in an environment rich with reward in terms of helping enhance lives and improve patient care.

Sure, we’d all like to earn more. But with a median salary that is well in excess of the average wage in the UK, the medical sales professional, despite all the pressure that goes with selling in a competitive environment, has got it good.

Surely that’s a reason to join the majority of the UK and, amid the doom and gloom, be just a little happier?