Lundbeck has appointed a trio of new Vice Presidents in Supply Operations and Engineering.

Kristian Sibilitz, Christian Houborg and Lene Andersen have all been promoted after impressing as divisional directors.

Lars Bang, Senior Vice President, Supply Operations and Engineering at Lundbeck, says the new VPs have all been “excellent ambassadors” during their time with the company.

Mr Sibilitz, who served as the personal assistant to Lars Bang from 2007 to 2009, has been appointed Vice President, Logistics, Christian Houborg is the new Vice President, Service & Technical Operations & Lean, and Lene Anderson will take the role of Vice President, Quality Supply Operations.

CHASE Recruitment has appointed Kirstie Justice as Recruitment Consultant, responsible for the East and West Midlands area.

Kirstie originally trained as a teacher before working for Eli Lilly as a Hospital Specialist. She has worked for CHASE previously in June 2010 to cover maternity leave.

CHASE provides specialist recruitment services and contract sales organisation (CSO) solutions to pharmaceutical, biotechnology and healthcare companies in the UK.

Actelion has appointed the experienced Jean-Pierre Garnier (pictured) as the Chairman of its Board of Directors.

Members of the board nominated Mr Garnier in favour of its existing chair Robert Cawthorn, who has held the position since the company’s inception.

Mr Cawthorn said he was grateful for the opportunity and is delighted that a “highly experienced and very successful leader with an unparalleled career in the healthcare industry” will lead the company.

Mr Garnier was the first CEO of GSK after its inception from 2001 to 2008. Prior to that, he served as President of Schering-Plough’s US business and served as CEO at Pierre Fabre Labs for two years after leaving Glaxo.

He has been awarded various accolades for his work in healthcare and also serves on the Boards of Directors of the United Technologies Corporation, Renault S.A, and Cerenis.

“I am extremely proud to have been nominated as Chairman of the Board of Actelion,” said Mr Garnier. “I'm very impressed with the company’s track record and its position today as Europe’s largest biopharmaceutical company.

He added that since joining the company earlier in the year, he has become “even more convinced” of the company’s capacity to transfer drug discovery into “meaningful therapeutic solutions”.

“Since joining the company this spring, I have become even more convinced of Actelion’s capacity to translate superior drug discovery into meaningful therapeutic solutions and long-term business success. I look forward to guiding the company in the next phase of its growth together with my fellow Board members, management and all the Actelion employees.”

A highly-skilled workforce is a must in today’s competitive business environment. But as many companies slash their budgets in the relentless pursuit of efficiencies, is employee training becoming yet another victim of austerity?

Companies that fail to invest in talent will undoubtedly learn the hard way that this is a short cut to failure. Chris Ross presents a crash course in the current market for training and development.

There are mixed views on whether companies’ training and development activities are taking a hit in the current global economy. Recent mid-year analysis in the US revealed that global spend on training this year has been around 7–9% higher than in 2010. But Training 2011, a study by UK market intelligence company Key Note, presents a different trend.

The report estimates that spending on off-the-job training by UK private and public sector employees fell by 3.2% in the year to April 2010 – and that spending on external trainers dropped by around 17% in the same period. The study reports that training investment most likely dropped further by around 2.5% up to April 2011, but forecasts a slight recovery of 1.5% by April 2012. These are worrying times.

Companies are desperately seeking to increase their capabilities as the markets in which they operate are changing; but to drive real growth, continued investment in talent is essential. The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) says that whilst organisations will undoubtedly expect people to do more with less, they should not expect employees “to want to do more with less learning and talent development.”

Learning and Talent Development 2011, the CIPD’s annual survey report, revealed that resources and budgets for learning and development had decreased in two-fifths of organisations in the past year, whilst a third of companies had reduced their headcount.

The study showed that although most businesses have a training budget, in most cases these have not only suffered cutbacks, but are also expected to cover a broad range of activities and costs. Unsurprisingly, the majority of budgets cover items such as external courses and conferences (93%), hiring external consultants and trainers (83%) and books/training manuals (81%).

But for two-fifths of the organisations surveyed, the training budget is also expected to cover fixed costs and salaries for in-house trainers. Clearly, the battle to upskill the workforce is being played out in the most testing of circumstances.

 

The employment market

The employment market is certainly creating challenges for employers and candidates alike. Unemployment is rising as organisations continue to reduce their workforces – but those companies that are hiring are finding that many job applicants are not sufficiently skilled and are therefore unsuitable for employment.

Conversely, in a stagnant job market, those who are in employment appear reluctant to move. Talented individuals are staying put. But is enough being done to nurture and develop them? Or are they too likely to stagnate as opportunities fail to emerge?

Likewise, less talented but generally reliable employees –the ‘safe pairs of hands’ that populate every organisation – are in many industries failing to receive adequate skills development, leading to an uncomfortable paradox: they are safe in their roles, but as their markets evolve they are not ‘fit for purpose’ to perform them.

In difficult times, the need for increased investment in human capital is significant. Training and talent development is a major priority for businesses large and small. In a market characterised by growing shareholder expectations and shrinking operational budgets, what are the options for training and developing the workforce?

Learning and Talent Development 2011 says that most companies are continuing the 2010 policy of “switching to more cost-effective development practices”. This has seen organisations reduce their use of external training service providers and instead increase in-house development programmes, internal knowledge-sharing events and coaching by line managers. In addition, the use of e-learning solutions continues to grow.

Technology-led learning tools are becoming increasingly popular across Europe. Training today, training tomorrow, a present-day analysis of learning trends across Europe by Cegos Group, says that uptake of solutions such as ‘serious games’, mobile learning and online learning has grown considerably. This, it says, is driven by an emerging younger demographic in the workplace, and widespread corporate objectives to reduce costs yet maintain productivity.

Learning solutions that are delivered in a medium that is more familiar to this emerging user-group, and that mirror the new “social, global and mobile environment”, are not only easier to integrate into employees’ daily activities, but are also considered more engaging and effective. According to Cegos Group’s 2011 survey, half of those trained in Europe have used informal learning tools such as videoconferencing, wikis, blogs, forums and podcasts.

 

Old school still rules

So the rise of e-based learning solutions is tipped to continue. But, despite rhetoric to the contrary, not at the expense of traditional learning tools. Face-to-face training remains popular – external courses, seminars and conferences continue to play a valuable educational role.

In heavily knowledge-based and technical industries such as life sciences, traditional methodologies remain both popular and effective. In medical markets, despite the obvious growth of e-learning tools, tried-and-tested lecture-style learning still appears to be the preferred option, with many participants choosing it as their favoured route for CPD.

The CIPD study shows that external conferences and events are rated as being among the most effective learning methods for leaders, potential leaders and middle management. Despite this, more than a third of companies (34%) have reduced their use of external events in the past year.

In other areas, classroom-style lectures are being replaced by individual one-to-one sessions that enable more individualised, targeted training. There has been significant growth in activities such as coaching and mentoring, which are being recognised as important tools to encourage individual accountability and nurture talent.

According to the CIPD survey, coaching takes place in more than four-fifths (86%) of companies polled, with its main objectives being to support performance management, prepare people for leadership roles and assist learning and development.

A third of companies employ coaches, while two-fifths hand responsibility for it to line managers. Only one-fifth use external consultants for coaching. Group training – such as team coaching sessions and collaborative workshops – is evolving to become more interactive, customised and flexible – giving facilitators the opportunity to adapt training quickly, based on employee feedback and needs.

 

The need for speed

Speed is emerging as a key consideration in companies’ training and development strategies. Businesses are becoming more impatient. They want their employees to develop quicker and to become more proficient and productive faster than ever before. Such corporate impatience is, in fact, often mirrored by learners themselves. Employees want the fast track to success and, where it exists, will choose the crash course over longer-term learning.

As a result, multimedia and web-based training tools have seen a real surge in uptake. The benefits are clear, but the approach is not without its challenges. The dropout rate in self-monitored online training is apparently high, with too many participants failing to complete courses.

Developers need to work hard to ensure that online courses are engaging and exploit the opportunities for interactivity and connectivity that the medium provides. Critics claim that too many courses appear little more than traditional training manuals that have been uploaded to an online format.

Clearly, as the global business environment continues to evolve in challenging times, training models and methodologies are having to adapt to meet changing needs. The emergence of collaborative, interactive and dynamic learning tools, enabled by rapid advances in technology, have opened up new opportunities for training and development – but it only really completes the circle of learning solutions available to the market.

Training is, after all, demand-driven and should be designed to meet the varying, and often individual, needs and tastes of its end users. As such, training managers should continue to consider the full suite of learning tools open to them – in dialogue with learners and their line managers, to find the most effective solutions to meet organisations’ and individuals’ objectives.

Undoubtedly, however, the biggest demand from a business perspective is to nurture a skilled, talented and engaged workforce. To do this, companies must continue to invest in training and development, rather than chip away at training budgets for short-term efficiency gains.

The potential long-term impact of that approach is a disengaged, unmotivated and unproductive workforce that is not fit for purpose. And that really would be learning the hard way.

Data in this article have been sourced from Learning and Talent Development 2011, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s annual survey report. This is available for download from the CIPD website. Training today, training tomorrow, an analysis of learning trends across Europe and global comparisons, is available for download from the Cegos website.

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.

For decades analysts have been trying to find the perfect formula for workplace satisfaction. Dr R K Powar explains how organisational behaviour can bring together essential cogs in the workplace to improve levels of productivity.

All businesses from the smallest enterprise to the largest of corporations consist of people designed to fulfil human objectives, and organisational behaviour seeks to understand how best to do this. Therefore, organisational behaviour can be described as the study of how individuals, groups and structure affect and are affected by behaviour within organisations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge towards improving an organisation’s effectiveness.

Management as a discipline, along with other disciplines, has been around for centuries. However, serious interest in the study of management did not emerge until the turn of the twentieth century, making organisational behaviour a relatively new subject. Also, the initial players interested in studying organisations were economists, who generally looked at management practices as efficient and effective, focusing on economic policies and industrial structures, rather than the internal structure of organisations.

A brief history

The Scientific Management Approach: this was developed by F W Taylor, who worked on the assumption that human beings are largely motivated by money. Taylor advised that managers pay monetary incentives to efficient workers, making employees work harder and faster, reducing them to machines. As this approach did not take account of the human facet of labour, it was heavily criticised and today is considered inadequate.

The Bureaucratic Approach: while the scientific approach worked on the interaction between workers and the task, this theory focused on devising the best organisational structure for workers and managers. Max Weber, the theory’s most prominent advocate, proposed a ‘bureaucratic form’ of structure which he thought would work for all organisations.

The Hawthorne Studies: The above two approaches were heavily criticised as they failed to take into consideration that the human aspect was important in the workplace. Whilst the Hawthorne Studies have had their share of criticism, they had a dramatic input in the field of organisational behaviour, highlighting that workers are influenced by social factors and the behaviour of the individual is influenced by the group.

Over the years, the study and practice of behaviour in the workplace has developed from initial human resource theory to the system approach and on to organisational behaviour, which has grown through creating alliances with disciplines such as leadership and anthropology. Today organisational behaviour is highly influential in the business world with practitioners like Peter Drucker and Peter Senge, who turned academic research into business principles – please refer to the article on the concept of the Learning Organisation in the April 2010 edition of Pharmaceutical Field.

The importance to pharma

Organisational behaviour is important to help us learn about ourselves and how to deal with others. It needs to be noted that people are complex and, whilst they have a need to acquire, individuals are multi-faceted and work for several reasons, such as the need to grow and develop and bond with others.

The pharmaceutical industry, like all industries, is in a constant state of flux faced with business competiveness and the need for increased networking and globalisation – where there is a greater need for individuals to work with people from diverse backgrounds and cultural values. Consequently, the pharmaceutical industry needs to be increasingly concerned with organisational behaviour, as it needs all employees to perform well to sustain success and in a nutshell become more productive.

At a practical level, these are some of the advantages offered by organisational behaviour:

Having more self-insight and perceptual skills to bring about the desired outcomes: The various facets of organisational behaviour can be used by all of us to understand our own feelings and behaviours. Starting from the premise of understanding ourselves is important in helping us understand others. The concepts of organisational behaviour can be used to bring about the desired outcome behaviour in others by sometimes modifying our feelings and behaviours towards others.

The ability to do this would be beneficial in all walks of life, and especially in the pharmaceutical industry. For example:

• Manager to employee: Having a greater awareness/understanding and appreciation will help bosses modify their management style to lead their staff appropriately to attain goals and hence become more productive.
• Motivate self and others: Organisations that perform well have a culture that promotes ongoing growth, learning and development. At the core of organisational behaviour paradigms rests the notion of how to bring out the best in others, so developing a good understanding of the principles of organisational behaviour and putting them into practice can help with motivation.
• Managers and employees’ interaction with external customers and stakeholders: Having a good understanding of organisational behaviour can help managers develop a better understanding of processes. This in turn can help managers interact with the various individuals outside the organisation, such as suppliers, competitors and customers. Managers can gain a better understanding of the environment in which they are working by using organisational behaviour to help them appreciate how and why things happen, giving them the advantage of being ahead in today’s competitive environment.

The ability to analyse situations correctly: A good understanding of the concepts of organisational behaviour can help staff and managers analyse situations correctly. All too often misunderstandings arise when situations haven’t been correctly understood. This can prove useful in the following ways:

• Avoid/manage conflict: A small amount of conflict can prove useful sometimes. However, where possible, if it’s likely to be destructive it needs to be avoided in the first instance, or be managed appropriately. With the sheer size of most pharmaceutical companies, the number of employees and the numerous relationships with the various stakeholders the probability of conflict arising can be quite high. Therefore, being able to curb this is of significant importance for the human relations and media departments.
• Better observational skills: This can be extremely useful for sales teams that need to be able to pick up on the buying signals, deal with obstructions and work with the complex set of interrelationships and dynamics that exist within the NHS.
• Recruitment and retention of skilled staff: A great deal of time and expenditure is involved in recruiting the right staff and the majority of the techniques and methods to do this employ organisational behaviour concepts in the form of questionnaires, psychological profiling and role-playing exercises at interviews. People work for several reasons and a better grasp of organisational behaviour concepts could be applied to retain staff, instead of developing them and then allowing them to leave and take the skills and knowledge they have gained elsewhere.

Limitations of organisational behaviour

• Having an understanding of organisational behaviour can help in situations of conflict but not eradicate them completely.
• Organisational behaviour is resistant to change due to human cognitive processes and defensive routines which can lead to ‘behavioural biases’, where the focus is on satisfying employees but overlooking the objectives of an organisation.
• The law of diminishing returns also applies to organisational behaviour: as this needs to be practised to an optimum point, when that point is exceeded there is a decline in returns. This highlights that organisational effectiveness is achieved when all variables work together.
• In some cases the knowledge and techniques of organisational behaviour could be used in a manipulative manner.

The future of organisational behaviour

Organisational behaviour has evolved over the years: initially from the need to create productive organisations, followed by a philosophical desire by many people to create more humanistic workplaces. Although organisational behaviour has certain limitations, hopefully by building a better working climate for people there are many advantages which should have longterm effects, not only in the quality of an individual’s life, but in improved harmony among people and among organisations.

The future success of organisational behaviour revolves around the related processes of theory development, research and managerial practice in areas such as communication between and among foreign business operations, cultural differences and motivation techniques in different countries, career development in the global economy, and the differences in leadership and decisionmaking practices in various countries.

The challenge faced by the pharmaceutical industry is to employ organisational behaviour to bring the various stakeholders and actors involved with different values together to create processes by which it can be efficient and effective in exceeding goals and objectives.

Dr R K Powar is the founder of R11OSY CONSULTANTS.