Pharmaceutical Technologist - September 2007 - (Page 12)

Morpheus // starts. This will enable them to view others in the building as colleagues rather than “that person down the corridor that always leaves a mess in the communal kitchen”. It would be impossible for a new starter to see everyone within the company, but the induction schedule run by a human resources department should attempt to break down artificial barriers that can exist within a big company between different groups and divisions. Beyond this, company managers need to set an example by speaking to colleagues and not viewing them as faceless entities that occupy the same building. In fact, the view needs to come from the top and a CEO should try to show his/her face around the organization. After all, if the CEO can demonstrate good communication skills with employees then they might feel sufficiently encouraged to make an effort themselves with co-workers. Many companies believe that they are doing this, but the fact that people can wander past each other every day without even having the decency to simply say “hello”to a newcomer undoes any efforts to improve communication. Indifference towards co-workers should be challenged, otherwise the rot will soon set in and one day it will inevitably affect project work. E-communication Another area that many people appear to need training in is electronic communication. Unfortunately, many people seem to think that e-mails are a substitute for normal methods of communication rather than a support. It is far from uncommon to find people who literally sit a few feet from each other e-mailing each other rather than getting up and talking. As a result, they never really get to know each other and so their working relationship will rarely be ideal. It hardly promotes teamwork. In many cases, these electronic exchanges confuse situations that could easily be resolved face-toface. They can even cause problems between people because of the interpretation of words. It is not always possible to have face-to-face contact, but even those working remotely should not feel shy to occasionally pick up the phone to let their colleague know that they are dealing with another human on the project concerned. The difficulties caused by an over reliance on electronic methods of communication are compounded by the lazy person who likes to send or forward multiple documents, but cannot be bothered to write a message to the recipient. If they are feeling generous then this type of individual will tend to put “FYI” in the subject header or body of the e-mail as they bombard the other person with numerous messages containing lengthy attachments. If challenged, these people will claim to be so busy that they do not have time to write explanatory messages for every e-mail. Yet, this hardly helps anyone who may have to sift through previous e-mails to determine the history of a project. What these failed communicators hope is that the recipient of their e-mails, containing numerous random attachments, will be some sort of psychic who will be able to interpret the information automatically. This situation persists in most companies and is sadly encouraged — mainly because senior staff are guilty of this behaviour themselves. Staff should explain why they are sending a message to another person so that the recipient understands what is going on and potential confusion is avoided. After all, if you had several documents to physically hand to someone you would hardly march up to them and dump them on their desk without saying anything to the person concerned. So why should you behave like a faceless automaton when communicating by e-mail? An easy way to explore these viewpoints is to think about your organization and the means by which you came to know your various colleagues. Are you absolutely sure that you communicate in the most effective way with your colleagues or are you too claiming that time pressures mean that you cannot even utter “hello” to people you pass in the corridor or send an explanation with your e-mails? Do you really believe that your work and company is best served by pretending that other people don’t exist until you have to deal with them? How many of us have got to know someone through a staff party or social event, even though we work with them in the same building? Subsequently, we might find that this contact proves invaluable in our work as we find that this particular person has skills that prove useful for our project. Instead of feeling reassured we should feel embarrassed as there may be many other useful contacts within our organizations that we are failing to engage with. The pharmaceutical industry is missing a big opportunity to work more efficiently by ignoring the importance of communication. Drug development requires people with different skills sets to collaborate and they must be brought together. Technology is invaluable, but if people cannot handle basic methods of communication then they will become even bigger failures when using something high-tech. The greater the reliance on faceless methods of communication then the greater the likelihood of indifference flourishing throughout the organization. PT 12 September 2007 l pharmaceutical technologist

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Pharmaceutical Technologist - September 2007

Contents Editor’s Comment News Morpheus Market Watch CPhI Worldwide 2007 Compliant Pharmaceutical Labelling Q&A

Pharmaceutical Technologist - September 2007

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