Focus Magazine - Fall 2012 - 30

PRODUCTTRAINING

Selling Beyond the Clinical Message
I By Steve Shuck ne thing remains a constant in pharmaceutical sales today — change. So much is happening that sometimes it becomes too di cult to keep up. Five years ago, a sales representative might have been able to get by with a high-science message only; that no longer works today. Due to the evolution of the healthcare landscape, customers’ demands are getting more sophisticated and the clinical message alone does not drive results. e inability to roll with these market changes presents a signi cant challenge to today’s sales force. As learning and development professionals, we must ensure that our eld forces are being equipped with the knowledge and resources to meet these challenges head-on to continue the success of our organizations. ese new changes being implemented by public and private payers primarily a ect providers and, to a lesser extent, patients. On the provider side, new payment models are being implemented that focus on incentivizing practitioners to provide better management and to coordinate care to improve outcomes. Additionally, population-based models of care such as the accountable care organization (ACO) and the patient-centered medical home (PCMH) have emerged to meet payer and customer demands for high-quality care. Providers are faced with rising

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operating costs while watching a drastic reduction in reimbursement from public and private payers. Patients are also feeling the e ect of these changes — with more cost shi ing from their employers — and working to understand new tier-structure designs to their drug bene ts as well as generic incentives and mandates. So how do the eld forces of today adapt to the changing environment and still bring value to their customers? In today’s pharmaceutical sales world, every representative must know certain things beyond product knowledge. One of the most important of these is the understanding of the general market environment in which they sell. Today, managed markets dominate the U.S. healthcare marketplace. roughout the nation, managed care drives treatment methods, management of diseases, settings of care, cost of services, and utilization of treatment options. e ability to demonstrate a strong clinical foundation is a must, and having a command of the current market dynamic is becoming more critical for success. Clinical knowledge plus market acumen equals increased customer value. Learning and development (L&D) departments need to raise their standards on the quality and selection of training needs beyond the traditional clinical approach. Here are some suggestions on how L&D teams can address the future and get beyond the clinical/high-science message: • Interweave market dynamics trainings throughout clinical/product training from the beginning. Start with foundational managed markets training to level-set audiences regardless of experience and tenure. e curriculum needs to be designed to a speci c therapeutic area, disease state and product. • Adopt an “all stakeholder” point of view. Identify the stakeholders early in the process, e.g., patient, healthcare practitioner (HCP), payer, institution or pharmacy. ere are many moving parts before and a er a prescription is written. Having a clear understanding of how all these stakeholders interact with each other is critical to understanding the needs of the customer. • Frame the value of the product according to each stakeholder. How does the patient view the value of the

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Focus Magazine - Fall 2012

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