Appealing to the better angels

A big part of my job is motivating sales/marketing teams; getting everyone to do the right thing for the right reason. Getting a large population to do anything in unison is challenging but the starting point is always cohesive self-image. We have to see ourselves as part of the group before we can develop group values.

In the last few weeks I've been lucky enough to get along to two big international sporting fixtures; England v. France in Six Nations rugby at Twickenham then Chelsea v. Copenhagen in Champions League football at Stamford Bridge. At both occasions the crowd was asked to stand in silence to honour the victims of two horrific earthquakes (Christchurch and Japan respectively).

Getting a crowd to stand in silence is a really interesting challenge; it can only work if absolutely everyone participates. The many are held hostage by the few.

At Twickenham 80,000 people were so quiet, so still, that I could hear traffic noise outside the ground. It lasted two whole minutes and made the hair stand up on the back of your neck.  At no time did Stamford Bridge manage complete silence, even for a few seconds. A few people in the South Stand kept talking and were shushed by others nearby.  They reacted by talking louder. More shushing. Louder talking and so on until some presumably well-meaning soul from the other end of the ground screamed: -

"Shut up you c***ts!"

At which the referee decided enough was enough and blew his whistle to end the ordeal.

Much has been written about the contrasting ethos of football and rugby and here it was writ large. Twickenham had many French supporters just as lots of Danes were at the football so I don't think the differing behaviours can be attributed to a misunderstanding of language.  Rather it seemed to me that the rugby crowd wanted to behave well whereas the football crowd didn't care so much.  Rugby celebrates universalism, football cherishes tribalism so perhaps it will always be easier to appeal to the better angels of a crowd watching rugby than football.

There's no point in trying to influence group behaviour if no self-reflexive sense of the group exists in the first place.

Marvelous teeth... and a reputation for not being above skullduggery

Much of my life is spent dealing with pharmaceutical sales representatives (aka 'drug reps').  These are the perfect physical specimens you see chatting to the receptionist whilst you're waiting to see your doctor.  It's a strange sort of career; you're degree educated, generously paid and you work for a well-known, well-respected company yet what you actually do is of questionable value.

For fifty or so years drug reps barely registered in the public consciousness; unless you worked in the health care profession or for a pharma company you didn't know the job existed.  I'm always meeting people who are genuinely bemused that a brand new life-saving medication needs a sales force.

Over the last few years reps made their way onto the edges of popular culture; Heather Locklear in 'Scrubs', Catherine Heigl in 'Side Effects' and Jake Gyllenhaal in Love and Other Drugs.  As beautiful as these actors are for once they're probably a representative sample of the profession they're portraying.

My favourite observations about drug reps in pop culture come from a 2009 discussion thread on the fansite for the American version of the reality show 'Survivor': -

"Is it me or is there a pharmaceutical sales rep cast every season?  Does casting have a booth at pharmaceutical sales conferences?  This season it's Natalie; Gabon - Corinne; Palau - Stephanie; Thailand - Penny.  I'm sure the list goes on.  Evidently it's a job exclusively for women."

"Daniel from Panama also falls into that category."

"I can think of a few reasons for having sales reps as regular cast members, as well as people from certain other fields:

1) there are a lot of pharmaceutical reps in So Cal, the casting ground for Survivor.

2) they tend to be young, good looking, and have marvelous teeth.  (it's a sales job where the clients are physicians and other health professionals - clean looks are essential)

3) they have a reputation for not being above skullduggery, which makes the show more interesting

4) it's not a big deal to give up the job for the show."

"Pharmaceutical companies hire good looking men and women to go shmooze and get the attention of doctors.  At least that's what my wife says, I never worked in a hospital or office.  Heard the same story from a friend who has a father and brother and sister that work together at a clinic.  You also have to be a go getter too.  Two good qualities for being on this show."

This week I'm working with a Swedish sales team; a ridiculously beautiful subset of a population that's already ridiculously beautiful, but less of a reputation for skullduggery so I suppose that's something.

Live stand-up? I went once...

A Birmingham promoter named James Cook writing on Chortle: -

If your first experience of live stand-up comedy is a night at your local where you've paid a fiver to see eight comedians, only three of whom looked like they knew what they were doing, there is a very high probability that you will never go to see live comedy again.  Not just in this venue, but in any venue, even the big ones.  Not only that, all the punters at these sort of gigs are likely to tell their friends.  'Live stand-up? I went once, it was shit.'

My point exactly.

A bird in the hand is worth...

This post may be a bit dry for some.  I'm going to try and set out the new way of forecasting that I'm applying to my consulting business.  The more I think about it the more I'm sure that these principles apply to most freelancers including stand-up comics, graphic designers and the like.

Every successful freelancer struggles with the 'feast or famine' phenomenon whereby you're either too busy to scratch yourself or else you're sitting around waiting for the phone to ring.  The problem stems from failing to generate future work whilst you're preoccupied with the challenges of the present.  Most of us fall into the dreadful habit of not worrying about the blank page in the diary until that actual day.  The oh-so-astute Kate Smurfwaite nailed this with an observation that you often go through periods of always gigging with the same few comics because they emailed with the same promoters s you on the same day three months previously.

I can't remove the need to constantly be prospecting for new business but there are ways to be smart about it.  Firstly, focus on the money, not the diary.  For fear of an empty diary it's easy to fall into the trap of selling your at a discount.  The logic is that it's better to be busy but underpaid than, I dunno, going to the gym and then reading a book.

This diary / money nexus has to be inverted.  The question you need to ask is: how much do I want to earn in a year?  Work out how much do you need to pay the bills, to add to your savings and still have a little left over to splash around to prove to yourself and the world that this self-employment malarkey is working out.

Let's call that 'annual earnings' figure A

Have a good hard look at it.  If it doesn't look a little daunting then you probably haven't got the maths right.  Once you're happy, divide it by four as we're going to work in quarters.

Let's call that 'quarterly earnings' figure Q

Now rather than one big problem (A) you've got four smaller problems but they won't seem to be problems of equal size.  If we say we're going to start this new regimen on April Fools Day then the challenge of earning Q for April-May-June probably seems much more daunting than for January-February-March.  Or maybe your diary's looking good up until summer and you've got less of a handle on July-August-September.  Either way, the psychological challenges represented by Q fluctuate over time.

From here in on you'll need pen and paper or (better still) a spreadsheet.  Create four columns, one for each quarter with three rows.  Write Q at the bottom of the first row as per below

Now get your diary and enter every definite job in the appropriate quarter.  Only include those where you are 100% sure that your services will be needed and that you will be paid.

Let's call these 'definite earnings' D

List the details of D in the top row of appropriate quarter and subtract that from Q.  Call that new figure Qa

This example roughly follows the pattern that my business follows: few clients book me a long way in advance so I have to be comfortable with a 3-6 month horizon.  I know I should be worried that the end of the year and early 2012 are looking thin but I also need to know what to do with that worry.

Go back to your diary.  Now list every probable job by quarter.  Define 'probable' as anything where there's a better than 2 in 3 chance of your services will be needed and that you will be paid.

Let's call these 'probable earnings' P

List the details of P in the top row of appropriate quarter.  Now divide P by 1.5 and subtract that from Qa to get Qb

Why 1.5?  Because we think there's about a 2 in 3 chance of the job coming off.  And look what I've learned; I'm probably going to miss my budget (Q) for April-May-June by 17 but I'm more than fine for July-August-September.  More importantly for the period between October and March I still have a lot of work to do.  Even though I might bill another 360 in October-December, which would get me to 510, the jobs aren't booked yet so I'd be a fool to bank on them.  And I still have plenty of work to do for the start of 2012.

We have to make up the difference in the bottom row.  This is where the diary is of less use than the old the contact list, that stack of business cards and the guy who said to give him a call some time.  We're deep in maybeland.

So let's call these 'maybe earnings' M

There are only two places that these earnings can conceivably come from:-

1. Finding new clients (Mnc), or
2. Selling new products (Mnp) to old clients

I've had my UK business for almost six years, so I have enough data to know that my average time from first meeting with a client to actually delivering a project is 8.67 months.  I've never been able to reduce this.  I now accept it as a fact of my working life.  So even if I met a potential client today I can't realistically bank on anything (Mnc) before January.

Another problem is I'm not especially good at putting time aside for new product development (Mnp).  Almost all of my innovations have emerged as solutions to problems articulated by clients and I'm actually quite crap at building the thing that meets the unrecognised need.  But I do have a few ideas that have worked in one market but have yet to be taken up in others so there's hope for me yet.

I guess we'd better input M into our spreadsheet

This bottom row always has a fantasy element about it, however, the rule is you must keep the Qc fantasy to the right hand side of the page.  If I could realistically anticipate any new business in the next six months then it should appear in the middle row (Qb).  If I need it to happen later in the year it's a task, needing it tomorrow makes it a prayer.


In keeping with my 8.67 month average I've assumed I'll get no new clients (Mnc) before next January.  This means that all of my October-December earnings have to come from existing clients (Mnp).

To temper the fantasy just a little you'll notice that I reckon there's only about a 1 in 3 chance of any Qc earnings actually coming off; remember that we're selling either something that doesn't yet exist or to someone we haven't met.  So we have to be able to identify three times as many Qc opportunities.

Summary
My imaginary business might just survive the next twelve months.  Well done me.  But for that to happen I've got to find new things to sell to my existing clients as well as speaking to new ones.  I knew that already.  The nasty truth I've was avoiding was that both these tasks have to happen now.

Variations
There are a few obvious variations to this basic model that will make it more applicable.  For example, I've assumed that the demand for my stuff is constant throughout the year (500 / quarter).  If your business dries up in the summer then you the initial Q figure for that quarter and compensate with higher targets over the rest of the year.  Anyone contemplating the Edinburgh Fringe may well have a negative figure for July-August-September. 

I've also gone for conversion rates (1.5 and 3) that are a realistic reflection of the way my industry operates but may be questionable elsewhere. 

In Conclusion
As I said at the beginning this is a new technique for me and I apologise if in my excitement I've overcomplicated it.  Like many good ideas it seems to clarify something that I've long known but never articulated.  I like knowing where I need to focus my attention.  I like that it shines a harsh light on the naive expectation that 'somewhere, someone unknown to me is about to come to my rescue'.

I like that if I can see a feast on the horizon then I can decide that next week isn't a famine but a chance to finish that book.

The US Supreme Court agrees with your claim that your job is pointless

Drug reps working for Novartis in the US have won a case in the Supreme Court that awards them a share of over $100,000,000 in back pay for unpaid overtime.  Merck and Boehringer Ingelheim face a similar bills.

The case, which has been working its way through the American legal system, revolves around a question of whether a drug rep was a salesperson (in which case ineligible for overtime) or something else.  The reps in question were calling on Primary Care physicians (GP's).  They testified that the nature of their work was robotic: -

One Rep testified that Reps were expected to act like “robots” because of the limitations on what they could say during sales calls.

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals agreed:-

The Reps, inter alia,

• have no role in planning Novartis's marketing strategy;
• have no tole in formulating the "core messages" they deliver to physicians;
• are required to visit a given physician a certain number of times per trimester as established by Novartis;
• are required to promote a given drug a certain number of times per trimester as established by Novartis;
• are required to hold at least the number of promotional events ordered by Novartis;
• are not allowed to deviate from the promotional "core messages";
• and are forbidden to answer any question for which they have not been scripted.

Novartis' defense against the robot claim was so weak as to be laughable: -

Novartis argues that the Reps exercise a great deal of discretion because they are free to decide in what order to visit physicians offices

Talk about letting go of the reins.  My favourite aspect of this comes from the ruling made by a lower court which had actually ruled in Novartis's favour: - 

They do not begin to answer why or how a robot or an automaton could or should earn an average salary of $91,500 per year.  Nor do they explain why NPC (Novartis) would employ 6,000 Reps at a cost in excess of half a billion dollars per year.

It defies logic to accept that, in such a situation, Reps are expected to do nothing but chant slogans and mouth platitudes.

So the argument that Novartis made was, "Why would we pay them so much if they were robots?  Do you think that we're that stupid?"  In overturning the decision the Second Circuit Court in effect said, "Yes.  Yes we do" and the US Supreme Court agreed.

The restrictive sales processes adopted by American pharma companies are built around an overriding medico-legal strategy.  The worry is that a misspoken word from a rep might lead to one of those law suits that would cost them millions of dollars.

Oh, the irony.