Listening is the key

Dr Savita Chari

The main point of this article is to point out that top management hardly ever ‘listens’ to what the field force has to say. There is hardly any pharma company that does not want to improve their implementation of strategy and achieve better results. Yet very few ‘listen’ to what their own field-staff want to say.

Insulated from knowing what really hurts

Top management often argues that the field force have many other levels of operational hierarchy that one should not disturb. What happens in fact is that the “real problems hardly ever reach the top.” Top management is insulated from the real problems that people have in a company. They never get to know what really hurts some people.

Field force has many things to tell

There are not just complaints but what could improve the results in the short run. If top management relies only on the existing lines of communication, truth is hardly ever going to reach the top.

No one wants to bring ‘bad news’ to top management. Good news, encouraging news travels upward by middle manager, but bad news always gets suppressed, distorted and goes unnoticed.

The real problem is that the Area Business Manager, the Regional Manager and/or the Zonal Manager often don’t have any time to listen to complaints from the field force. They have no access to top management unless top management itself is keen to listen.

Bad news is actually good news

Most senior managers know that bad news from the field is actually good news. You need to have the transparency to learn periodically from your own sales force, what can be corrected and improved.

In a survey conducted recently among 1800 medical representatives of pharma companies in Greater Mumbai, almost 70 per cent of representatives pointed out that no top management person ever gets to know what is critical and needs to be changed.

This is not because ‘bad-news’ is suppressed but in the hurly burly of running a business top management hardly has time to ‘listen’ to what the sales-force wants to say.

Being heard can be therapeutic

The field force feels better when they are heard and this has a big impact on their morale. Only one major Indian company seems have had the ‘culture’ where the Joint Managing Director met field-force and asked them to speak. And he listened carefully. He went back to his office and wanted corrective action to be taken. Such top management intervention is very effective.

Ask yourself this simple question

When did your top management listen to your field-force directly?

Almost over 70 per cent of medical representatives said company top management is insulated from facts and bad news does not reach top management. It gets suppressed and killed somewhere so top management is often unaware of what is going wrong. So corrected action is difficult.

If top management makes it a point to come and listen what field-force problems are corrective action can be generated.

Those who have a ‘system’ to listen to the field-force do better. Little wonder that the company which listens is one of the leading Indian companies among the top three.

When to listen?

Top management must listen periodically. The field-force must feel free to say what they want to. Like promotional material does not ‘reach’ on time etc. or that the material is too complicated to deliver.

The material that comes from head office is often long and no doctor enjoys listening to such long stories. More importantly, the representatives often do not enjoy detailing the material that is too long.

The real problem

The real problem goes much deeper: Can you detail the same material for three or four months to doctors? What is the level of fatigue in your field-staff if they have to ‘detail’ long messages that companies prepare for three or four months without any changes?

Implementation no longer remains a major area of excellence. There is compromise all around. Unless top management is willing to listen to the front-line representatives at least twice a year, they will never know what is responsible for indifferent execution of strategies and what is hurting them.

Top management could refuse to delegate the listening part to other senior managers. When you listen yourself, you hear so much more and you can take corrective action. Managers recalled how the Joint Managing Director of one company used to periodically listen directly from the representatives. He preferred to listen and get back and take appropriate action.

Intervention is very effective

Such intervention by top management is very effective way to know what needs to be improved. It also indicates that facts cannot be suppressed and the system is transparent enough to throw up real problems that are hurting people who are in the Sharpe end of selling.

Periodic ‘listening’ is therapeutic for the field-force and very useful for top management. The seniormost people who listen to field problems and also make field staff feel they are supported. This improves employee morale further.

Action taken

Undoubtedly, listening alone is not enough but listening is the first step. Top management has to ensure that remedial action is taken so that one does not live with the problems. No two organisations have the same problem. Yet there are areas where corrective action must be taken.

Courage to listen

Few top management persons have the courage to listen to problems and are willing to solve problems. Field force develops a different kind of trust in management; they know that what they are saying is hard. It makes management so much more authentic. Continuous improvement is possible only when top management periodically listens problems of force and are asking to take corrective action.

(About the author: Dr Savita Chari is a Senior Research Associate in the School of Business Management, NMIMS, deemed to be University in Mumbai)