Learning by “Gaming”

Jenna Sweeney has this excellent post on the effectiveness of gaming for training.
I have felt for a long time that this is a vastly under-utilized tool for pharma sales training. The competitive aspect of multi-player immersive gaming, and the potential for learning by repetition (in a mission-oriented game that is designed to make the players [...]

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Pharma News 9_28

I cannot believe that September is about over.
This has been my busiest month ever at Impactiviti, and I’m grateful for the clients who have put their trust in me to provide value with strategic thinking and targeted recommendations.
Now, onto the news of this week:
Pfizer gets a favorable ruling about Neurontin patent; may be real problem [...]

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Reactive vs. Strategic

Meeting with a client yesterday to start mapping out a strategic initiative, I was struck afresh by how many decisions are made in “reactive” mode in sales training departments. Many of the programs, systems, and suppliers in place are there only because a certain need had to be met at the time. What this often [...]

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Drug Reps to start leaving Disease Samples

In a creative new move to increase market share, Behemouth Pharmaceuticals has switched from the practice of having sales reps leave drug samples, instead having them leave samples of communicable diseases.
“Look, we’ve taken a lot of flak over this practice of leaving drug samples, you know what I’m saying?” said J.P. MacRost, President and CEO [...]

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Lecture of a Lifetime, reprise (with complete video)

Last week, I wrote about a moving speech by Randy Pausch, a Carnegie Mellon professor dying of pacreatic cancer, who delivered “the lecture of a lifetime.”
This story, which was featured by the Wall Street Journal and grew viral on the Internet, led to an explosion of attention and has deeply impacted many.
Today, the WSJ does [...]

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The end of drug sampling?

Will it be the end of drug sampling as we know it? Tune in Friday morning, as Impactiviti reveals the secret plan of one “Big Pharma” company to take a radical new approach to sampling…

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Wanted: Instructional Designers

It’s a fairly common occurrence that I get quiet inquiries, from both the client and the provider side, about career needs. Some are hiring, some are looking – and I have a pretty large network to draw on. I do my best, in an informal way, to see if I can “matchmake” in these situations.
In [...]

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“It’s the Network”

Verizon has been running a campaign of late depicting a massive crowd of their employees, there to provide service for every customer, under the phrase “It’s the Network” (my favorite is a recent TV spot with a loner biker pulling away from a middle-of-nowhere diner).
It’s not a bad campaign idea, actually – a way to [...]

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Missing Pharma Rep (Chicago area)

On a serious note, a young Eli Lilly pharmaceutical sales rep (Nailah Franklin) has gone missing in the Chicago area. Picture and details here. (from PharmaGossip blog)
UPDATE, 9/27 – it appears that they have found her body this morning. Very sad.

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Your own Doc for $500/year?

Our medical system needs more creativity. I like what this young doctor is trying out as a new approach. Read the article AND the growing set of comments below it…

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