Unlocking Team Potential: Strategies for Success in Pharmaceuticals

To be a team inside a pharmaceutical business is to have the opportunity to do something unique and special:  to make a meaningful contribution to human wellness and progress.  Anyone working in such a team also knows it means sitting amidst several tensions and paradoxes that can make delivering on that purpose highly challenging:

• Working towards an inspiring mission that can at times seems distant and smothered by everyday pressures and layers of hierarchy
• Striving to deliver consistently in an environment of constant change and transformation
• Seeking agility and innovation within tight regulations and safety guidelines
• Delivering the teams unique role whilst partnering in a complex matrix structure filled dependencies on other teams with expertise and value to offer

How do the team and those responsible for architecting the organisation truly unlock the potential of teams in this context?  Let’s explore some strategies for success founded on what we know works for all teams and how they can be applied to unique pressures and demand of pharma.

Architecting a supportive context

Before addressing the team level, it’s necessary to act on the context of the team.  In a large complex pharma business, the most impactful context often extends one or two levels up in the hierarchy to the Business Unit, Divisional or Functional level.

All teams need the right context to thrive.  For BU, Divisional or Functional Leaders or organisational designers such as HR or Strategy roles, this has some implications:

• Defining a clear overarching goal or purpose that is meaningful for each team – in pharma this means translating the organisation mission one level lower for the relevant BU or Division and putting it in everyday, accessible language.  This provides the necessary direction and alignment for teams to orient towards.
• Creating an environment where performance matters – without this the work of the team loses energy and teams meander.  Within large Pharma companies, constantly reinforcing that the work of the teams matters within their division, and to whole, is critical.  Celebrate success, name individuals and teams in town halls, flow resources towards teams that perform and offer support to the struggling.
• Establish and role model empowerment and open dialogue – pharma organisations are often hierarchical in nature and signals from senior leaders and figures of authority tell teams whether it is safe or not to act with empowerment and speak openly.  To foster this, gather the team leads on annual basis to engage in frank, transparent but safe dialogue on the vision, the aligned strategy, what is working and what needs to be addressed for future success.
  
  

Unlocking potential at the team level

With the context set, the task of unlocking potential at the team level has a much greater chance of success.  Teams can be the performance unit that whole organisations are built on and the following intentional strategies can help teams fully unlock their potential.

Start with the significance of the work:  people join pharmaceutical and life science companies for many reasons, but a dominant driver is the organisation’s purpose.  Keeping this central and alive in human, accessible language is enormously important.  The performance of people and teams is greater when the ultimate significance of the task is clear and compelling.

Teams can leverage this by reminding themselves of patient impact stories or sharing their own personal motivations for being at the company – the latter also builds openness and trust in the team.

Generate clarity on team purpose:  the big picture must then be broken down into something that binds an individual team together.  The team purpose must be as compelling and as differentiated as possible.  It becomes the cause for which people set aside their personal drives and act in the best interest of the team.

The first part of any team charter, a document that any team should create, is the team’s purpose.  Co-creating this purpose is a fantastic team activity and worthy of the multiple iterations it will probably take.

Be clear on team values:  values act as the moral and behavioural rudder for teams.  There will undoubtedly be organisational values that must be honoured, but at the very least the team need to discuss these and agree what they really mean for them.

It’s even better if the team have the freedom to establish their only values to guide their behaviours.  This will not be an amalgam of everyone’s individual values, but rather a set of truly shared values that arises from team dialogue in the context of the purpose.  This may mean personal sacrifice in the name of aligning values as part of something greater.

This is a superb activity for a team that is forming or reforming after change and builds the trust that underpins performance under pressure.

Thinking systemically and foster external relationships:  no successful team in a pharma company is an island.  The life sciences industry is highly technical meaning that value exists in expertise that must be tapped into.  The teams that unlock potential recognise their interdependence with other teams and invest in intentionally partnering for mutual value.

Investing in intentional dialogue at the leader level, visiting each other’s team meetings and engaging in meaningful joint planning are all great ways to enact this.

Foster internal cohesion and become a learning team:   change is a constant in pharma with the portfolio constantly transforming in the context of radical shifts in technology, population and the climate.  Paradoxically, at the team level to best handle change requires hitting the pause button and engaging in open, learning-oriented dialogue.  This is the necessary maintenance work any team must do to adapt to change, learn and grow.

Making time and space for this on a quarterly and annual basis is a great discipline.  Leaders capable of holding space for dialogue and focusing on their team dynamics in these moments of reflection will ensure potential is always unfolding for the team and it can adapt to change.

Work with a team coach to develop the team:  just as pharma companies are filled with deep technical experts, team development is greatly enhanced by the assistance of an expert.  Team coaching is a smart investment made by many teams to ensure team potential is fully unlocked.

An experienced and well-trained team coach is an expert in partnering over time with the team to catalyse their development journey.  Being credible and experienced in the context of the team with an innate sense of the unique challenges, opportunities and dynamics of the pharma industry will also allow the coach to support the team more effectively.

The rewards of unlocking potential

There is something deeply exciting, meaningful and memorable about our best team experiences.  The sense of being with others in the name of something greater than ourselves is special, and the pharmaceutical industry can enhance that sense of meaning with its overarching inspirational mission.

Taking the time and energy to focus on setting the right context and developing the team to its fullest potential can be both a deeply rewarding experience and a major catalyst to business performance.

Are you ready to elevate your team’s performance? Contact us for a consultation to explore how Energised Engagement can help unlock your team’s potential.