Hello there. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening. It doesn't matter what time it is, what matters is that you were here with us for one more strategizer, our road for a sales strategy. Welcome to the place where the salespeople meet. Today, I'm very honored to announce our guest. He was a boxer, a cart pilot, a pilot who had a beautiful motorcycle. Please welcome my very good friend, Rubens Weg. Hi Rubens, thank you very much for coming. Thank you very much for the invitation. Okay nice. So, why don't you tell us about yourself and your experience. Sure. I started my career about 25 years ago in a company called Schering Pharmaceuticals, which was based in Berlin, as a sales rep. After that, I became a product manager for different areas, and then a corporate communications manager. I also then, still in Brazil, I became a marketing director. And then afterwards, I was sent to Berlin where I stayed two and a half years. So, I had experience in terms of strategic marketing, more focused on dermatology, came back to Brazil as a commercial director, went through a fusion between sharing Bayer pharmaceuticals. And then also doing the merge, and right after the merge, I went to Chile to be the general manager of Chile pharmaceutical, and came back to Brazil about five years ago for the current position of Bio-pharmaceuticals in Brazil, as the CEO here. If you think on a market oriented company, which areas assume a more strategical role in your opinion, your experience? Definitely the customer, but what are we more say that in a pharmaceutical branch, is there is a patient intensity orientation. So that comes also from the development of a new drug, which will be the clinical trials. And also how we at the end of the day make that reach to patients, which include for example how do we have access to that. But in-between, more specifically, in pharmaceuticals we have more stakeholders, like the medical doctor that who prescribed given medicine for example. So, then we have multiple stakeholders that we have to convince, regulators, patients as I mentioned to you before, and patients today as a customer, they are much more aware about their rights, and information is more available in the Internet, so patients or customers today in the pharmaceutical branch, they do have more information before they go to the doctor, and then it's our obligation also to provide the same information to the doctor, so that they are prepared also to have argumentation with the patients. So, our responsibility is not only to the doctors but also to society. And then we have to be careful that the patients are more informed than the doctor and vice versa. Yeah, in the past we're not that, but with the advent of internet the things are more transparent, which is good. We also we have regulators. So, it's a multi-stakeholder approach, because regulators can also define our success or not in terms of at least a pharmaceutical company. So, customer first, ours. Not necessarily, it means they are right, but they have to be first in our minds, how we approach them. Okay. Wonderful. Did you hear that? That is important for you. So, sharing your experience again, how do you define the relationship between the areas, marketing and sales, are they used to work together always? How to align these two areas? Yeah that's a very sensitive topic definitely. If we're looking into how you put it Company archetype, that defines a lot the relationship between market and sales. I had a chance to work in two different setups. One is marketing director and sales director. And the current one that we have today is a BU director. So, in the past with the marketing director and sales director, there was more environment for competition, which was not healthy in my opinion. When we redefine the company as more strategic business units, where the head is responsible for marketing sales. In my experience that keeps more unity, being able to navigate between sales and marketing. We thought major disruptions in terms of fighting who's right? Who's wrong? Is there go? It's my go? Etcetra. So, I think that is a lot to do with how you define your company structure, yeah in order to, and also as one in charge of the organization in a country, we will also have to be sensitive and to understand which forces are playing here and there, and to constructively manage that in order that people don't really have attrition, I mean negative attrition. They can have disputes about opinions, they may have another plan or a target, but not being disruptive. This is the art we have to have, in order to make the organizations succeed with everybody in. What are your guidelines, like the strategic objectives of the company? What we do today in more globalized companies is that, somehow we are a mirror of the corporate structure. So, the corporate structure is also defined in business units and also support areas. So, coming to a market at least the market's as big as Brazil, not small markets, the setup is pretty much the same, and then having the same structure, also help us to really bridge exactly what we have in global, to regional, to the country. And in terms of how we aligned it, again, being a part of the business unit, it's easier to understand the common guidance, the common strategy, the common goals and objectives. And interesting or not, it may have this situation at least we have that in Brazil, that one business unit, compared to another. I have six under my responsibility. Wow. They also have different culture. Yeah, because that's also depending on the type of business that shaped our full behavior. I understand. Yeah okay. The core values are the same in the company, but let's say sometimes the culture goes much more in the direction of who is in charge of that business unit. The leadership. The leadership, definitely. That's very interesting to see how do they differentiate, but any how, even the business units at the end, they have a common goal, which is the goal of being a Brazil. So, we have different layers, where you have to align is not only within business units but also as business units, we all have the same target which is our country results. I see. We have to think about financials and manufacturing and so on. So we have to, And also when we have, we do have a situation like we are currently having in Brazil where the economy is not really running well. Everybody has to think together how do we achieve our goals, and together and in a compliant manner et cetera. So, if one business is doing fine, what I expect in general is that this business is also sensitive to all other business units because not everybody is running fine every time we know that. Yes. But it is important as the sales force, they identify themselves with the other sales force because it's very common that one area, the most likely have overlaps in terms of clients, and then how do we make the sales force will help each other, even if they have different targets. And then we try to bring synergies also from that perspective, yeah. Synergies and sometimes some opportunities that we can define. Yeah. We also have sometimes, I had in past companies the sales force really disputing things, where none of them would agree doing anything. But the ideal would be one face to the customer. We know that we have for one hand for example oncology another hand on the cardiology, but both are in the same hospital. So, they have the same understanding of the same clients etcetera. How do they help each other. Perfect. And the sales, how should this areas act to affect operationalize, the corporate strategy. More Operational, I mean. So we think on the strategy both. How we deploy that?. Yes, Yes. Well, maybe it sounds strange, but I'm going to tell you a good strategy. Yeah. People should understand in the level of the company. Once people understand this strategy and they buy it, they are eager to implement it really, because they see a meaning on what is said to them or what's presented to them. The most difficult part is when people don't really understand the strategy and in their minds or in our minds that doesn't make sense for us. This is the biggest hurdle I get to see. Good starters are simple and meaningful. So, once we have that incorporated in our minds, the next step is how we'd prepare an operational model to deploy that, and then comes excellence in a seclusion, which is part of a good marketing plan which embraces also how we are operationalize that in terms of sales. So, we can now also talk about the different concepts of marketing, you probably know better than me. But always keep in mind what does the sales force need, because depending on the perspective where you are in the company, we also have to understand that this sales force, there are also the client of marketing guys. So, how to work together, how many times you guys, if you are in a marketing position, you go out with the sales force to really understand the front where people are really battling for for results. So, this is really where, besides the books that we have to read, we have also to be sensitive to the other people function. So, being together to empathize with their hurdles, it help people from marketing to develop better actions to be implemented. Try their shoes. Definitely. Okay. So good advice. Well, based on your experience, what advice would you give to anyone who wants to develop successful sales career? Okay. Perhaps you should discuss about success, what's, how you measure it. But then I will not enter in this field right now. Okay. At first, I think you have to like what you do in any professions. And, you really have to do that with passion, hard calculation, study your products, understand your customers, do things that are sustainable. So, don't do things that we should not do. Definitely. More and more companies are looking for being sustainable, meaning it doesn't count only the short term results but how we will be the company in the range of five to 10 years. And we are pretty much dependent on the sales colleagues, because at the end of the day, they are in the front of the customer where we they will materialize our strategy. And we know that the majority of the companies, at their sales function is where the money flows. So, there's also the chances that something goes wrong and we don't want that to happen. So first thing, do things that you like to do, and do that with passion, correctly, in line of the company objectives and values. And also, if you are a good sales rep and you are happy or on, don't push too much. I have seen, also experienced where we take an excellent sales rep, and try to promote him or her and people fail, because one thing is to be an excellent sales rep, another thing is to be a manager of sales reps, that's chances totally different, the perspective on how to define a success. One thing is, as the first line sales manager, that's what we call it was a district manager. Today's one of the most important piece of a company because he or she, would really have the coaching days of the sales rep, and we will be able to steer to the right or to the left when they are together and doing the sales. So, the whole message of coming from marketing goes to the district manager, and goes to the sale rep, yeah. So, my recommendation is do that with heart, energy, you have to like it, and quite simple. Rubens, thank you very much for coming and share your knowledge and experience with us today. Thank you very much for invitation. Thank you. And you, thank you very much for staying with us and stay tuned for more of "The Strategizer." See you soon.
