Help your teams understand the meaning of Digital Transformation

“It is said if you want to perfect a language then you need to start thinking in that language. I believe this to be the best way to incorporate digital in our lives in the new normal,” shares Mr. Amit Jain, Vice President, Sales and Marketing when asked about future of pharma marketing.

“COVID-19 has accelerated the digitalization process across the globe. Digital Transformation is the need of the hour, be it our operations, interactions, team engagement or customer relationship.

While everyone has been preparing for the digital tomorrow, with the pandemic we have to focus on the digital now. Telehealth, digital collaboration tools and a more disciplined approach to customer relationship management will be required to ensure short term survival and long term growth.

Customer Journey Goes Digital

Remember not only your people, teams and organisation are going through the change, pandemic is forcing the whole society to go through a change. Your customers are spending a lot of their time online. As things change we need to define the new customer journey in the new normal and be present where our customers are. Your biggest asset through all this remains your customer focus.

The new normal presents newer opportunities to build your customer engagement and engage them with your innovation and ideas. This is the time to create unique differentiation for your products. Your customers are amidst information overload and everyone is eyeing for some piece of their time. Developing a digital brand strategy that ensures value to customers and delivers on the key messages of your organisation will help.

Here data and digital tools help. Execute campaigns in the short run and measure them to build long term strategies. This will help set a baseline and foundation for future success. Keep in mind a lot of changes happening around you are happening for the first time.

Digital is faster

One of the biggest advantages of digital is the ease in speed of execution. Technology makes it faster for us to execute ideas, study success and course correct. This also helps you adapt better to disruptions and changes which you might not be aware of. Technology has made it easier to adapt these changes.

One of the aspects that I have been really happy about is the exchange of fresh ideas. Not only does technology enable one to implement ideas faster but it also makes innovation a continuous process, since team shares ideas and iterate them on the go. Operationally, digital mediums have helped do away with a lot of roadblocks and bottlenecks.

It is important for us to invest in technologies and people who can help make this foundation stronger. The stronger the digital foundation the better you will be able to analyse and correct your actions. This will also ensure we are more secure while facing the uncertainty of the future.

Digital as a Team Culture

Pharma has never been associated as an industry which a leader in adopting technology and hence digital mindset might take time getting used to. The new normal dictates that we have smaller gatherings, have more virtual meetings and reduce in person or face to face conversations. While there are plenty of communication tools out there, it is important that this way of working is promoted in teams.

This means that organisations have to culturally align themselves to this digital transformation. They have to encourage and reward digital initiatives, remote collaboration and sharing of innovating ideas. This will also help keep your teams motivated and engaged in the new normal. This will help you execute your business strategy better and remain flexible in the face of the given environmental and economic changes.

As a leader I believe in giving ownership to my team, setting clear expectations and making them part of this cause has helped my team deal with the new normal better. As much as bringing in new technology platforms or introducing digital models is important having the buy in from team members is the key to digital success.

Build for Scale

As a last thought, I would like to iterate the biggest power of digital is that it is built for scale. Sitting in India you can engage an audience in USA and there is enough proof at present that there are organisations who are doing this and with great success. Technology is a great enabler when it comes to expanding your reach beyond your existing markets.”