Time for a reality check?

Who could have failed to notice that things are changing fast for the healthcare industry.

“Drug firms lag behind other industries in the way they use information technology to discriminate between profitable and unprofitable customers... The bosses of big drugs firms have been horribly slow to grasp the enormity of their problems.”
The Economist - Big Trouble for Big Pharma

Context in a nutshell: the blockbuster mentality is flawed, the assumed NCE promise of the genome is now a fraction of what we thought, pipelines are becoming slower and more costly to maintain, and patients and doctors are being changed by the technology around them in a way that threatens the integrity of one of the world’s most powerful industries.

Among the obstacles to real progress in the healthcare arena is the homogeneity of its marketing culture. Similar people making similar choices deriving similar comfort from similar behaviours. An almost tribal conventionality of thought and action that manages to propagate and proliferate itself (by attracting and rewarding similar people), reducing differences to a point where it really doesn’t matter (to a customer) where your product comes from.

That should matter to you. If it doesn’t your products are destined to remain just that.

The creation of BrandPhial (and Doghouse) occurred because I – as a creative service provider to both the Healthcare and Consumer Industries for some 18 years –had begun myself to question what was the role of branding in healthcare.

The biggest question of all – Where is the real meaning in brand?

The inspiration and hard work was all about the search for meaning in the Pharmaceutical Industry and its products.

Meaning defined here as a feeling that is experienced by humans, at various points along such important axes as belonging, sharing, understanding, perceiving, associating, finding relevance, feeling inclusion and trust, seeking and seeing value, engagement, attitude, belief, acceptance, receptiveness, expectation and often attraction, desire... even love.

It’s time to draw a line under the legacy of ‘old value’ and move on.

With thought innovators in the pharmaceutical industry recognising that the industry is at a ‘strategic inflection point’, it’s time to begin planning the escape from legacy-based historically entrenched ‘best practice’.

We have developed the processes needed to discover, prioritise and realise new forms of meaning and value for your brands and for your business. With new context, with fresh insights, with new tools and processes to get there.

What are the benefits of doing things our way?

Take a few moments to think this through, you should begin to sense the impact you can make by stepping across the legacy line. (If you need some help, just read the "meaning' paragraph again).

It's not always comfortable, involves inevitable change and dare-we-say-it risk, but we believe that it will take you to to a better place.

I ask the question of the industry:
Where is the Spirit of Leadership (PASSION) in Big Pharma?

Because from here on the outside, it’s not apparent.

The challenge for leaders is to start thinking outside the box, to challenge the legacy culture and practice in which Big Pharma currently seeks comfort (to incremental effect), and to attract people who are driven to magnificence, rather than comfortable grey-suited conformity.