Who Influences Me?
Who Influences Me?
“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” –Jim Rohn
Seek out the right people.
It’s Not About Me
It's Not About Me
Market Access professionals are doing the work that matters. But only the work that’s actually done will matter.
There’s a good chance for abandonment if I’m doing it out of convenience/paycheck/promotion.
To do something despite all odds requires a purpose that’s bigger than myself.
Market Access professionals are in the business of SERVICE. They work for manufacturers. Manufacturers are part of the health care system. The North Star of ANYONE working in the health care system should be: “What can I do in order to keep patients healthy enough so they stay OUT of the health care system?”
Imagine if people around us began thinking like this. How efficient would be meetings, projects, budgets, organizations—and even the system as a whole?
Who benefits? Don’t we all?
It Wasn’t the Rookie
It Wasn't the Rookie
When something goes wrong, it must be the rookie who screwed up. Even the rookie believes it.
But how the tables turn when the truth surfaces: the rookie wasn’t at fault…it was the expert!
What can happen if experts gracefully accept their mistakes?
What can happen if experts refuse to accept their mistakes?
How would each scenario impact morale of the team and the possibility of a new beginning?
By definition, humans make mistakes (otherwise we would be God). Owning them requires courage and wisdom.
Two Heads Are Better Than One
Two Heads Are Better Than One
Gather a group of people who care enough to contribute. A diverse group actually works in your favor.
Before they come into the brainstorm session, hopefully they think through the problem on their own.
Then, watch the magic happen during the meeting when a brand-new idea emerges that no one could’ve imagined on their own, because it’s actually the product of the individual ideas.
Before dispersing, ask the person who didn’t speak up during the meeting: “what are your thoughts?” This could be another magical moment waiting to happen.
Collaboration at its best!
Riding the Hoverboard
Riding the Hoverboard
Crafting market access messages is a lot like riding a hoverboard.
The natural tendency is to teeter back and forth in order to avoid falling. In this balancing act, fall is inevitable when leaning in (shameless bragging) or leaning back (by-the-book bland words).
Shift the focus from leaning to gathering a core balance: figure out exactly what needs to be said and find robust references to support it.
An experienced writer (rider—punny!) is good at maintaining core balance and zipping ahead in what seems like second-nature.
Mistrust Even For Trustful Data
Mistrust Even For Trustful Data
A sacrosanct rule of bar charts is to always start the y-axis at ZERO. Starting at any other number skews the chart and can draw trouble and mistrust.
What should be the value of the first bar in the graph below? <3.5 million?
It’s actually 6 million. And this chart actually appeared on a major news network in 2014 (!).
“It’s good to learn from your mistakes. It’s better to learn from other people’s mistakes.” –Warren Buffet
Nothing Is Free
Nothing Is Free
Market access is about giving.
If you give customers enough of what they want, they will give you everything you want.
Those who want something for nothing, will get nothing for something.
Robust Information Management Even When No One Is Looking
Robust Information Management Even When No One Is Looking
How can you build a tower without the blocks?
How can you build a story in Market Access without datapoints?
No one knows the datapoints better than the writer—but even the writer sometimes attempts to build slides without laying out the datapoints (blocks) first. Good luck!
Mapping out datapoints (information management) does nothing to get the slides done. However, without it, there would be nothing to build the slides with.
It’s hard to marvel at a strong foundation because it’s buried underground and out of sight—but what would you miss in its absence?
Persistence
Persistence
The devil has always been cheap dopamine.
Instead of giving into a sea of alcohol or daydreaming of a sunny vacation, embrace the pain and lean into the dip.
Most don’t persist in the face of struggle. For those who do, boy was it worth it!
Fixing What’s Broken
Fixing What's Broken
Before discharging patients with heart failure, serious mental illness, or acute renal failure from the hospital, doctors should say, “see you back on the bed within 30 days.”
On average (across the nation and all severity levels), readmission within 30 days is guaranteed for 1 in 5 of these patients.
How troubled would patients feel about this statistic?
How is this acceptable?
We have the best technology in the world.
We also have manpower. According to the Census Bureau, health care/social assistance is THE LARGEST employer in the US with >20,000,000 professionals.
Then why these bleak numbers?
Statistics like these can easily fuel the game of finger-pointing, often amounting to a mound of…nothing.
The only way out is through progress.
