I love my job. No seriously, I always joke in the office that I have the fun role! I get to spend a lot of time on social media, creating content, building relationships, and visiting pharmacies.
I also engage and connect with many different pharmacy teams. What I enjoy the most is I get to know pharmacy owners, pharmacists, retail manager, stock controllers, pharmacy assistants and so forth. This is because with marketing, every team member plays a key role. So, from my pharmacy adventures I have learnt a lot. One of the biggest lessons so far, is the power of a pharmacy owner using leadership to drive their team to success.
As Michael Jordan famously said, talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships. So, when an owner takes an interest in their team’s personal development, they almost always achieve some form of growth. Another key lesson is the art of listening, when an owner takes the time to listen to feedback from their team.
So, I wanted to share a quick story about an experience from a recent visit to a pharmacy.
I was there to chat about opportunities for the pharmacy from a marketing perspective and to set goals for the next 12 months. It was a great meeting! However, what I want to highlight is a conversation I had with one of the team members just as I was about to leave.
She stopped me to have a quick chat. She mentioned a lot of patients are asking for OTC medicines to help for when they’re not sleeping. Since has been working at this pharmacy, she has gained a real insight about natural sleep supplements, and how it can be a great long term solution for a patient vs a reactionary of taking something on a night that they cannot sleep. She was extremely passionate about her findings and was asking how we could incorporate this into our marketing strategy. So, together we sat down and created a campaign for patients struggling with sleep.
Now, first up I now know a lot about natural sleep supplements! Secondly, I now know that there is a solution for patients at this pharmacy for sleep issues. Thirdly, we know exactly who in the pharmacy we would refer these patients to. This sparked so much joy for me, as I could see an opportunity presented purely from pulling on a team member’s interest.
When we look at an employee from any organisation, they are all going to have different belief systems, life experience and value sets. Therefore, their interests or skillset within a pharmacy will bring its own special flavor. Now, what I want you to ask yourself are your leveraging your team’s interest and expertise as best you can?
Whenever I work with any pharmacy, I always share the worst kept secret, your team is and always will be the number one asset for your business. This is because they are in control of patient experience and how your pharmacy is perceived by its community. You can have the best website, social media following and service offerings, but if your team decides that they are not interested or engaged with any of those strategies, they will impact patient experience. That is why I was so thrilled after the above conversation, as I could see a team member’s passion and drive for something that will benefit the pharmacy.
So, what can you do within your pharmacy today to spark ideas, inspiration, and conversation within your team? I have shared some quick ideas below 👇
Daily Huddles
This is a Peak Strategies hack! Daily huddles are a daily catch up with the team. It is informal and can be done on the floor just when the pharmacy opens or perhaps you adjust the roster to factor in, a fifteen minute before open time. The purpose of a daily huddle is for each team member to share what they achieved yesterday, their jobs for the day and share any wins or anything that they might be stuck on. It is a great way for everyone to understand the workload for the day, discuss any issues and to simply be together as a whole team for a few minutes. Key tip for this exercise is someone must take notes so you can follow up the next day (promoting a sense of team and accountability.)
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