Case study: Why the pharma company was recruiting for mediocrity

The Situation
Faced with increasing competition the UK National Sales Director of a major pharmaceutical company posed the following challenge:

'I have a small number of representatives who are very good, but I don't know what makes them so good - and they don't seem able to tell me. I have a lot who are OK - they do a good job without being great. Those we can continue to develop. I have a few who shouldn't be working for us - who probably in truth should be doing something else altogether - and those I can deal with. What I want to know is how can we find more truly great reps - and why aren't they coming through our recruitment processes?'

The Project
A small team of consultants work-shadowed and interviewed a cross-section of high performing and averagely-performing representatives, using an externally validated framework shown to be predictive of high levels of performance.

Simultaneously internal HR staff and National Sales Mangers worked together to map out and log all the different recruitment methods, tests and processes used by RBMs to recruit new representatives locally.

Analysis of the field force observations by the consultant team showed five key areas in which the high performers operated in subtly yet distinctly different ways from the average performers.

A very close and detailed statistical analysis of the interviewing methods showed that the company was recruiting for mediocrity . The methods used tended to discriminate against the very factors that would be indicative of a high performer. This analysis also showed that certain tests and procedures were helpful in weeding out those with little aptitude or inclination for the job, and that where these were used consistently there were usually no truly poor performers on the territory.

The Result
The company was able to create a solid, consistent recruitment process which looked for and selected the key attributes of current high performers whilst at the same time highlighting the most effective development areas for average performers to improve.
The Sales Director declared himself 'delighted and excited,' with the results.