CEO Insights

Strategies for Effective Field Sales Ride-Alongs

Written By: Dave Manning

For pharmaceutical and life sciences brand teams, participating in ride-alongs—where managers join their sales representatives in the field—is a valuable tradition. Embracing effective planning and a strategic approach can transform these outings into golden opportunities for both leaders and reps to significantly enhance HCP engagement and improve performance.

Recently, I sat down with a couple of PDG colleagues to discuss best practices for ride-alongs. This article contains some tips that came out of our conversation.

First, the purpose of the ride-along is to let managers observe their reps’ interactions with healthcare professionals (HCPs) and assess the effectiveness of presenting branded material to support therapy, using these insights to:

• Guide ongoing training that can improve specific capabilities
• Tailor coaching to reinforce successful behaviors, redirect unsuccessful ones, and foster overall development, and
• Allow for mentoring and modeling of best practices.

Observe and Listen

The most important goal of the sales manager is to use the time together to observe how the rep performs in various situations—listen to how they present the materials and handle issues that may arise with healthcare providers (HCPs) When there are opportunities for improvement, the role of the sales manager is not to jump in and “fix the problem.” This approach does little to empower reps to achieve their fullest potential. Rather, during the ride-along, the manager will be observing not only the rep’s sales techniques, communication skills, and product knowledge, but how they respond to unexpected questions and objections and then using those observations to inform ongoing mentoring and training opportunities.

From a broader perspective, the ride-along lets the sales manager take the pulse of what’s going on in the marketplace. For instance, the sales manager should be observing how the rep delivers the brand messaging, how effective they are in both engaging with the HCPs and pivoting in the moment based on specific feedback, questions, or resistance they may be encountering during the visit. Additionally, is the sales rep interacting with all important staff members in addition to the physician? For example, is he/she interacting with the nurses/Mas, engaging with those who work on insurance reimbursement, etc.?

Similarly, the sales manager should be assessing the rep’s logistical and tactical capabilities, such as how efficiently the rep sequenced the schedule of visits to ensure optimal routing and time management and how proficiently they were able to work with the sales materials and other resources to close any knowledge gaps or frustrations the HCPs may vocalize and enable broader use of the product at the point of care.

Model Best Practices

Throughout a multi-day field visit, many opportunities will arise for the sales manager to model best practices. These may be related to how the rep delivers key messaging, handles objections or rejections, and builds relationships. Receiving feedback and seeing best practices modeled in the moment (or shortly thereafter) is especially helpful for younger, less experienced reps.

Importantly, during the ride-along, the manager should continuously encourage reps to self-reflect. Ask questions like, “How do you think that visit went? What do you think the impact was for the HCP? Why do you think the HCP showed some resistance?” This allows you to discuss specific issues and successes that occurred during the call.

Similarly, it is critical for the sales manager to be present and fully engaged during all ride-alongs. This may sound obvious, but too often managers multi-task during field rides by taking other calls, and answering texts and emails. It’s okay to set boundaries and manage other’s expectations by saying “I’m in the field for the next two days so you won’t be able to reach me,” to cut down on distractions.

Preparing for the Ride-Along

To make the most of their time together in the field, both the reps and their managers should spend some time preparing.

Tips for sales managers. Prior to the visit, managers should review the rep’s prior two to three field coaching reports. This will help them to review the strengths, areas for improvements and specific performance-related targets that have already been established. Advanced preparation helps in two ways:

1. It sets clear objectives for this ride-along based on earlier observations, and
2. It models good behavior — If the sales leader does not arrive prepared to make the most of the time together on the ground, what message does that send to the rep?

Tips for field reps. Sales reps should create an organized plan that will ensure that the HCP visits will go smoothly from a logistical standpoint. In addition to mapping out the sequence of calls for any given day, the rep should be ready to articulate what challenges or points of resistance they are likely to encounter during that visit. Importantly, reps should include some visits with receptive HCPs so they can demonstrate how they are able to present the materials and conduct deep, informative conversations with the physician. But they should also schedule several visits where they expect to encounter some resistance, so that the manager can assess how the rep handles points of friction and provide coaching related to the interaction.

Make Feedback Personal and Actionable

The field report (and related performance assessment) offered by the sales manager following the ride-along should be as specific and as constructive as possible, using concrete examples and anecdotes. The greater the specificity, the more impactful the interaction. Such details will help to create a more actionable roadmap and targets for ongoing improvement.

The field report should not only summarize key observations or takeaways from the days spent together on the ground but should also create an action plan. It should establish measurable goals or milestones that will be assessed again during the next ride-along. The goal is to encourage and enable ongoing performance improvement and a growth mindset — not to embarrass or demoralize the sales rep as they continue to develop their full professional capabilities.

Importantly, the field coaching report should be written immediately after the ride-along has wrapped up — not days or weeks later. Capturing the details and formulating the go-forward strategy immediately helps to keep the momentum going.

An important but often overlooked best practice for managers is to use the insights developed from ride-alongs with multiple field sales reps to connect individual reps for peer-level coaching. It can be very empowering for a rep who is focusing on improving a particular skill or overcoming a particular challenge to connect with a peer who has had more experience or more success with that particular issue. Setting up a broader peer-coaching infrastructure also allows individual reps to serve as a mentor in some situations while being able to access a mentor in others.

Clearly, fruitful interactions between sales reps and their managers are not limited to scheduled ride-alongs that happen just several times per year. The success of the approach will be borne out over time with continuous coaching and assessment. At the end of the day, it’s not just what the rep does when the sales manager is along for the ride — It’s what they are able to do when they’re out in the field on their own.

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Thank you, Dan Snyder and Ed Gutshall, for the robust conversation and your contributions to the ideas shared in this article.