MESS IN ATTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES:

MESS IN ATTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES:

PHARMACEUTICAL PRODUCTS PERSONNEL ON AN EDGE.


BRANCH: HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
JINU. P. ISSAC
RESEARCH SCHOLAR, BHARATHIAR UNIVERSITY
ASST. PROFESSOR
PEOPLE INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES
MUNNAD. P. O
KASARGOD DISTRICT
KERALA, INDIA.

Abstract: In business perspective, pharmaceutical is a highly attractive industry. But for the internal personnel at work, the same has a different story. In every company of the industry, the field staff, the back bone of the profile, continues to be just victimized for unfair dealings. What happens to their own welfare? Facts give negative answers. Issues revolve around absence of a health policy, decontrolled pricing, improper redressal mechanism, wrong application of foreign laws in Indian soil, high work pressure, poor enforcement of SPE Act, and so on. It is shocking to learn that most of the employees are not at all authentically appointed as per Form-A. The stress factors force workers to leave the industry at the earliest chance. It provokes companies to meet physicians straight for a long term understanding that never do better for patients. The same accelerates un ethical trade practices on the other hand developed as a social evil. The women workers are not at all safe at least in terms of life security. All these burning issues contribute to the worst face of an attractive industry that often leads the ‘beneficiaries’ into miseries and poverty. It has become urgent to avail protection measures to field personnel in terms of minimum wages, legitimate appointments, freedom for getting organized, time limit on work, reasonable travelling allowance, favorable provisions of Industrial Dispute Act, maternity benefit for women workers, increment in salaries on the basis of seniority and track record, well stated and agreed upon working conditions, job immunity against top level collaborations rearrangements of companies and so on.

KEY WORDS: work force; sales promotion employees; unethical trade practices; health policy; industry back bone; social relevance; law updating; enforcement; intervention.
Bibliography:
1. Desai, P.N (1988). Medical Ethics in India, The journal of medicine an Philosophy, 13, 231 -255;
2. IIMB management review, vol. 25, No. 1, March 2013.
3. What is Good Distribution Practices; IRISH exporters association: 2012
4. FMRAI NEWS; Vol. XII, XIII, Kolkata 2013
     MESS IN ATTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES:
        PHARMACEUTICAL PRODUCTS PERSONNEL ON AN EDGE.

Introduction:

In pharmaceutical industry, more than manufacturing, distribution is simultaneously vital and complex segment. This field has been many times questioned on the basis of ethics and norms. Good distribution practice is much more than just distributing the product.  MHRA, one British agency, has recently defined a Good Distribution Practice as “the sum of all the processes and activities designed and implemented to ensure that the quality of medicine is maintained throughout the distribution chain from manufacturer to patient, ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements at all relevant stages. It includes the storage and transportation of drugs, other ingredients and packaging components used in the production of the medicine”.

  Here arise the relevance of marketing executives and medical representatives who accelerates the sale of products at the ground level and also providing updated information to hospitals, doctors and patients. Despite of their vital role in the process, how the companies, the financial beneficiaries of the process approach the field staff and their problems? Were they been treated at the right way? How did the grievances are often handled? Does the industry have a mechanism for the same? Does the companies provide a comfortable work environment? What about their pay and perks? Being the unorganized force, they do suffer a lot especially from their caregivers ie, their own companies.

Objectives of the study:

1. To analyze the issues in pharmaceutical distribution industry that are related with its employees in general.
2. To find out the challenges face by sales executives in pharma industry specific to Kerala.
3. To analyze social issues in pharma sector specific to pricing.
4. To find out grass root reasons for the increasing labor issues in pharma sector.
5. To find out the burning issues in general with regard to corporates- Government- law in pharmaceutical marketing industry.
Role of the workforce:
A diagrammatic representation shows the distribution structure as;



The physicians, though their time is scarce, who meet sales representatives provides apt medicine and better health care than who restricts interaction with sales reps. It helps the doctors to save time being spent on trial and error. The technical side of the job is admired as it stands for a social cause too. India still doesn’t have a National Health Policy is appalling. A draft has been lingering for a long time. Owing to lack of political will, Indians are just losing a chance to streamline health care sector. According to a World Bank estimate, millions of families have been dragged to poverty due to high cost of health care in India. The role of a medical representative in between the greedy corporate and poor patients is therefore a crucial one as far as pharmaceutical industry is taken as a public venture.

Certain Burning Issues:

The industry is in a mess with lot of issues that are hazardous to employees and toxic to people. A very few titles are being deliberated here;
i) MNC Penetration: It is very clear that drug MNCs are rushing to grab Indian Pharma market replacing Indian players by acquisition or trapping out. Now they are imposing unfavorable conditions on the Govt. which orients at FDI to meet the Current Account Deficit. These MNCs used to tighten clutches on people by exorbitant price on drugs and squeezing the workforce by many means such as imposing huge targets which may be sequentially enhanced on every achievement. It is shocking to examine a case where the distance between places are measured as given in ‘Google Earth’ which shows the air distance and employees are paid on that when it goes 5 or 6 times on road, companies are highly vigilant and cunning to ensure that. If the Govt. continues to be silent there could be unimaginable stress on workforce under such companies in upcoming days.
ii) Poor enforcement of SPE Act: There is a deep and hard cry from the side of workers to constitute a tripartite committee for sales promotion employees (SPEs) in a preparatory meeting, very recently, the union labor ministry somehow arrived at a consensus with the beneficiaries. Lacuna in enforcement of SPE Act gives opportunities to the companies to harass the field staff. Their job security is in hanger. If imprisonment and higher penalties are not incorporated   to the Act, the situation may get worse and naturally the sales promotion process may be disturbed.
iii) Decontrolled prices: As stated already India has become a nation where people falls into poverty due to high expense in health care. The union ministry notified Drug Price Control Order (DPCO-2013) with a message that the prices including that of lifesaving drugs will be lowered. The pharma corporate are playing a hoax on the DPCO, claiming value erosion to a high tune in pharma investment. They indirectly challenge the Govt. that if the order is adverse to their bottom line, they will quit and may another blow to the economy.
iv) Applying foreign laws in Indian soil: Since the most front running companies foreign nations, especially the US and the UK, when they make all attempts to sell out products of ‘inacceptable quality’, our Judicial system and enforcement authorities remains to be mum, when such companies draws in foreign laws applicable to their function and products. They make the Indian rules and authorities helpless in crucial issues. Such companies got enough chances to shift the goal post according to their convenience in between Indian laws and theirs.
v) Appointment Order in Form- A: The Sales Promotion Employees (SPE) Act specifies that the SPE have to be given appointment order in Form A. It brings employees under the protectory provisions like minimum wages, Industrial disputes, Bonus, Workmen’s compensation, Gratuity, Maternity Benefits etc. under various labor laws in India. But the companies purposefully avoid Form A and pushes employees into a never secured category. Most of their grievances should have been avoided if Form A is used.
vi) Ever increasing mental torture: No doubt, the sales and marketing segment of any business involves stress and therefore competency due to various reasons. The sales portfolio of various divisions have to be designed in accurate estimates. Under these objectives, why should the field staff to suffer the pressure beyond  limit.
vii) Never Increasing Pay: Once the job of a medical representative had some dignity and praised as wonderful profession with attractive pay packages. The basic pay itself is defective and unscientific; incentives and efforts do not match; even travelling expenses are not par with actual. Pay revisions in many companies frame comics and cannot be called as human efforts; withholding expenses and salary becomes routine stories. If the time value and deserving increment are taken into account, just common sense is enough to find that the salaries are diminishing year by year.
viii) Unsafe women: There are considerable number of women in the field of pharma today, lacking even life security. Their grievances are simple but still not addressed and include; No casualization of work, Equal work- equal pay, No arbitrary increase of work, Women friendly work Schedules, maternity leave, protection from sexual harassment.

Findings:

1. Unethical trade practices are on the peak in the industry. It has been turned unfriendly to employees and therefore, employee turnover is very high.
2. Pharmaceutical sales personnel face a lot of challenges including work stress and pay reduction.
3. Pharma products carry exorbitant rate as people or agencies do not assess price well on the basis of their utility.
4. Every time companies resolve labor issues with peripheral solutions and real causes left untouched, which aggravate issues on favorable occasions.
5. When issues remains and grows, neither corporate nor Government doesn’t come out with creative and constructive remedies including a strong health policy.

Conclusion:

The study reveals that the attractive pharma distribution segment has many self designed problems inside. The same are in worst phase as Govt. and regulatory agencies become helpless and ineffective. Employees happened to be the worst victims and in every stage their grievances are ignored with contempt. If a strong health policy is placed in no time and the supportive laws are effectively enforced, the public and work force could somehow manage the adverse situation and if not a serious untreatable sickness may be observed in the realm of pharma distribution and consumption. Beyond the findings and conclusion of few studies of this kind and deliberations there in, I leave huge part open for the consideration of all persons in academic and industry who expect to be right thinking to spent their logic and wisdom for designing a mechanism to overcome this vulgar face of a socially relevant  issue.
****************************