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Ask most leaders to describe team building or team development and they will immediately talk of offsites or 'away-days', paintballing, high-ropes exercises and orienteering. All fantastic in their own rights, but forget them for a moment and consider this: used in the right wa

According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product

y, the plain old team meeting is one of the most effective, easily-organised and least costly tools for team building and development.

I recently spoke to a sales manager preparing to go to a team meeting offsite, and he was not looking forward to it! When I asked him why he

; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

Examples of combination products may in

old me that whilst these meetings are always good fun, they have some serious failings:

they are badly planned - team meetings appear to be called at random, with little notice, and there is never an agenda in advance

they are always focused on the future - the

lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

whole meeting is spent looking forward towards long-term, high-level goals and the team never refers back to what was agreed last time or to consider the lessons that can be learned from what has happened since the last meeting

there's no accountability in the team - my

here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe

riend resented the work he was putting into his presentation on projected sales because he felt that, after the team meeting, he would never again be asked whether he had achieved it, where he had had success or indeed where he had failed.

I was interested - my experie

d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

Combination pro

ce of team meetings has often been quite different. When I ask the teams I work with what works well and what hinders them, some common complaints appear time and time again:

team meetings are often postponed, or even cancelled, in favour of other priorities - giving the

ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc

impression that the team meeting, and maybe even the team, is well down the leaders' priority list

the whole team is rarely present, participants turn up late and often the first things people say on arrival is that they have to leave early! Mobile 'phones are left on an

easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi

people regularly leave the room to take or make 'important' calls. All of these issues are symptomatic of a lack of interest in the meeting, probably due to a perceived lack of value in the meeting

typical agendas - where they exist at all - consist of information-downlo

nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically

ad from the team leader, followed by an update from each team member about what they are currently working on - team members often find this more of an exercise in proving that they are working rather than adding any value in helping them to achieve their goals

there is o

and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ

ten little attention given to communal problem-solving or ensuring individual activities continue to fit with the team's overall purpose - exercises that would add value, build mutual accountability and utilise team strengths to best advantage.

Team meetings don't have

ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi

to be like this. Structure your team meetings well and you will see the difference in your team members' motivation and commitment through their attendance - always a good start! - and contribution to the team meeting. High performing teams employ some common practices for their te

ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

Following aspects would a

am meetings:

Plan team meetings well in advance
- Put your team meetings for the entire year in the diary now!
- Agree under what circumstances dates will be changed, and otherwise stick to them

Agree some rules about attendance a

dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
Which combination prod

d participation

Define when it is acceptable not to attend, to be late or to delegate

Agree that mobile devices be switched off or silent

For each meeting, structure an agenda and send it out beforehand, giving team members ample time to

cts are meaningful and rational?
Which therapeutic categories to select?
Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
Do combin

prepare

Define a format to keep updates brief and relevant

If you want team members to present, be clear about the level of detail and duration

Keep meetings action focused - blue sky, high-level planning is all very well but what speci

tions increase the patient compliance?
What would be the developing cost?
How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen

ically is the team going to deliver between this meeting and the next one?

Make sure actions are clearly defined with appropriate owners and timeframes

Ensure it is clear how they fit with the team's overall purpose and goals

Use team me

t?

As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel

tings as a form of self-assessment for the team

Refer back to the actions from the previous team meeting and check whether everything that was agreed has been achieved

Make the team accountable for its collective performance

Publicly ap

ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust

plaud the successes since last meeting

Where there have been disappointments, discuss them together and learn from them

Work together to generate ideas to ensure success next time

Treat successes and failures as belonging to the whole team, not to any

y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products

ne member

Ensure that every team meeting ends with a run-through of a documented set of actions, with owners, and make a review of previous actions a standing agenda point for future meetings.

I will leave you with a quote, the spirit of which I

.

As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de

think many of us will recognise:

"[If] we are all in agreement on the decision . . . then I propose we postpone further discussion of this matter until our next meeting to give ourselves time to develop disagreement and perhaps gain some understanding of what the decision is

elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

Companies that provide selfless information through particip

ll about." - Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. (1875 - 1966), a US auto executive

Don't let this be you! It is still early enough in the year to make another resolution, so make a commitment to implement the 7 simple steps above, and keep it!

© Allagi Consulting 2007. All rights reserved

tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

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And so, over scrambled eggs and bacon, I was gently fired. After seventeen years, in three cities, and across two divisions of the company, it was over. These are some of the things I've learned since that Terrible Breakfast.

It is only natural that when you start a business, you are doing something different than most people. They not only will look at you because you stick out like a sore thumb, but human nature will cause people to naturally ridicule what you are doing.

Explains the use of video surveillance as a crime deterrence tool for small businesses. Video surveillance should be utilized in conjunction with a combination safe, keyless door locks, and employee training as components of a comprehensive safety program.

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