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The Pharma Career Ladder · The country manager · Step 3: Money, pricing and forecast · Lesson 14

IQVIA data used properly

What it can tell you, and what it cannot

By Ahmed El Menshawy · 20 years in pharma, from medical rep to country manager in the UAE. Founder of RepPharma. LinkedIn
Published

Market audit data is one of the most useful things a country team has.

It is also one of the most misread.

IQVIA describes its audits as built from a panel of sources and projected to a national estimate. That is a strength. It gives everyone the same view of the market. It also means the data answers some questions far better than others.

The misreads I have seen most often:

  • One weak month treated as a lost market.
  • The audit treated as the whole market, when some channels are only partly visible.
  • Territory data used to rank reps, instead of helping the team decide where to focus.
  • And the biggest one: believing the data explains why sales moved.

It does not. It shows what moved.

The why comes from the field. From the doctor who changed her prescribing, the hospital that switched after a tender, the pharmacy that ran short of stock.

So in my teams, a share movement starts a conversation. We read the trend, not the point. We check what the audit covers in that channel. Then the first-line managers bring what their customers are telling them.

“Use market data to ask better questions, not to end the conversation.”
IQVIA data used properly: What it can tell you, and what it cannot

Lesson 14 of 17 in Step 3: Money, pricing and forecast, with the full guide and a checklist for this week.

More lessons in step 3: Money, pricing and forecast

Lesson 1Sales, profit and cashThree different questions about one businessLesson 2Reading a P&L as a commercial leaderThe five lines that matterLesson 3Gross margin is a strategyVolume without margin destroys a planLesson 4Working capital in pharmaStock, receivables and the cost of slow moneyLesson 5Forecasting you can defendAssumptions written down, not numbers inventedLesson 6Sell-in, sell-out, inventoryThe three numbers leaders confuseLesson 7Price is a decision, not a reactionHolding your net price under pressureLesson 8Bonus versus discountProtecting the price while moving volumeLesson 9Trade terms that do not leakRebates that stay under controlLesson 10Return on promotionWhat a call, a meeting and a sample really costLesson 11Cost per callThe number that reframes coverage decisionsLesson 12Budgeting without guessingZero-based thinking for A&PLesson 13The month that was boughtRecognising a number that was loadedLesson 15Market share versus growthWinning ground in a shrinking marketLesson 16The cost of complexityToo many SKUs, too many promisesLesson 17When to invest in a losing brandDecide on what is ahead, not what is spent

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