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Developing Strong Internal Thought Leader

Management Capabilities Inside Medical Affairs

Best Practices, LLC Strategic Benchmarking Research & Analysis

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Table of Contents

Executive Summary pgs. 3-11

Research Overview pg. 3

Participating Companies & Segmentation pg. 4-5

Key Recommendations pg. 6

Key Findings & Insights pgs. 7-10

Thought Leader Management Leadership and Responsibilities pgs. 11-16

Thought Leader Management Spend and Resource Allocation pgs. 17-22

Importance of Thought Leader Management Activities pgs. 23-27

Managing Thought Leader Interactions pgs. 28-33

Effectiveness of Coordination Methods pgs. 34-40

Social Media Impact on Thought Leader Management pgs. 41-45

Medical Affairs Structure and Leadership pgs. 46-48

Medical Affairs Spend Allocation and Importance of Functions pgs. 49-55

Medical Affairs Spend Ratios pgs. 56-61

Demographics pgs. 62-65

Appendix pg. 66-69

About Best Practices, LLC pg.70-71

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Field Research & Insight Development

Thirty-one survey responses from Medical Affairs

leaders at 27 biopharmaceutical companies. This

report captures insights on Large , Mid-Size and

Small companies segments as well as on

companies from Global and US-only regions.

Additional deep-dive interviews with 2 selected

Medical Affairs executives- 1 Manager and 1

Director of Medical Affairs.

Provide Leading Insights on:

• Identifying the critical

requirements to create strong

Medical Affairs capabilities

• Create strategies to build and

maintain strong relationships

with Thought Leaders

Research Objectives & Methodology

Research Objectives:

Illustrate how leading Pharma and Biotech companies structure and organize their Medical Affairs

capabilities

Highlight strategies for building and maintaining effective relationships with Thought Leaders

Understand resource levels for effective Thought Leader and Medical Affairs organizations

Identify opportunities with social media use in Thought Leader Management

Explore strategies to improve internal communication and coordination of Thought Leader information

exchange

Business Objective

This research delivers current data, insights and best practices from Medical Affairs leaders at top biopharmaceutical

companies. The benchmark data in this study will help companies find better ways to create strong Thought Leader

Management and Medical Affairs capabilities.

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Universe of Learning: 27 Top Companies Contributed to This Research

This study engaged with 31 executives from 27 leading biopharmaceutical companies. Seven research participants

represented large biopharmaceutical organizations, while the remaining benchmark class emerged from mid-size and small

companies. Also 14 companies form a US-only segment, while 13 companies form a Global segment.

Benchmark Class

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Study Analyzes Two Main Segments

% Respondents

Benchmark Class

Regional

Segments Company Size Segments

U.S.-only Global Large

Companies:

Revenue > $10B

Medium Size

Companies:

Revenue $1B –

< $10B

Small

Companies:

Revenue < $1B

N=14

N=7

N=31

N=13

N=13 N=11

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Key Findings

Thought Leader Management Functions are Becoming Critical: Thought Leader Management

groups have a director or higher level leadership. This demonstrates the importance of the

Thought Leader Management function for biopharmaceutical companies.

Budget and Functional Responsibilities Should Align: Ideally, companies should align budget

management and functional responsibilities to use resources effectively. While Medical Affairs

group leads Thought Leader Management in a majority of the companies, the group has less

budget decision power than functional responsibility in this area.

Thought Leader Management Spend is Allocated to Most Important Activities: The

importance level of an activity influences the amount of spend for it. For example: Funding

Clinical Research Activities has the highest spend and is rated the most important activity by all

segments.

The following key findings and insights emerged from this study:

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N=31

Thought Leader Management Groups have High-Level Leadership

Q6. Leadership for Thought Leader Management: Who has oversight responsibility for your Thought Leader management?

Director (Includes Senior, Executive or Associate Director)

48%

Vice President (Includes Senior or

Executive Vice President)

45%

Other 7%

Thought Leader Management Group Leadership

Other: Therapeutic Medical Heads by TA Patient Value Unit

% Respondents

Forty-eight percent of the Thought Leader Management groups are led by Director level executives, and 45% are led at Vice

President level. High-level leadership at more than 90% of the Thought Leader Management groups shows the importance

of this function within Medical Affairs organizations.

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N=30

Medical Affairs has the highest functional and budget responsibility for thought leader management activities. It’s critical

for Medical Affairs organizations to manage budget for the activities that they are responsible for. This will help Medical

Affairs organizations allocate their resources more effectively across their Thought Leader Management activities.

Medical Affairs Leads Thought Leader Management

% Respondents

Q5. Responsibility: What group or groups within your company have functional and budget

responsibility for Thought Leader management?

3% 6% 6%

13% 13%

29%

55%

39%

87%

3% 10%

13% 16% 16%

32%

52% 55%

94%

CommercialCorporate FinanceSpeakers’ Bureau Scientific AffairsGrantsR&DMarketingClinicalAffairs/Operations

Medical Affairs

Thought Leader Management Responsibility

Budget Responsibility Functional Responsibility

8% more participants say that

Medical Affairs has the functional

but not budget responsibility.

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114

107

105

83

78

64

66

56

6

Clinical research support (trials, IIS, etc.)

Clinical advisory boards

Disease state awareness exchanges

Peer-to-peer presentations

Speaker training and presentation opportunities

Consulting Opportunities

Off-Label Discussions

Marketing advisory boards

Other

Importance of Activities

N=28

Benchmark class participants think that Clinical Research Support is the most important activity for Thought Leader

Services. Second and third most important activities are Clinical Advisory Boards and Disease State Awareness

Exchanges. All top three activities have over 100 score units, while the average score is 75 units.

Clinical Research Funding Seen as the Most Important TLM Activity

Importance Averages

Q11.Importance of activities: How important is each of the following Thought Leader services to the success of your organization?

Mean Score: 75

Note: We created the importance graph by multiplying the average importance rating (0 to

5) per activity with the number of respondents for that activity.

Other: Clinical Research

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Groups Get Wires Crossed Over Thought Leader Interactions

Information

exchange

is crucial

for success

in TLM

MSLs/

HOLS

Commercial

Team (i.e.

Sales and

Martket

Access)

Executives

and Others

Clinical/

Medical

Affairs

Teams

Different employees are

targeting the same

audience and competing

with each other for

TLs’ time.

Medical

Affairs Commercial

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High impact 10%

Moderate impact 16%

Low impact 35%

No impact 29%

Other 10%

Impact of Social Media

N=31

A majority of the participants don’t find social medial impactful in Thought Leader Management activities. Thirty-five

percent of the participants say that Social Media has a low impact in Thought Leader Management. Another 30% says that

Social Media has no impact in these activities. Still, a quarter give it moderate to high impact, signaling that some have

found a way to use it effectively.

Most Participants Think Social Media Has Low or No Impact

% Respondents

Q16. Impact of Social Media: Please rate the extent of impact social media is having on your

Thought Leader management activities.

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N=30

While half of the participating companies have a centralized Medical Affairs structure, one-third have a hybrid organization.

In addition, we observed that a higher percent of smaller companies have centralized structure compared to medium and

large companies.

Half of Medical Affairs Groups Use a Centralized Structure

% Respondents

Q3. Current Structure: Which of the following best describes the current structure of Medical Affairs at your company?

Centralized organization serving

entire enterprise under one

administration/budget 50%

Hybrid (some functions centralized

& others decentralized)

33%

Decentralized by region

7%

Decentralized by therapeutic area

10%

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About Best Practices, LLC

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Best Practices®, LLC is an internationally recognized thought leader in the field of best practice

benchmarking®. We are a research, consulting, benchmark database, publishing and advisory firm that

conducts work based on the simple yet profound principle that organizations can chart a course to superior

economic performance by leveraging the best business practices, operating tactics and winning strategies of

world-class companies.

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Chapel Hill, NC 27517

(Phone): 919-403-0251

www.best-in-class.com

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