In explaining to an interviewer why the pharmaceutical industry has become so reviled by consumers and politicians, Pfizer chairman Hank McKinnell echoed my first rule of reputation management – that there are three sides to every business relationship.
A big factor in the public’s disrespect toward the industry, Mr. McKinnell said, has been the four billion dollars it spends each year on direct-to-consumer advertising for prescription drugs. “We didn’t do enough to strengthen and reinforce the importance of the doctor-patient relationship,” he said. “It was a consequence of our success that we created visibility for products and many people in the public said, ‘That would be nice, but we can’t afford it’.”
Mr. McKinnell's comments suggest that brand advertising representing doctors as mere influencers – rather than empowering them as stakeholders with a vested interest in same people that drug companies target as consumers – has done more to erode public trust than the Vioxx scandal, profiteering allegations and billions paid in penalties and fines.
Blaming bad advertising strategy more than bad behavior is an easy out, of course. But it does underscore the idea that big business must align the myriad of publics and institutions that also matter to the bottom line.
Pfizer and other large companies “can’t behave as if we had only one group of stakeholders, which are our shareholders,” said Mr. McKinnell, who is also chairman of the Business Roundtable. “Obviously, they’re still No. 1. But rather than being seen as part of the problem, there’s increasingly a recognition that in health care and in the community, we have to be seen as part of the solution.”
Chief Executive Magazine | CSR and Big Pharma
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