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“The good CEO, the one who will remain and stay in charge, is the one who learns how to outsource”, said Philippe Courtot, CEO of Qualys, a company that provides IT risk management solutions to the engineering industry. I have previously noted in several publications that the pharmaceutical industry is relatively new to outsourcing, but recent advances in strategic outsourcing as practiced by Wyeth, Solvay and, most recently, Eli Lilly show the beginnings of real comprehension of what outsourcing is all about.
In 1991, the CEO of Sasson, a $250 million company with just nine employees, said “I have to keep networking everywhere, looking for good partners”. The pharmaceutical industry is still miles away from being as lean as Sasson, but outsourcing is certainly on an upward path.
In his book Liberation Management, Tom Peters quotes Groucho Marx, “I wouldn’t want to join any club that would have me as a member” and suggests a variation: “I would not want to work with a subcontractor who would have me as a partner”. This is a way of saying that you should only work with CROs who you believe are better than you. This may be anathema to company-proud CRO managers in pharmaceutical companies, but the current economic conditions may force them to change their minds. CROs are essential to the pharmaceutical industry and it behoves the industry, therefore, to support, nurture, train, encourage and improve the sector. |
