Clinical developments within Asia Pacific and their
impact on ‘People Resources’
Building a team of suitably
qualified clinical research professionals within the Asia Pacific region,
particularly in China, South Korea, Taiwan and India, has become a critical
requirement due to the enormous growth in clinical trial activity in the
region.
Building a team of suitably
qualified clinical research professionals within the Asia Pacific region,
particularly in China, South Korea, Taiwan and India, has become a critical
requirement due to the enormous growth in clinical trial activity in the
region.
While there is variance from
country to country in both the extent and type of resource shortage within Asia
Pacific, it is generally accepted that there is a significant lack of qualified
and experienced, English speaking, Clinical Research Associates (CRA's),
Project Managers (PM's), Data Managers, Statisticians, Regulatory Affairs
personnel and Clinical Pharmacologists across the region. Within China and
India, in particular, there is also a lack of study nurses/coordinators.
This shortage has led to an
abnormally rapid career growth, salary escalation and acute turnover of staff.
It is common for CRA’s to be offered a senior or PM role within 2 - 3 years of
recruitment and Clinical Trial Assistants (CTA’s) to move into a CRA role
within 6 months. These trends present a challenge for managers to ensure
individuals have the depth of knowledge and skills necessary for higher level
responsibilities.
That said, while there is a
scarcity of experienced, qualified clinical research professionals, the good
news is that there is an abundance of highly educated science and medical
graduates who, with practical training, have the potential to bring new energy
and ideas to the industry, and increase its attractiveness to future graduates.
The resourcing problems that currently exist are, therefore, not insurmountable
with the appropriate investment and a positive approach. This article reviews
the challenges and outlines the various options available to pharmaceutical
organisations and CROs and how they can be implemented.
Resourcing Options
As in any other region,
pharmaceutical organisations can decide to either build their own in-house
teams or utilise strategic partners, such as CRO’s, by either insourcing
(contracting staff) or outsourcing trial operations.
Building an In-house Team
Workforce planning, role risk
review, sourcing the right skills, attraction strategies and retention
management are some of the critical requirements for building an in-house
team.Companies within Asia Pacific tend to utilise the return of ‘expats’ or overseas
skilled workers for long or short term assignments to fill a skills’ gap while
they train up staff locally. Countries such as China and India are also
experiencing a growth in the return of Western educated citizens, attracted by
new opportunities in their home countries.
The challenge facing many companies
is to recognise that maintaining and attracting good quality candidates
requires substantial investment and resource allocation in what may, at first
glance, be considered a non-productive area of the business. Retention
strategies must include a proactive evaluation of promotion expectations and
career development, and substantial training, not only at ‘entry level’ but
ongoing training initiatives are also important. Frequent exposure to new events
and experiences will also help maximise the retention of high quality
candidates.
Insourcing
Some Asia Pacific countries
have little experience in the use of contract staff compared to their Western
counterparts and some of their Asian neighbours including Japan, Australia and
New Zealand. As global companies continue to make headcount rationalisations, a
continued increase of insourcing within Asia Pacific should be expected, which
will be largely achieved through partnering with external vendors.
Historically, companies have
focused on insourcing one or two contractors to fill an urgent need. A more
valuable approach to consider is the implementation of strategic partnering of
insourced teams or entire functions. The movement towards strategic insourcing
pushes the focus for the Pharma/Biotech company on product development and the
resource/people management to their partner. This allows both to focus on their
core expertise. The following three aspects should be considered when selecting
an insourcing partner:
HR and legislative requirements
It is critical that your
partner company has solid HR processes that align with the insourced business
and comply with the required local legislation. For example, in Japan a company
must obtain a license to provide insourced staff whereas in Australia, New
Zealand, Taiwan and Singapore, this is not a requirement./
Capabilities
Ensure that your partner has
the brand, systems and processes that allow it to attract, train and retain
qualified employees with the right education, training and depth of practical
experience to manage increasingly complex protocols and clinical trial
processes.
Local resourcing development
While some global organisations
have excellent global processes and can transfer staff to local regions for
long and short transitions to help with gap training, it is the development
(attraction and retention) of local teams that can be a management challenge
and requires significant focus. Consider if your partner can source and develop
talent through various training programmes.
Building the Right Resources
Whether resources are supplied
via a partner or hired directly, requirements for the right resources do not
change. Each company should consider the following aspects when developing
their resourcing strategies:
Recruitment & Attraction Strategies
The recruitment aspect of
workforce planning is key to attracting the most suitable candidates and will
vary from country to country. In developing a recruitment strategy,
consideration needs to be given to salary equity, time frames for specific
roles, promoting the attractiveness of the industry and the employer brand, in
addition to the hiring processes which are used. If we look at Japan, a
significant priority for candidates is the company brand, for example, who is
the market leader, what is the company reputation, how attractive is the office
and location? So a key strategy in Japan would include building your company
image and leadership profile.
Within Asia Pacific, most
companies offer competitive salaries and benefit packages including allowances
for mobile phones, medical expenses, transport, meals and English language
training. In addition, many of the higher achieving candidates are looking for
skills enhancement training, management opportunities as well as the ability to
continue their education within clinical development through conference
attendance or other unique development opportunities. High candidate turnover
has contributed to salary escalation, particularly in China and India. The offer
of a sign-on bonus has become a popular method to entice candidates,
particularly in very tight markets with a high incidence of counter offers,
such as Taiwan.
Being Aware of Recruitment Timeframes
It should be noted that the
timeframe required to source new candidates can vary from country to country,
ranging from 6 to 10 weeks in China and Taiwan, to 12 to 16 weeks in Korea and
Japan. In general, a 4 to 8 week notice period is usual within Asia Pacific.
However, there are exceptions. For instance, in Korea and Japan it can take
considerably longer to recruit an employee due to the conservative nature of
candidates and the commitment the candidate may feel to their current employer.
In contrast, the timeframe can be shortened in India due to the local practice
of buying out the employee's notice period.
Counter offers can also impact
timeframes. In countries such as China, Korea, India and Taiwan there is high
likelihood of counter offers as companies will do what they can to retain their
staff. Having a well networked management and recruitment team who conduct
robust interviews, maintain regular contact with potential candidates and
continue to reinforce the benefits and prospects offered by the company, will
have a positive impact to help minimise this occurrence.
Promoting the Industry as an Attractive Proposition
The short term approach to
sourcing candidates is competing for experienced staff from the existing talent
pool and this can result in abnormal salary escalation and inequity within the
existing group. Currently, the existing supply of experienced clinical research
professionals will not meet future industry demands. Therefore, the
pharmaceutical industry needs to become more proactive in showcasing its varied
career paths and opportunities to rectify this situation.
Collaboration with universities
to attract life science and medical graduates is one way of achieving this.
Government initiatives and industry marketing are helping to attract graduates
into medicine and science, which is further enhanced with the establishment of
centres that focus on training medical graduates for clinical research. One
example is the Centre for Translational Research in Health Sciences which was
established in India. There has been an increase in collaboration between the
industry and universities in Asia Pacific, particularly in China and India
where there is a large proportion of scientific and medically qualified staff.
India has the added advantage that a high percentage of these people also have
good English language fluency levels. The continuance and development of these
trends will help to address the constraints in clinical trial resourcing.
Once they are attracted, the
training gap on the technical CRA skills continues to be a main concern for
many companies in China, Japan and Taiwan. These companies need to consider how
to build training into their resourcing strategy and whether they should
utilise in-house resources, or outsource.
Optimising your Brand
Brand is an important factor in
this growing jobs market and within Asia Pacific; it represents, perhaps, one of
the most important employment considerations for potential employees. A strong
company brand represents leadership, reputation, compensation and benefits. For
instance in this region, a global pharmaceutical brand will have a stronger
attraction for prospective candidates more so than a local CRO.Social media,
social gatherings and networking events are all channels through which
companies can create awareness of their brand but, while a good brand can
attract candidates, a brand that is not well regarded can be hugely detrimental
to a company. Brand negativity can spread very quickly in what is a relatively
small industry. Before implementing any social media strategy, the legal
implications and alternative strategies should be evaluated carefully.
Implementing Effective Hiring Processes
A consistent interview process
with skilled managers who are trained in interview techniques will help ensure
sustainable levels of high quality hires. In countries with strong labour laws,
such as Japan, Korea and Taiwan, wrong hiring decisions can be costly to a
company. Proper screening of candidates for the required skills and attributes
should be implemented. At a minimum, this should include competency behaviour
interviewing, reference and qualification checks and correct onboarding
processes.
Retention & Development Strategies
Staff turnover is reported to
be in the region of 12 - 24 months for a CRA in China, Korea and India. The
cost of turnover to an organisation is often quoted as 1.5 times salary.
However, there are additional hidden costs such as the perceived quality of the
organisation, it's brand and the effect on remaining staff. Also, the delays in
sourcing a replacement candidate may lead to greater workloads for employees,
which can result in job dissatisfaction, disengagement, stress and ongoing
turnover.
Retention of employees depends
on a number of factors including salary, career development, lifestyle, work
challenges, management and training. Companies also need to adapt their
strategies to meet their employees work/life balances such as increasing
workplace flexibility, training via webinars and career secondments.
Relationships with managers and
colleagues, particularly in countries such as China, Japan, South Korea and
Taiwan, is also a key factor that impacts retention and should be monitored
carefully.Within Asia Pacific, we often see clinical research professionals
changing jobs just for title and/or salary enhancement. While there is no
single solution to this complex issue, the instigation of suitable training
programmes, a focus on employees' career goals and proper management procedures
will aid in the retention of a company’s most valuable assets. Clearly, the
level of retention will be greater with employees who are engaged and connected
to their job. Engaged employees feel that their career goals are being
acknowledged, that they have adequate workplace challenges and a clear vision
of how their value and career will develop and grow within the company.
Therefore, training and development is crucial to retaining your workforce, not
only by developing employees on an individual basis, but by implementing clear
career paths and titles that reflect career progressions in the organisation.
Conclusion
Asia Pacific is experiencing
high resourcing growth and this growth varies across the region. To source,
recruit and retain a qualified and dedicated clinical workforce in the industry
is an ongoing complex process, but awareness of local trends and perceptions
and having access to flexible resourcing models will help to ensure that the
resourcing needs of the future will be met.Marketing the benefits of contract
employment will also help to overcome a cultural mindset in some areas where it
is perceived that long-term security, career progression and greater
opportunities are only accessible via direct employment with larger
pharmaceutical organisations. This will be even more important as the number of
trials increase in the region and global resourcing strategies increase the use
of insourcing.
Training is also key, from
developing entry level candidates to the ongoing development of the skills
needed to manage the increasing complexity of trials and the more specialised
skill sets required to evaluate the impact on health economics and outcomes
research in the Asia Pacific region.
Companies that focus on
employee and career development will generally be rewarded with increased
retention and commitment from staff. In an environment where poaching is
commonplace, a company may still experience staff turnover but with a strong
brand, good training options from entry level to leadership, good management
and opportunities for employees, the potential to retain staff is vastly
improved.
Paula Mumby, Vice President,
Operations, Asia Pacific
Business & Investment Opportunities
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