Vivian Lee - From Traditional to Digital: Charting a New Course in Pharmacy Careers

Vivian Lee is a Senior Consultant at IQVIA, as part of the Strategic Insights and Analytics team.

Her expertise is in leading and executing projects in the management consulting and commercial effectiveness area of practice for Consumer Health and Pharmaceutical clients, where she brings her in-depth industry knowledge of the retail pharmacy landscape, categories and consumer behavioural trends.

Vivian’s background is a registered Pharmacist with 15 years of experience working in various roles within the industry, including ownership of multiple pharmacies, Digital Marketing Manager, Examiner for the Pharmacy Council of NSW and Pharmacist Advisor to the aviation health industry.

You can find Vivian Lee on LinkedIn.

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Transcript

00:03 - Announcer (Announcement)

Your Pharmacy Career podcast, proudly brought to you by Ravens Recruitment, australia's Pharmacy Recruitment Agency, spotlights the myriad of career paths available to pharmacists. Your host, Krysti-Lee Patterson, and her esteemed guests will be sharing invaluable career advice that you can implement at any stage of your career journey. 

00:27 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

Welcome to another episode of your Pharmacy Career podcast. I'm your host, Krysti-Lee Patterson, and today we have a special guest whose career journey encapsulates the versatility of the pharmacy profession. Joining us is Vivian Lee, a seasoned pharmacist and senior consultant at IQVO Consumer. 

00:44 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

Hello, Krysti-Lee, it's really my pleasure to be here today and share this with you and with the wider audience as well. Just a little bit of background and introduction on myself I'm a senior consultant at IQVO and, for those who don't know, IQVIA is a molecule to market our company. We are at the forefront of health and data and we do anything from digital clinical trials, where there's a lot of data, to helping launch products to market sales force effectiveness. 

01:25 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

Could you tell us about your early experiences in owning those community pharmacies? 

01:32 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

Your intern year has to be a good year, because if you have a bad one, it takes a long time to catch up. You really want to be having a really strong mentorship and support In terms of key learnings. The first one is your staff are your biggest assets. They are your allies. You need to have good support. You need to have the same vision. You need to invest in training them up and having that shared vision. 

02:06

Leadership comes from the top. I always believe that you need to lead by example. You cannot talk the talk but not walk the walk yourself. The second one is I think you cannot be everything for everyone. You need to pick your model. Are you going to be service-based or are you going to be discount-based? If you are going down the service-based route, you need to make sure you are delivering on those value propositions that you claim you are and also be charging appropriately or being financially remunerated, because those services all cost money. Or are you going to go down the path of discounters? That's also fine, but that's a volume-based game. If you're going to do it well, I can tell you it can be a race to the bottom as well. 

03:01 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

I just wanted to pick up on a couple of things that you mentioned, especially with your internship and getting that really valuable mentorship from your preceptor. I think that's really important. I know that was something that was really important for me when I did my internship was to find someone that was willing to give me the time to learn as much as possible. For those that are listening that are pharmacy students, I definitely would say start thinking about your internship now. It doesn't matter whether you're in your first, second, third or fourth year. Start thinking about what type of pharmacy you want to be in. If you don't know, that's okay. Maybe even start getting some jobs in different types of pharmacies during your university days and see what you like and what you don't like. 

03:58

The other two learnings I just wanted to recap for people is people being number one. It sounds almost like common sense. I think people really are your business right. We're in the business of making people feel better about themselves and if your staff don't feel good, then they're not going to give that experience to the customers that are walking in. I think that's really important. That links into what you said about the you can't be everything to everyone Understanding what that vision is, and if you don't have that, how can you articulate that to your staff, I guess? Now I'd like to chat about that transition from the traditional pharmacy setup to moving into online pharmacy. 

04:47 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

I came to a point where I've just had my first child. I've sold out the pharmacy, so essentially I was unemployed. I began looking for work and I was successful in actually securing a job. Then I was also approached about a partnership or a potential partnership on an online pharmacy. The two opportunities that were presented in front of me was one was actually a sales rep role. That was for the industry and it was marketing to doctors on radiology services. I think some things that pharmacists have to recognise is how much our skill sets are transferable. We are a service-based industry. We are a people person. We understand medical terms and we have ability to grasp concepts. All of those are transferable. It means that you're very highly employable as well. In other industry. I couldn't quite commit to the amount of travel that was required for a sales role at that time. The other opportunity that was presented in front of me was through my business relationship. I was offered a partnership on online pharmacy. It's called Pharmacy Direct and it's actually Australia's first online pharmacy. At that time we bought it off Terry White-Kemmott, who had owned it and managed it for a few years. 

06:24

I had to learn very, very quickly. The way that I did that was. I had to prioritise because, as I said, you can't be everything for everyone, and that also applies to your own business, because you'll burn out very quickly. I had to reassess where I would be the most impactful. Where I found that it would have been the most impactful was actually in digital marketing and merchandising. Then, through that journey, I actually really realised the power of data, because when you're online, everything is trackable. You're one click away from the competitor. You need to understand consumer behaviour online. How long are they on the website? Where does traffic came from? How long are they staying on your site? What is their path to purchase and journey? What's their click-through rate, conversion rate, what is the cut abandonment rate? Where are you falling over in this journey and path to purchase and how can you improve so that you can improve your revenue? And, of course, that comes from people shopping on your website or through your store. 

07:42 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

It sounds like it certainly opened your eyes to that consumer behavior piece. But we, as pharmacists whether you're a small business owner or managing a large online pharmacy business we have to recognize that they are people and they behave like consumers. That's what they are, and understanding that can really give you that leverage. I also loved where you said about where you can be the most impactful. I think that's a really good take-home message for people, because as pharmacists, we I'm allowed to say it we're a little bit of control freaks and like to do everything ourselves, and that can lead to burnout. So it's recognizing what skills do you have and then what skills that you don't have and those skills that you don't have, hiring the right people so that they can do those things really well. 

08:47

And it sounds like you did that at Pharmacy Direct because, yeah, otherwise you can burn out, and professional burnout is something that is quite rampant in our industry at the moment, and won't just any industry, and so I just wanted to highlight that point as well. That's really important. But I wondered, with your journey, did you go and do any further study or did you like, how did you learn about that digital? 

09:18 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

marketing Prior to actually, you know, through acquiring a business. There is time to settle. You know it's about time you do your due diligence and settlement. There's a couple of weeks, like you know, leg time, right. So in that time I actually took up a digital marketing course. It was an online course, but it was basically six weeks. It was a digital marketing 101. But it just gave me insights into what I need to know in order to manage it. I don't necessarily need to do the work, but I need to understand conceptually so I can manage it. And then, throughout my journey as well, when you run an online business, there is always a CRM, which is a database, and so most of them work on a, you know, relational app sequel database in the back end. And so I actually went and did a technical skill to understand SQL. So you know, and it's all you know, I didn't need to look. 

10:32

I think some people also make the mistake and even in my journey now as a senior consultant at IQVIA and through my mentorship with my manager, I say to him I have a lot of analysts who work for, you know, with me, colleagues of mine, and they have extremely good technical skills and I sometimes I feel inadequate in terms of you know of technical skills and I asked my manager do you think this is something I need to upskill on? And I said well, you can, but you're going head to head with someone who's fresh out of uni, who's done a you know five years computer science engineering degree, who's going to be extremely good at technical skills. You're time poor. You know mom, who's juggling your career and that. So why don't you think where your real skill sets are and you're impactful and learn conceptually? I highly recommend that you know, do these short courses so you can understand it in order to manage it. You don't need to be the one sitting there doing the coding, you don't need to be the one sitting there doing the graphics, but you need to understand so that you can manage the process. You know, from end to end. And any business that you go into and any job. 

11:48

I always recommend that, when you first take up either a business or a job, that you spend the first you know a period of time observing. In business, we have a rule which is you know, maybe it's a bit unspoken, but in the first year you don't make changes. You sit there and you observe, you learn everything you need to know about the business. Then you identify where the gaps are, where the challenges are, where the pain points are. Then you start prioritizing them and creating some sort of framework and what you're going to address first, and then you then start conticking them off A lot. 

12:24

Some well, some people make the mistake and go. I'm going to go in and I'm going to make such an impact. I'm going to make this change. You end up losing your best people and you can end up not taking the good things away from them, not taking the good things from a business because you want to keep that. You want to keep what's good in a business, but you want to work on what's not working well and really drive improvements there. So, whether it applies to being an employee or applies to being a business, I still think that that bit of just observing and that grace that you give yourself is really, really important. 

13:00 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

Oh, that is fantastic advice. I think that's I was kind of having I don't know if it was a bit of a PTSD or something from when I was first pharmacist in charge and I, I guess you could say, went in guns blazing and wanting to make change and change the world overnight and did it too fast and some things worked, but some things didn't and we didn't bring the team on board. We definitely made changes too quickly, and so I think that's, yeah, whether you're buying a business, acquiring a business or just stepping up in a leadership role or moving into a new pharmacy, I think that's really great advice to, yeah, observe and really get involved in, in, I guess, the nitty gritty or all the detail of the business and understand, yeah, what's happening, and then you can see those gaps and then make that prioritization. I think that's great advice, really really good advice. That's a really good point as well. Having, yeah, people around you that are also supporting you to make those mistakes.  I think that's also, when I look at, yeah, some of my past career. I've been very grateful that the owners have given me that, I guess, freedom to make mistakes, and I think that can can be really great learning, and I think if you you're not making mistakes, you're not growing, but then at the same time, if you're making that same mistake over and over again, you're not learning, so realizing okay, maybe that wasn't the best idea, let's learn from it and move on and try something else. So, as we've been chatting, I can definitely hear your passion in data and how to use that data, and I think in pharmacy there is so much data out there, even just from a, just the data that's sitting in your dispensary software, and I would almost say that 90% of it people don't know what to do with that. It's just sitting there, they pull reports, but if you're just, if you're not doing anything with it, it's almost like you're wasting time. So, yeah, let's move on now to your role at IQVR. Yeah, I'd love to understand how you think the pharmacy industry can utilize this data to ultimately make better health outcomes. 

15:38 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

And it's such impactful and so powerful data and we just don't realize the power of it and sometimes for pharmacists, I think sometimes it's not having the time to explore the data as well that you have access to and being able to draw those meaningful insights. But, yeah, from like, even within the pharmacy itself, you know the data that you actually have. Like you have dispensary data, so you have all your consumers, you have sales data, you even have dispensary data, which is also actually a longitudinal tracking of consumption. Like you know consumer behavior, patient and doctor, initiation, switching, and and and you know the source of business. So, like all of those fall, you know within sort of, you know our analytics and we actually look at that data as a, as a data agency. But, yeah, in terms of for the industry or for pharmacists, how you can relate to that, I think we, when you need to recognize how powerful data is, making those data driven decisions and not really on that, that gut feel you know like, for example, you know you, you know that, for example, doing vaccinations is going to increase your business, but how? How much? How much incremental, how much uplift are you going to get? Are you, are you really measuring that. Are you measuring whether it's increasing to your average basket size? Are you measuring whether it's actually impactful in terms of, you know, your customer reach or your traffic, our patient, our patients more loyal it's? So there are a lot of metrics that you can think about in terms of how you track all of these. You know all of these things. 

17:39

So what we saw was what we were incorporating, these digital health services, as part of a journey for the patients, so that you take them on board, you hold them accountable, you empower their journey and you help them along the way. Then we're also seeing digital, a digital therapy, and digitalization incorporated into treatment itself. So, you know, I noticed things like VR being incorporated into, like back pain management or migraine management. So these are all part of you know things that are, you know, coming for our industry, and can you imagine all the data that all of this is capturing and our ability to analyze all of these patients and behaviors and how this can be impactful to drive better outcomes? So I think, yeah, it's something that I'm extremely passionate about. I think there's a lot of gaps in the market and I think that, you know, knowledge is, you know, extremely important to be aware of. You know what it can actually do for you and what, what, what next, what, what else? 

19:01 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

And I think yeah, maybe with, the data for a pharmacy. It almost goes back to what you were saying about what's your vision and your strategy for your business, because data is so big and you can sometimes get lost a little bit in and go off on little tangents. 

19:23

But if you've got that solid vision and strategy about where you're headed in your business, then you can actually map out, yeah, what are your existing capabilities, where you want to go, and then how can, I guess, digital transformation help you get there? And I kind of want to comment a little bit about digital transformation as well. It's kind of a bit of a buzzword, but I would love for our listeners to understand that it's not just about, I guess, a digital version of a manual process, because you're kind of seeing that transition in pharmacy at the moment where, okay, we're recording something on paper, so we're going to record it onto a form on the computer. That's not quite what we're talking about with that transformation and that's actually about how do we make it easier to streamline those processes so that pharmacists, ultimately, can spend more time doing what they want to do with the patient and not, I guess, wasting valuable time doing all these administration processes and things like that. So, yeah, you got me very excited about the future when you were chatting. 

20:40 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

What you called out is really relevant, I guess, for our audience, and I think maybe we need to take a little bit of a step back and talk about what does this mean for the average community pharmacy, Knowing what I know now and how I would have applied that when I maybe first went into community pharmacy. Are you pulling your sales data from your point of sales? Do you know who your top customers are? So who is driving 80% of your business and how much value does the average customer contribute to? These are just really simple metrics. What are your peak hours? Do you understand that? What's the category that's contributing most to your business and then which one is growing the fastest? And when we talk about growth, it's easy to be caught up at a percentage. But offer what base? So I think, even just taking that little step back and how it's relevant to your normal community pharmacy setting, I think even you've got a CRM. All of us do. We have a point of dispense, a point of sale system, unless you still have the fruit market cash registers. Then pull the data out, export it into a spreadsheet, play around with it, have a look. What's your peak hour? What days do you have the most customers? Then have a look at what you're paying in terms of wages. Does that actually line up? Look at what your profit margin is for every hour and look at your staffing level. Are there times where you're actually understaffed? Is there an opportunity where you actually should be increasing your staff and hence services in that time, and are there times where you could be cutting back? What's the most valuable category for you as a business and are you giving the right amount of space for that category? Are you giving enough time in order to make it presentable? Have you got the right range for that category, because you've identified that it's an important category? So I think, look, taking that step back. I hope that answers a little bit and resonates a little bit with community pharmacists. 

23:04

Then you talked about, Krysti, digital transformation and data for the sake of data, or entering things for the sake of entering. I do 100% agree with it. So even I remember in my practice in community pharmacy, we moved to, instead of the manual DD book, we did the EDD book and that was really great because we didn't have to write and we were able to actually pick up invoices digitally so you could receive and you could record what was going out against what's already dispensed, and that was a lot of efficiencies gained. And then I know that something close to our hearts is, like all of the administration work behind vaccination. Are you leveraging digital capability that can do the screaming for you, that can do the recording, the uploading to air as per your requirements? 

24:10

Who can actually then claim what your entitlements are, either through the government or patient pay, where you can create digital invoices? Are you leveraging these technologies that give you more time to do more vaccinations or introduce more services into your pharmacy? So, yeah, I think there are a lot of people who definitely would not encourage data for the sake of data and digital for the sake of digital. It has to make sense, definitely for your business, and it has to drive efficiencies for you so that it frees you up to do more of the things that we should be doing, which is clinical practice being in the forefront. We've got full scope of practice to look forward to. Yeah. 

25:01 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

I love that. I think that's really great advice. Now, we've talked for quite some time already. I think I could talk to you about this all day, but I think, as we wrap up, I'd love to understand what advice you would give to, say, early career pharmacists or maybe students that are maybe thinking, oh, this is something really exciting, maybe I want to explore these, maybe unconventional career paths, but I think what's really important is that in your career path, you've had that really good grounding community pharmacy first and you did that for quite some time and so, yeah, I'd love to hear, yeah, what advice you would give to those early career pharmacists. And, yeah, for those pharmacists that are considering those career transitions, what do they maybe need to think about? 

26:03 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

I think the advice and I think you and I both connected on something, and it's about finding the right mentorship and receiving that sort of advice. And I think that in no part of my career journey have I not had very, very strong mentors that have guided me whether it's been the best pharmacist that I could be, being the best business owner that I could be, or even giving my best in terms of even my role as an advisor to Quantys Medical. Having that strong mentorship, someone to just guide me, to guide you and to call out the right and the wrongs so that you don't make as much mistakes because we're all gonna make mistakes and mistakes are part of your journey and that self-reflection and the ability to learn from your mistakes is really, really important. So I strongly encourage early pharmacists to try different things and to find the right people and pillars that you can lean into and really work out what is for you and what is not for you. And, yeah, but definitely I think seeking that advice early on I think is really really important. 

27:42

Now, in terms of career transitions, they can be tricky, I'm not going to lie, it can be tricky. We talked about upskilling. We talked about it, but one thing I didn't talk about is starting from the bottom. I've had jobs where, actually based on where I am in terms of my career like 10, 15 years at that time in the industry that should qualify me for a role in senior leadership, and that was in my digital marketing, as a sales and marketing manager luxury marketing luxury handbags online, selling Chanel handbags online. So my role there was actually sales and marketing manager and next in line to the Australian general manager. So if they were ever away, I was essentially responsible for the whole business and I think that that was really great and I really really appreciated their faith in me. 

28:44

But there's a lot that comes with not starting from the bottom. So when you're put into a role where you're expected but you have gaps in your knowledge, you're no longer given the grace that you should because you're put in a position where you're expected to know. So I found that quite challenging, to be honest with you. I found that because I had people who reported into me who were extremely good at public relations, but yet I was expected to lead them and, not really having any foundation, I felt like I couldn't. I wasn't the best version of myself and didn't give them the appropriate guidance and leadership that I could. So when I transitioned into the role at IQVIA, I actually started from the bottom and I started as an analyst and I wanted to be taught. I was open to learning and I was open to receiving feedback, to advice, and because I was able to apply my skill sets to it, I progressed extremely quickly in my role. 

30:07

I think jumping three steps within two years is not really a normal career progression but because I started at the bottom, people almost treat you a little bit differently. They give you the grace and they teach you, but when you kind of expect to come in at the top, you're not given that grace. So really think about that when you make your career transition whether you should be having maybe a bridging sort of way in. Sometimes a bridging role is your entry into a new role. So, for example, if you were working in community pharmacy and that was your background and you wanted to come into industry, there are entry points that are easier. 

30:56

I know a lot of pharmacists work in regulatory affairs within pharma companies but that is not really an entry-level role. A lot of people actually start as even sales reps to get their foot into the door, leveraging our people skills, our clinical knowledge that we already have and an ability to market these products because we're already marketing them to our patients. So that is a really good entry point or even an analyst role within a company. I do highly recommend some sort of bridging to get to where you want to be. And yes, and it does sometimes involve self-learning that may fall outside of outside work hours, so there will have to be commitment on your part as well. I hope that answers your question. 

31:54 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

No, that definitely helped. Yes, it did answer the question and I think that's fantastic advice for people that are wanting to make that career transition and that not being afraid to, I guess, take that entry-level role, which absolutely would mean taking potentially a pay cut, but seeing it as that long-term investment in yourself and also that self-learning as well. So investing in yourself and essentially using your own money to invest in yourself, because if you can't do that, why on earth would anyone else want to invest in you? So I think that's really, really great advice. It's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you today, vivienne. 

32:44 - Vivian Lee (Guest)

It's been such a pleasure to connect with you and to be a part of this. I really enjoyed this experience and being able to talk with you so naturally and sharing this with our audience. But one thing also that I say is the power of networking, like how you and I connected, I think don't be afraid to reach out to people. Most people want to meet and hear what other people do and, yeah, I think it's been a wonderful experience for me and definitely connecting with you as well, chris. So thank you very much for inviting me to the show. 

33:27 - Krysti-Lee Patterson (Host)

No problem, thank you so much. And for those that are listening and you're wondering how we did meet, I actually listened to Vivienne speak at a pharmacy connect conference and then I hit her up in her DMs on LinkedIn. So don't be afraid to reach out to people that you think are interesting or that you want to connect with. So that's, I guess, my parting message for maybe those younger pharmacists that don't know how to make those connections and network. Go to these events, reach out to people and don't be afraid to walk over, say hi or message them on LinkedIn. We all started somewhere and most of us remember what it was like to be early in your careers. So thank you so much, vivienne. 

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