Important Competencies for Medical Representatives: Scale Development and Validation

Abstract

The purpose of this research paper is to identify important dimensions of medical representatives’ competency. This research adopts the dimensions of competency of sales people and roles & skills of sales people to develop a framework that can be used to measure competency of medical representatives. Data for the research was collected from a sample of 550 medical representatives and sales manager of pharmaceutical companies. Research model for competency of medical representaives is confirmed and validated using confirmatory factor analysis and ten important dimensions of medical representatives’ competency were identified. These include performance competency, technology competency, learning competency, relationship management competency, communication competency, leadership competency, administrative competency, selling competency and time management competency. A pool of indicators for the antecedent factors of medical representatives’ competency stood out, acting as a guide for Indian pharmaceutical companies in improve their human resource policy and performance appraisal process.