Why have an actionable insights workshop?
Insights are a critical part of the MSL role and vital to the success of the organization. Reporting actionable insights is one of the toughest things to get right. It takes time, practice and refinement to become proficient. Having a workshop is a great way to introduce practical skills and techniques for gathering actionable insights that MSLs can use for the benefit of patients.
Benefits of having an insights workshop:
Motivate and empower your MSLs (and onboard new ones)
Build community, trust and share best practices across the team
Generate higher quality insights that make analysis easier and reports better
How to use the actionable insights workshop template
The purpose of this template is to help MSL teams create their own insights workshop and reduce the planning time required to design a workshop. Make it your own! Add the lexicon used at your organization, delete slides and concepts that don’t make sense for your team, and add whatever you feel is necessary.
The notes section of the slides is full of tips for using the template and planning your workshop. Don’t forget to check out the notes!
How to customize the workshop template
Throughout the template, you will find several areas to customize to your team’s specific needs. Update the template to reflect these needs and make it easier for your MSLs to follow.
Use your team’s terminology
Throughout the template, survey type insights are referred to as “surveys.” Your organization may call these “Core questions,” “Listening priorities” or “Scientific imperatives.” Free-text insights are referred to as free-text but your team may call them “organic observations”. Update the template with the terminology your team is familiar with.
Slide 6 gives the definition of an insight. Use your organization’s formal definition. If you don’t have one, no worries! Use the one included on the slide.
Slide 6 of the actionable insights workshop template. Enter your organization’s official definition of an insight or use the one provided on the slide.
Incorporate examples from your team
The template includes several places to add your own examples:
Use slide 10 and 12 to review surveys and initiatives that are important to your medical strategy. Be sure to include WHY you want them to gather insights on these topics!
Slide 19 is a template for reviewing insights and why they are actionable or not. Inserting insights from your team is a great way to enhance MSLs’ learning!
Insert specific examples on any slide.
Doing this makes it more real for MSLs and easier to relate to. Including WHY these examples were useful is key!
The notes section on the slides includes guidance on how to use the slide.
The “is this an insight?” template slide (slide 19). Incorporate insights from your team to enhance MSLs’ learning. Clearly explain why an insight was or was not something that could be acted on. This is key to helping understand what makes an insight actionable. Consider making this section interactive by using animations and asking the team to discuss how to make it better.
Make it interactive - the key to a great workshop!
Great workshops are interactive. The template includes several spots to incorporate discussion:
When discussing examples of good insights and insights that could be better, ask MSLs to share their own good insights examples and why they were good.
Ask MSLs for examples of good questioning strategies that have helped them uncover the why.
Give MSLs time to discuss the concepts being introduced and how these apply to their own insights.
Ways to make your insights workshop more effective
Tie it to your medical strategy
Create a slide to review the medical strategy and how insights contribute to this
Give specific examples
Focus on the benefit to the MSL and what they will get out of the workshop
Make it about what MSLs will learn
Include practical advice that they can use right away
Focus on the why to improve understanding
Improves adoption
Focus on the positive
Use positive reinforcement to help MSLs learn instead of pointing out everything that is bad
After the workshop
Getting feedback after the session is a great way to gauge how effective the workshop was. You may:
Follow up with a questionnaire
Ask for success stories. How have MSLs been using their new skills?
Conclusion
MSLs report that insights workshops are very useful and help them understand what actionable insights are. MSL managers and those that generate insights reports find that the quality of insights goes up after hosting workshops. Insights analysis and reporting become easier.
Frequent refresher insights training (2-3x/year) helps MSL teams gather insights that lead to better decision making and ultimately better outcomes for patients. This insights workshop template should help your team have a larger impact and create more value through great insights collection!