The Challenge: To boost sagging sales by building leadership for the future and preparing teams to more effectively handle projects.

The Solution: Created a customized leadership and team development process as well as a performance and productivity process focused on increasing sales.

The Results: The north central sales region division climbed to the number two spot for sales revenue in the company up from number six.

Merck—one of the world’s leading drug firms—discovers, develops, manufactures, and markets a broad range of innovative products to improve human health. Specializing in drugs that treat cholesterol, hypertension, and heart disease, it seems to have the cures for whatever ails the inhabitants of our highly developed society.

As a company, Merck has 60,000-plus people in its divisions worldwide and eight major research centers in the United States, Europe, and Japan. It has six business units in the U.S.

A few years back, the sales division of the North Central Business Group was looking for a way to boost performance. It was thought that by increasing focus on building high performing work teams they could go a long way toward accomplishing their goal.

There were a lot of reasons for this focus, but the bottom line was that the sales group had in place a structure based on teams, but needed to further develop the culture to support it.

Finding the cure seemed as challenging as bringing a new wonder drug to market.

The breakthrough came when Tim Schmidt—then Director of Sales Training and Professional Development for Merck’s North Central division—heard Ken Blanchard speak on Gung Ho! at the American Society for Training and Development conference and was inspired to read the book on his way home. Schmidt then bought copies and provided them to the North Central senior sales managers. The Gung Ho! approach seemed like an excellent fit, and some said that it was exactly what they had in mind.

“At that time the business group was without a vice president, so there was a great opportunity to think about the culture we wanted,” says Schmidt. “As people think about what they want, they can’t be told they have to do this. It has to come from within. That’s precisely why I asked the other managers to be involved. The leaders have to support this type of initiative or it’s worse than if nothing had been done.”

Barbara Giacomuzzi, Blanchard’s National Account Manager for Merck and Company, worked closely with Schmidt in implementing the Gung Ho! sales management session for the North Central Business Group. “Tim and the North Central Sales Managers proved quick Gung Ho! studies,” she says. “They rapidly internalized, applied, and modeled the principles of Gung Ho! as a management team. Because of this, the rest of the North Central Business Group were fast to follow and readily adopted the principles of Gung Ho. The results—amazing!”

As this business group rapidly rose to the number two position within a year, it caught the attention of Merck’s executive management. They met with the North Central Senior Managers to uncover the critical success factors that led to such a dramatic increase in revenue. One of the reasons? Gung Ho!

Schmidt remains low key about his role in the success of the initiative. “I just pushed the first domino,” he says. “Rolling this out has been a team effort in itself. Our senior sales management team has embraced it and continues to focus on building a culture that supports the results we want to achieve. People are empowered to build the type of environment in which they want to work.”

“This is so much bigger than one person,” he says. “There are many stakeholders now. That’s how you make it last.”

The entire North Central regional business group has been exposed—some 450 people. The process has been left openended in terms of how members of the management team provide training for their representatives. They’re sanctioned to do it the way they feel it works best. The management team strives to serve as role models. They get together to revisit the Gung Ho! principles, and have put their own purpose statements together.

“Gung Ho! has helped us develop a clear vision for how to build a culture in which teams can be high performing,” says Schmidt. “Now Gung Ho! is much more than a two-day training program—it is part of how we do business.”

Schmidt is currently Director of Planning and Support, North Central Business Group and plans to carry Gung Ho! into his new team.

“Gung Ho! has great operating tenets for teams and has improved their performance. It is part of a mix of things that led to our sales going up,” says Schmidt.

Founder George W. Merck would approve. His statement still echoes true today: “We try never to forget that medicine is for the people. It is not for the profits. The profits follow, and if we have remembered that, they have never failed to appear.”

With a little help from a squirrel, a beaver, and a goose, North Central is now contributing its share—Merck’s overall sales were valued at $32.714 billion.

The medicines Merck makes are good for the heart. Obviously, so is Gung Ho!

“Gung Ho! represents a framework for teamwork and team building that works well with the structure at Merck’s North Central Business Group. Here, the need to communicate effectively and work together is paramount. We have to operate synergistically to provide our customers with the best products, services, and possibilities, so there’s an extra emphasis on teamwork.

The Gung Ho! principles give us more clarity for creating and maintaining strong teams by providing us a common language and a common understanding. One of biggest lessons is that everyone has responsibility and accountability—not just the team leaders or the people in the home office.

Creating an environment with strong teams has supported the business results we were trying to achieve. Gung Ho! has a direct link to our success!”

—Janet Crawford, Senior Business Director North Central Business Group