Hey, guys. Welcome to the podcast. My guest today is Jill Fenick, and she is director of global medical training at EMD Serono. And we talk about what it means to be an MSL trainer and what MSLs might want to know if they wanna consider this role. So Jill is awesome. You guys are gonna love this. I learned a lot in this conversation. Don't forget to connect with me and follow on LinkedIn and check us out on MSL Talk Live, which is the first Tuesday of every month at 1:30 PM EST.
Welcome to MSL talk with Tom Caravella, a podcast specifically designed for MSLs and all things field medical. Hey, Jill. Welcome to the podcast. How are you doing? Good. Thanks, Tom. Nice to see you. Yeah. I'm excited. So guys, just so you know, Jill and I met at a conference. I got a chance to see her speak. I was like, you need to go on the podcast because she's amazing. And here we are.
We actually also met and talked at ASCO this year, and you guys are in for a treat because Jill is awesome. But before we get into that, why don't you do a quick introduction so you could tell everybody who you are, where you're from, all that good stuff? Thanks. Yep. So I am currently, my new title is the head of medical learning at EMD Serono. And just like to set the same because it's training. Even though it says medical learning, it's training role.
But I have spent most of my career has been in the field. So I'm not doing this perspective from an ivory tower. I've been an MSL and MSL manager. I've worked in sales. I've worked in market access. So it's coming from a place of experience. And it's exciting. I love this topic. I don't feel like we've done enough of it on this show. And, actually, before we jump into the episode, I do have a surprise.
Actually, I'm not gonna announce it today, but we do have a big announcement coming very, very soon. It has to do with MSL training. Not gonna give you any more details, but I am gonna give you that much. So anyone that listened to the show, check out follow me on LinkedIn because there's gonna be a huge announcement coming up soon. Jill doesn't even know what that announcement is. I might tell her later.
But anyway, so, Jill, let's talk about this the the training role because I think a lot of people kinda know what it is, but I don't really feel like they totally know what it is. So what does it really mean to be an MSL trainer, and what are some of the main responsibilities of the role? Yeah. So I think it's easiest to start with what what is it not.
Okay. Someone's standing at the front of the room pointing or not even pointing, but at a PowerPoint slide and reading every word on the slide, that is not training. That is me sharing information. Mhmm. And a lot of people think that is training, and that's what you do. And I did at one point, but, actually, it really isn't. Because you sitting and just having to listen, that doesn't really help.
And especially not nowadays as the environment's changed and we're all on social media, TikToks, Insta, whatever it is, we've got really short attention spans. So in terms of being a trainer, it's a much more strategic role than people recognize. So your main responsibilities are to do things like developing training plans. Now those training plans are aligned with the medical directors, so they've got a strategic intent.
And, generally, you plan out for, like, a rolling 12 months of what's gonna happen when. What's that gonna look like? Now it's really exciting when you're on the receiving end of training, like, oh, this big meeting happened, and it was really, really good. But you've got to allow all of that time for planning. So there's a lot of logistics that go into it. So you need to be really good at being able to see the big picture, but drill down into details.
Mhmm. You're going to be the person responsible for developing the engaging content, So interactivity. Knowing perfectly well that not everybody likes to get interactive. So it can't be a rah rah. Everybody's gonna be involved all the time because some people just aren't comfortable. So you've gotta try and get everybody in the room hit with the knowledge in different ways. So times when it's quieter, times when it's louder, times when it's more chaotic, times when it's very organized.
You've gotta try and reflect that throughout the trainings that you develop. So you've got to have this knowledge of the team and the audience that you're presenting to in mind as well. And a lot of this also involves trying to shepherd the trainer the presenters who you've got who may or may not have high skill sets.
Helping them to try and be a little bit more impactful or engaging for your audience, knowing full well, quite often a lot of people who are medical directors or medical experts are not very good at actually getting that presentation knowledge into the people who are sitting there quite often bored to tears by it. Even though they want to know, it's difficult to stay engaged for a long period of time.
And then because you're the trainer and you need to be developing engaging content and interactivity, it could be around skills, but it could also be around the knowledge. So you're not there to deliver that knowledge. You're there to help embed the understanding. So your plans would involve also a longer term plan to help and really make that knowledge go deep rather than being surface level. So the strategic component is you need to understand what is the most important part of this training.
What is the most important part of the content that the MSLs and the rest of the audience in the room needs to retain after this training? And gamification plays a big part in that as well. So Gamification. Engaging Yeah. But enjoyable engagement. Because you can be engaged or you can try and engage people, but if it's not enjoyable Well, let me say this. So I did attend one of your training sessions. It was a breakout session at Mass East, and it was everything you just said.
It was engaging, and it was impactful. It was interesting. And I'm I'm not an MSL, but it was something for everyone. It wasn't intimidating. I didn't feel like I was being called on. I didn't feel like I was, I I had to stand out and was uncomfortable. It was and it was fun. So And did it push your comfort zone a little bit, though? Because we had people for information, we had people building things out of pipe cleaners, and they didn't know they were doing this when they came into the room.
Yep. So a lot of people looked very uncomfortable at being suddenly asked to do this. Yeah. And that's part of it. You push in that envelope of people's comfort zone as well because that's how you grow. Yeah. No. And and but it I guess so. I guess for me, I've been feeling uncomfortable at all because I thought it was very fun. And I don't care. Like, what's the worst that I have? My stick figure that, you know, the thing that I made look silly and I you know?
But, I guess the point in getting back to what you were saying, I did not when you the first thing you said, trainer isn't just someone that goes up and presents on PowerPoint and educates people. That actually was very eye opening for me because not that I thought that was all it was, but I thought that that was a big part of what it was. So that misconception that you started this whole conversation with already in the first 30 seconds, I think change the tone of this because you're right.
I I and from seeing you, I realized how important the role is in not just being an educator, but being a facilitator and an implementer. Because that's what people are going to be able to walk away from and learn from. Use word gamification. You totally gamified the session that I sat in. So what other that's a misconception I wasn't aware of. Were there any other misconception? Is there anything else that you wanna share?
Because I just learned a lot in the first, like, 5 seconds of this conversation. I think for me, one of the because I was just speaking to somebody on in other roles, people who work on the development side and clinical development. And when you're trying to explain to them that you do medical training, they think that means you're a scientific expert on everything. And you're like, no. No. I'm a training expert.
I utilise the scientific experts, and I help to make sure that the key components of what they need to communicate are, first of all, communicated, but then they're returned and embedded for use by the audience. That can be a big shift for people who think that it's about being a scientific expert because if you have so I work in oncology.
So if you've got multiple assets with multiple different modes of actions with multiple competitors who may or may not have the similar mode of action, then you can't possibly return all of that in your head. The medical directors are working on one. So why would you, as a trainer, need to know, like, multiples of that? You are not you want to know enough because, you know, PhD by background, I'm very curious. I want to know lots and lots.
I want to know more than I can possibly take on board, but I can't because I know my limits. But I can't be that scientific expert as well as being a training expert because I just can't stay current with what do I need to do for training and what is the latest data on this and this and this and this. It's just not possible. So it's losing that expectation, and sometimes that can be really disappointing for people who come into TriNet to realize that you will no longer know everything.
You'll know what you need to know, and it might not be to the depth that you want to know it, but you'll be very strategically aligned so you will know what's important to know. Right. So then if there are people listening to this that are like, yeah, I think I wanna be a trainer, but they're not scientific experts. The then the message to them is, well, good news. You don't have to be a scientific expert. You just have to be really good at training. You need to be good at training.
You need to be good at communicating, and you need to be very flexible as well. Because the number one thing is when you plan a training, you need to have things in your back pocket you can pull out in case it all goes wrong and nobody wants to engage and nobody wants to speak, particularly important virtually when people hide behind cameras. You know? Oh, I can't come on camera for whatever reason. And there's nothing you can do to say you're lying, but it can often happen.
And I'm sure you've experienced that as well. But though you've got to have those things in reserve. And maybe if you need to change partway through the direction that you're going, you can also pull those things out. Sometimes it can be I've planned something and it's gonna be 1 hour virtual or might be something in person. Like, even when we were at Mass East, we had contingency plans and backups that we could do. We can make this time shorter. We can make this bit longer.
We could skip this bit if we need to. We can just give this as a handout. The contingency plan in that you do could easily fill, like, a 2 or 3 hour session, but you're planning for 1 hour. And it might be that you only get to point 1 of the multiple things you needed to do, so now we need to plan a follow-up training.
But it's about having being able to keep all of this in your head and then communicating effectively because you need people to understand the tasks that you assign them when you do an engaging interactive learning. If it's not clear what people need to do, then they're not gonna be able to do it. Right. But not just telling them what to do. It's explaining the value of what they're doing and why.
Even if you don't explain that upfront, but you pull it around at the end and so that people actually get the value out of it. So your objectives at the start were clear. At the end of this training, you will understand and be able to articulate x, y, zed. At the end, reinforcement. So now you should be able to articulate these three things because they've practiced, because they've done something interactive and not just sat there and nodded or not nodded.
They've been multitasking doing something else at the same time. And none of this is possible without brainstorming it. So training does not happen in a vacuum. Yeah. You can't just go in and write a training plan. You've gotta be aligned with the medical directors. It might be that you need to cross collaborate with other functions in order to be able to pull together what you're wanting to pull together.
And nothing is better than having colleagues that also work in training when you can just get together and brainstorm the craziest ideas. Borrow something that somebody's done before, take part of that, tweak it, and maybe pull it into your training because now that fits. But you hadn't thought of it. It really sounds like this is much more cross functional Yes. Than I would have thought. So you're literally pulling across different areas within medical affairs and to And even into commercial.
Even into commercial. Yeah. Because quite often, there's things that can be learned from commercial training that can be utilized in medical training. At the end of the day, communication doesn't matter if you're, you know, commercial, medical, fish, bird. It doesn't really matter what it is. Communication is the same. The communication skills that you use at work as an MSL are the same communication skills you're gonna use when you go and buy a car. Yeah. Somebody likes to say going on a date.
I'm like, I okay. But I think buying a car or a big purchase is an easier way to actually relate that in your head. You don't sell as an MSL, but you actually need to be able to communicate effectively. And we know data storytelling, that's one of the big buzzwords that goes on at every conference that you go to. But it's effective communication, so it doesn't matter what role you're in or what part of your life you're in.
If you've got good communication skills, you're gonna be successful at what you do. For sure. Yeah. And then you're ready. You're obviously very good at this, and and and I'm not just saying that I I've seen you in action. And and I'm talking to you in in the very brief, you know, amount of time we're talking. I can see that you're an expert. What do you like most about being a trainer? I like the flexibility.
So it's one of the things I love most about the MSL role was that degree of flexibility. You weren't being micromanaged. Didn't have to report where you were at every second of every day. The flexibility with training is quite often you've got the topic and you've got the this is what we need people to walk away really understanding and knowing. The path to get there, that's what you get to decide.
What is gonna be most effective based on the audience that I know, the time slot that I've got, the forum that I've got? Is it in person? Is it virtual? And then you can plan from that, and you can plan something which you think, I think this is really gonna play well for them. I think this will work. You know, really weird consideration. So my role is global, so thinking of cultural differences works a lot.
Now the US is also very multicultural, so their cultural differences still play in and language differences can still play in as well. So you have to be you have to really think about a lot. And I love that idea because you have to think really big picture and also really detailed at the same time. It's a really weird place to be. And then you're just so curious. You're just listening for ideas can come from lots of places.
Like, you know, we use, tools like Kahoot, which is used in schools by kids. But we use that because it's bright. It's colorful. It's different. It's a little bit exciting. You don't we don't use it to death, but it's a tool you can bring in and use. You get other ideas from having kids and looking at things from a different perspective. Equally, you can look at other industries. And that's why I say you can look at commercial trends and things people have done.
Maybe somebody did something 10 years ago. It's never been repeated, but actually there's bits of that you can pull in. I find that really energizing to try and be creative but also flexible and also knowing that I plan that route. You go back. Sometimes you go back to your medical directors and they're like, what? Bear with me. I promise you it's gonna be good. And then you adapt as you go. If you need a lot of interactivity and people aren't interacting, you need to change what you're doing.
Maybe the big breakouts you'd envisioned when people aren't talking don't work, but maybe they'll be really small intimate breakouts instead. Right. We're going into pairs. Let's do this. I've got other activities I can just pull off, like, pull out at the drop of a hat because maybe people just don't know each other or trust each other enough. So let's do something else which builds a little bit of trust.
And then, obviously I mean, you make it sound so easy because you, you know, you're an expert. You've been doing this, but there's what are the challenges? What are the frustrations? It sounds like you really like your job, but I I imagine that it's it's it's definitely has its its its drawbacks and its challenges as well. Like all of the like everything that we do in medical, it's got admin. There's no escape and admin. Doesn't matter what you go into.
You've gotta deal with all of the the boring stuff. Mhmm. You might be using vendors, then you've got you get to discover the delights of doing contracting and budgets and all of that really fun stuff, which you don't tend to deal with as an MSL or not very often. It can be frustrating because you do need to be collaborative, and you do need to bring everybody on board.
Like I say, quite often, people with a very defined way of doing things, when you you bring something and it's too far away from their comfort zone, takes a lot of convincing that it's gonna be any good. And they're obviously, they're sending off that negativity of, well, I don't think this is gonna work, which can have an impact on you thinking, yeah. This is great. You start to doubt yourself.
So the frustration sometimes are the the buy in that you need to get from other people, the admin work. I mean, I didn't realize when you plan a an in person training, how bogged down you can get in how many attendees. This is the day rate. So this is how it affects the budget. And you're like, oh my god. This is like torture. This is not something I got into training thinking I would have to do is look at, well, how do we get them from here to here?
So now we need to think about buses, and you're like, oh my god. This is not fun. Yeah. But you're not doing that all the time. You get to have the time when you get and say you're not the focus of the training, but you get to get in there and see it come to life. So quite often, especially when it's in a big room, you're still at the back. You're out of the way. It's the audience that's doing all the work and the scientific presenters, if that's who you've got in there.
Or if you've got a contractor in there running things like skills training, they're the star of the show. You're in the background because your success is seeing that engagement from people. And then at the end, hearing them go, I actually really understand that. I can't wait to go and talk about this. Right. Well, I think it's important that you I appreciate you sharing that because there's a lot of people that are listening to this that might eventually wanna be a trader.
They need to know that there are obviously challenges as well as there's some really positives, you know, positive parts to it. I would think a challenge and and correct me if I'm wrong, but how challenging is it for you to keep up with the trends and best practices that go on in medical affairs? Is that your responsibility to make sure that everybody's totally up to speed with, you know, omnichannel engagement or whatever the buzzword is of the day?
So we don't need to keep people up to speed on that because that's personal responsibility. And, obviously, in most companies have different work streams, which are always working on these things and communicate internally. But you have to stay abreast of it because quite often, you'll get pulled into those types of work streams, another fascinating part of the job, which can be more or less fascinating depending on the work stream you get pulled into.
But I actually I think LinkedIn is great for things like that and being able to go to the medical affairs conferences because you get viewpoints from outside of your organization as well. And I think that's the richness of the things that you can bring back is not being blinkered just into your organization.
Because there's not usually many people in training, you can go and network at different things externally to pick up best practices and what's going on at other organizations and bring those back in as well. Mhmm. So that's what I like. But in terms of in terms of keeping up with things, I think because you do have that internal network as well as the external network, you can also leverage that internal network of not everybody needs to be an expert in everything.
Mhmm. So this is coming up quite a lot with omnichannel. So what do I need to know about omnichannel? At a top left a top line, how detailed do I need to know this? And a lot of it, you pick up with experience as well. So coming into training, I've been in MSL. I know a lot about CRM systems because I've had to use one for a long time when I was in the field because I've only been in training since April 2019. So up until then, I was in the field the whole time.
But people who haven't been in the field who come into training don't even know what a a CRM system is. They've never heard of Veeva or Iconnect or salesforce.com. They've not heard of any of that. So they have different challenges in what they need to come up with. So it totally depends on the route that you've come because MSLs come into training. Head office staff move into training.
And I actually think that from a training perspective, I think MSLs moving into training are stronger trainers because you actually have that understanding of what does a a new hire or for continuous learning. What do you really need to know? What's feasible? And how does this translate? So scientific themes are another big topic which is coming up a lot. These are linked to the CRM system. But how does that impact training? And how does that impact back to the data?
And how does that impact back to global strategy or local strategy? And this then all gets to sound, like, really complicated. It's doesn't need to be complicated. But if you understand it, it's like a straight line. Global strategy comes down, informs these scientific themes. These scientific themes are in your CRM system. So do you have the knowledge to speak to all of these? Right. You've got the knowledge, but can you articulate it? This is where training's coming in to help you.
You've got the knowledge, and you can articulate to these points really well. Right. Well, the one thing you did say, and I think a lot of people probably heard it. I'm gonna repeat it, though. As you said, MSLs do make good trainers. That's why MSLs could be very well equipped to be trainers. So I know there's a lot of people out there that are listening or like, maybe I need to consider that.
So for those folks out there that think they may or may not want to be a trainer, but want to consider it, or let's say they absolutely do, what what should they do first? Like, how do they pursue a career as an MSL trainer? So first of all is find out if it exists in your organization because this is not a given. It does not exist in every organization. If it does, set up an informational interview and speak to your trainers and figure out what do they do? Who are they?
Where did they come from? How did they get to that? What did they see as success? So having that discussion with them to figure out what the role actually is in your organization, because it does look different in everyone. See if you can shadow them. Sign up for any projects. You know, raise your hand. Let people know that that's something you'd be interested in, and you'll start to get flagged as the person to go to for those projects.
Or a short term assignment, if your organisation would support that. I've already had I know there's people that want to do short term assignments in in my team, and I'm open to that once our team has settled a little bit. But it's it shows that strong, I really understand, and I want to know more, and I want to get involved. Also, ask always ask lots of questions.
Be the person who's coming off and being interactive in the training so you're already automatically recognized as someone who wants to be involved. If you sit back and watch the whole time, how interested are you in this? But it does also doesn't have to be just in your organization. So if you go to medical affairs conferences, if you are linked in with different people and you know they work in training, speak to them. Ask them for advice. Ask them what does the role look like.
And given your skill set and your areas of interest, does it work for you that this will be something that you wanna get into? I think it's great advice. I I and just to unpack that a little bit, guys, if if you want to consider this type of role and it's something that you feel like could be the next move for you, well, you have to develop the transferable skills and build up your resume or CV to show others whether it's internal for internal positions or if they're gonna look external.
I hate to say that, but if there's no internal positions and you really wanna do this, well, then you have to build up your your skill set and your experience to prove that you can do this. The only way to do that is to do what Jill just said is you have to be proactive. You have to be your own advocate.
You have to start to build up your base of knowledge, information, experience, skills to show whoever it is that eventually you're interviewing with that you not only can do the job, but that you're the right person for the job. And, again, if it's internal, it's probably easier because people are gonna see it and you're gonna be able to develop into that role.
If it's external, it's gonna be even harder because you have to prove yourself to people that don't know who you are and what you're all about. So, Jill, let's get back to what what advice do you have for MSLs in general these days from what you're seeing in the market and how things are evolving and developing? It's the the most obvious one of all is be good at your job. Yeah. We are not getting away from hybrid.
So you need to be all the MSL skills you needed and you needed to have this great presence and ability to develop relationships in person Like, it still exists. You still need to do that. But people really need to get good with their virtual skills because although a lot of doctors want to meet in person for initial discussions, a lot of the times they can't. And we know organizations are now using the lockdown that they had where they got to keep all of Farmer out of the organization.
They're sticking to that for a lot of places as much as they can. So it's still really difficult for MSLs to get access. It always has been, but it's even harder right now. So you need to be impactful on camera as well. You need to be that memorable MSL they wanna see again even if you've never met them before. Completely new therapy area. Completely new territory. You've gotta develop that.
I hate to say it because it's so cliche, but the x factor, you want to be that impactful person they wanna meet again because that is the number one thing with MSLs. You wanna be memorable for the right reasons, so they wanna meet you again. But also, I think one of what's become really important, thanks to social networking, is about growing those networks. Internally and externally, your networks are more critical than ever before.
You're only gonna move in your career if you've got a really good internal network. And it could take you in a direction you hadn't anticipated because you get flagged for an opportunity that didn't even exist before. That's something totally new. Or you see a gap and you suggest that and because you're the right person for the job and found it, you know the people to go to and you create that for yourself. And the same applies externally.
People will come looking for you because they've spoken to you and they know how good you are and they want you. And they've got this great role that you are perfect for, And it turns out, yes, you are, and you really want it. Let's see. It also keeps you current with anything new that's coming as well. So you keep up with those trends, and you're proactive, and you're at the front of everything.
Keeping that open mindset, it's it can be really difficult when times get challenging, but that is the key to being a successful MSL. The two skills are the flexibility and the open mindset. No matter what difficulties you come up against, trying to stay open and keep looking and keep networking and keep growing is always leading to success. That's such great advice. It just might take time. No. That's it right there.
I and I I not only is it important to when you say be really good at your job and and everything else will come together, that's one piece of it. But the networking piece of it, you have to be consistent. One of the things one of the mistakes I see people make is they're like, yeah. Well, I need to work on my networking, and I need to work on my social media. And but then they're not consistent.
They'll post something, you know, once a month or or once every other week or they'll do some networking here and there. I know how busy you guys are. I totally get it. I'm not trying to, you know, give you more stuff to do. But if it's just one thing a day, or a little bit of of outreach each day, it adds up week per week, month per month. And that's how networking is done. That's how standing out on social media is done. It's the habitual consistent effort that will have a compound effect.
And at the end of the month, at the end of the year, you're gonna see a a drastic increase in your visibility and your influence as a result. So awesome advice. What about before we we end it, I you know, you're so good at this and you see so much. And again, I I've seen you in action. What about any secrets, like tips or tricks or anything that you might be able to share that they may people may not know? I don't think there really are tips and tricks. I think it's about over preparing.
I think that's why good trainers look good. Mhmm. Because you're like, oh, wow. You totally moved from there to there. You brought this and I had it's because you've over prepared for what you've you're actually going to deliver. Because otherwise, you don't wanna be the person that's left going, but we just have to do this because I haven't got anything else. I overprepared as an MSL, so maybe it's a character flaw or a character trait. But most MSLs do.
They wanna go in and they wanna speak about this shopping list of things. Yeah. That skill is actually really beneficial when it comes to training because you overprepare. But I also think it's about and I know you've had my friend Shannon on before about superpowers and curiosity and asking questions. That's a vital skill for an MSL. It's also really important if you're going to achieve anything. So when you set up training, you obviously want to train to what people want.
So you ask them questions, and they design the training that you're going to do. Because they don't. You've asked them a leading question, and you're going to strongly encourage certain words to come up, which you can then pick out and go, awesome. Because this is what we're actually gonna focus on today. And you've all seemed to have come up with that in your separate breakouts. So it's learning to manage the room in a way that makes people then think, oh, we all came up with that.
That's awesome. Yeah. You came up with a bunch of other things, but we're not working on those. This was what we were always gonna work on, but thank you very much for all playing the game. And now you're all bought into it. Now you wanna do it. Brilliant. You are brilliant, Jill. See, I told you guys this was gonna be good. I knew it. And that was, like, the fastest half hour in history of this program. You're awesome, Jill. It was, like, spot on. Everything was really good and think of part 2.
We'll have to have you back for part 2. And, and, guys, don't forget, there's gonna be a big announcement coming up, so stay tuned. But let's all thank Jill, and thank you guys for tuning into this. You're awesome. And, Jill, be well. We'll see you soon. Thanks very much, Tom. Thank you so much for listening to the show. And if you enjoyed it, please subscribe so that you don't miss an episode in the future and feel free to leave a rating or a review or a comment.
Thanks again, and we look forward to seeing you soon.