When Corporate Reputation Gets Personal
Recently, a colleague shared with me that he attended a father-daughter dance with his daughter. While he was there chatting with the other dads, he mentioned that he worked at Lundbeck. One dad immediately lit up and said his daughter had been helped by a Lundbeck medicine, and then he described how much Lundbeck means to him and his family.
Notably, he said that Lundbeck was important to him and he appreciated all that Lundbeck did for patients. He mentioned Lundbeck far more than he did the name of his daughter’s medicine.
This story struck me because it was such a validation of our deep-seated commitment to patients. Most people know the name of the medication they take, but they may not know the company that manufactures it. At Lundbeck, we believe we owe patients more than medicine to improve their lives, and we put considerable effort into building relationships with our patient communities. And people are noticing.
This week, the results of the annual PatientView Corporate Reputation of Pharma survey were released, and I’m proud to say that Lundbeck shone. PatientView studies how pharmaceutical companies are seen through the eyes of patient groups. The global survey gathered feedback from 1,330 patient groups on 46 pharmaceutical companies. Lundbeck was ranked #2 in global Corporate Reputation by the patient groups we work with. We also ranked in the top tier for all 12 categories in the survey.
But what really stood out to me was how we ranked on the net promotor score (NPS), which is a measure of loyalty. NPS is calculated based on people’s response to this question: How likely are you to recommend a company to a friend or colleague. According to PatientView, Lundbeck has the highest NPS of all 46 pharmaceutical companies in the survey. Our NPS was 60, nearly 20 percentage points higher than the next-closest score. To put that in context: an NPS above 0 is considered positive and an NPS of 40 or higher is considered excellent.
What I find particularly meaningful about this measure is that it gets personal. Rather than asking about a company’s reputation in general, it asks if people are willing to put their own reputation on the line by recommending it to their friends and families
Because our work is so intensely personal, this is exactly the bar we set for ourselves. We are the only global pharmaceutical company solely focused on the brain, and we have just one purpose: to improve the lives of people living with psychiatric and neurological disorders. We know how challenging living with schizophrenia, depression, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease or epilepsy can be. We also understand that behind each diagnosis is a person, with a wide range of interests and needs.
That’s why at Lundbeck, patient advocacy is not just something we write about in our annual report; it’s baked into our culture, and advocating on behalf of patients is a part of everyone’s job. We don’t just write a check to patient advocacy organizations, we show up. Our North American employees participate in and lead more than 600 patient events each year. Through our engagement with our communities, we better understand the needs of patients and their families; and we apply this understanding toward the development of new therapies and meaningful programs to benefit them.
Is our NPS score that big of a deal? By itself, it’s just a number. But to me and the rest of the more than 1,000 Lundbeck North American employees, the score is recognition that our patient communities recognize the passion and commitment we bring to our jobs every day. And to us, that’s a huge deal.
