| This exploratory qualitative research was guided by the following research question: How do leaders in the pharmaceutical industry describe the experience of implementing social media business into the organization? The pharmaceutical industry has been late to the game compared to consumer industries with the implementation of social media into the business due to the highly regulated industry and lack of health authority guidance. Fourteen experts in social media who work in the pharmaceutical field were interviewed, and those interviews were analysed through both thematic and narrative plot analyses. The analyses include the themes of social media leadership practices, social media uses in the pharmaceutical field, future plans, environment, and the role of leadership as related to social media implementation. Using Contingency, Trait, Transformational Leadership theories, and Kouzes and Posner Leadership and Technology Acceptance models, the researcher concluded leaders were beginning to embrace the use of social media and have developed processes and policies to work within the highly regulated environment. This research shows that over the past several years leaders have been evaluating how to use digital channels to interact with health care professionals and the public, piloting different ideas, and have been developing infrastructure focused on implementing social media. Social media use is occurring in different stages across the companies; some companies are more actively participating, and others are doing more listening. Two themes for social media use in the pharmaceutical industry were established: (a) Corporate Uses and (b) Patient Engagement. Corporate uses include (a) providing medical information and education to medical professionals, (b) corporate communications, (c) human resources--related activities, (d) employee advocacy, and (e) marketing. Patient engagement uses included (a) clinical research trials, (b) disease awareness, and (c) social listening. Overall, all leaders expressed that social media is the future, and recommended for the industry to learn how to use it, and use it well. The leaders expressed social media will be part of core strategies in the future because it is seen as an important communication vehicle. Leaders require the skills to be open, strategic and visionary to be successful in implementing social media strategies. |
