Effective alignment of the marketing and sales functions of a major pharmaceutical company in South Africa

Abstract

Recently there has been a growing interest in alternative measures to increase organisational business efficiency other than sales revenues alone. Specifically, a deeper understanding of inter-departmental relationships and its beneficial effects on business performance is one area where efficiency can be improved. To investigate the possibility that increased revenues could be associated with the optimisation of the sales-marketing relationship, it is important to determine the differences as well as their overlapping functions between these two departments. Sales and marketing are rarely separated from an external perspective, but internally, the reality seems to differ in most organisations. Although these organisational functions strive towards the same organisational goals, they ought to be guided by one another to achieve their mutual goals and to strengthen the outcome of the organisational goal of increased turnover; if sales growth, then ultimately, organisational revenue increases. This study explores this relationship in case study format in a multinational pharmaceutical company which is situated in Gauteng, South Africa. More specifically, the study aims to investigate their current situation regarding the Sales and Marketing Interface (SMI). The employees, from both the sales and marketing departments, of the company were subjected to a quantitative research design to collect the research data. The data showed favourable reliability (Cronbach alpha exceeds 0.90 for both marketing and sales data) and sample adequacy (0.888); hence the data were suitable for analysis. The results indicate that Inter-functional trust and Inter-functional rivalry (with effect sizes of 0.73 and 0.37, respectively) have intermediate practical significant differences between sales and marketing. Further analysis indicated that there are also three common factors relevant to both the sales and marketing departments. These factors are Organisational orientation, Interdepartmental relationships and Interdepartmental efficiency; they explain a cumulative variance of 70, 6%. The study is of value to management and also researchers who would like to pursue Sales and Marketing Interface (SMI) as a means to improve organisational performance.