Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Pfizer's Coin

All staff at US Pharmaceuticals Company Pfizer are issued with a coin. On one side it says OWN IT on the other STRAIGHT TALKING. Various newspapers have dismissed this as a gimmick, but it seems good to me to have an ethos like this where if you speak up with some straight talking it's expected.


From today's Telegraph Newspaper: 'The Business, Innovation and Skills Committee questioned Pfizer chief executive Ian Read and asked him about the coin, which is used within the company to initiate difficult conversations.
Mr Read said the coin, which on one side says "straight talk" and on the other side says "own it", was part of a "cultural change" at Pfizer.
"I believe strongly that everybody in the company needs to have a sense of ownership, hence "own it", and to own it we need to have the ability to do straight talk," said Mr Read.'