Making the Transition From Frontline Biopharmaceutical Sales to Wealth Management Advisory

Andy Timmerwilke is a Managing Director at Merrill (Bank of America) in Chicago advising high‑net‑worth families, executives, and business owners on comprehensive wealth management.​ In January 2026, Forbes announced that Timmerwilke and his colleagues were ranked “#1 best in state (under Chicago High Net Worth).”

In 2025, Forbes once again recognized the Oberlander Timmerwilke Group as the 13th top Wealth Management Team in America. Merrill (Bank of America) is consistently one of the top two or three full‑service wealth managers in the U.S. by client assets.

Prior to joining Merrill Lynch, Timmerwilke started his business career at Astra Merck Inc., which evolved into today’s $54 billion AstraZeneca plc. There he was a frontline professional account representative and consistently exceeded his annual sales quotas. He holds a finance degree from Rasmussen College and serves as a board member of the Elmhurst Children’s Assistance Foundation.

Introduction

The Astra Merck Group served as a launching pad for several of its executives to advance to CEO roles at other organizations.¹ But how did the startup’s sales training program support long-term careers for its newly hired recruits?

Q. While finance, consulting and technology are often the three most popular post-graduation verticals at HBS, MIT Sloan, and Wharton, healthcare is not far behind at fourth.² What were the top three skill sets that you acquired as a new joiner at Astra Merck to build your business development acumen; and how are they still applied, more than 20 years later, at Merrill (Bank of America)?

Timmerwilke: Astra Merck’s culture that centered on teamwork, effective communications, and the embracing of innovative technologies provided a business foundation that I have leveraged to this day. When I joined your sales region straight out of college, it was intimidating to go through a three-month training program and be expected to convince a doctor to prescribe my medications for their appropriate patients.

Given your readership, I recognize that some of them who attended the Harvard Medical School had to run through several gauntlets to be accepted into a program with a three percent acceptance rate. As such, participating in those informal lunches you provided where new hires could break bread with Astra Merck’s trainers and medical information specialists enabled us to quickly build rapport and not be afraid to ask questions so that our learning curves could be accelerated.

The funding you provided to enable my mirrored counterpart and me to meet for early morning coffees, not only enabled us to plan our upcoming territory management tactics but also to build a trusting relationship with each other. Look, salespeople tend to be very competitive and like being ranked number one in everything that we do.

Angie Lindsey was a softball player in college and I played hoops. Still, those informal lunches and coffee catch-ups allowed us to build trusting relationships with the entire team and each other. And I did see now Angie continues to do well as a VP of Marketing at Fresenius Kabi USA per your HBS Q&A with her.³

As for effective communications, knowing one’s target audience was crucial when I had less than two minutes to present my product’s features and benefits to those highly educated physicians. The Astra Merck training that focused on effective presentation skills elevated my comfort level with preparing to speak in the moment.

While I can laugh about it today, I remember one physician interaction where I was not well prepared to address how my Astra Merck product compared to a competing brand that was the market leader at the time. Investing time to understand your target prospect’s pain points and rehearsing potential responses to their likely objections are expectations that I have for my hires at Merrill.

Finally, leveraging emerging technologies into one’s daily work activities is table stakes to be competitive. Similar to how Astra Merck was competing against formidable competitors, Merrill’s competitive landscape can be brutal as well.⁴

Each bulge bracket firm has strong brand recognition and assets to support their wealth management advisors. So smarter employees understand the crucial nature of leveraging such tools as Salesforce and Microsoft Copilot to deliver value, which helps to build enduring long-term relationships.

Q. As Dr. Frank Cespedes of the Harvard Business School has shared, “At the undergrad level, less than 300 of the more than 4,000 colleges and universities in the U.S. even offer a sales course and, until recently, the topic was under-taught in MBA programs as well.”⁵ With students often steering clear of sales careers because of fear of rejection or ever-present sales quotas dangling over one’s head, what advice would you share with them?

Timmerwilke: First, business development in general is not for everyone. Especially for “rainmaker” roles, one needs to be extremely self-disciplined to meet with wealthy prospective clients who typically have a relationship with a competitive wealth management firm.

When I started in pharmaceutical sales, my direct supervisor worked with me about once a month in the field. For all those other working days, I needed to make sure that I started early and ended late to achieve those ambitious sales targets which you dangled over our heads!

And as I know that several of your readers are students at top business schools, please remind them that even though their post-graduation roles might be titled consultant or analyst, they are eventually going to have to be salespeople if they desire long-term careers in professional services.

Nearly all partner roles at professional services firms have revenue targets. If sales is not a good match for you, think twice about your post-graduation target roles.

Second, recognize the timelines associated with sales roles and how they match your personal and financial ambitions. From my 25-plus years in the wealth management vertical, I have observed that it usually takes three to five years for a new hire to get a good taste of the pros/cons of this career path.

It can even take a few more years to really hit your stride and recognize that successful advisors consider it a career and not a job. Remember that while some firms offer a modest salary as people begin their wealth management advisor careers, this monthly amount usually ends after a couple of years.

After that point, your income is correlated to the assets you oversee and the clients you serve and so it is not surprising that one article pointed to how nearly 71% of new advisors drop out within five years.⁶ Especially for wealth management careers, take an honest assessment if you have the resilience to make it through the character building years.

Finally, challenge some of the preconceptions that you might have around sales careers. For example, we have all heard about the lone wolf individuals who just want to exceed their quotas, make a great living, and be left alone.

And for some organizations, such operating models do exist; however, for wealth management, one can see the continued growth of advisory teams like the one I co-lead. We are a close-knit group of 16 professionals who need to team and trust each other and serve our clients.

The good news is that while my digital connections are always on, even during vacation, I know that I can count on them to help deliver the high-quality service which our clients, who have entrusted over $2.4 billion of their assets with us, expect every day.

So especially for your HBS, MIT Sloan, and Wharton students who are reading this Q&A, recognize the importance of getting to know your classmates, teaching assistants and professors. As I mentioned in the beginning of this Q&A, learning how to informally connect with others over a simple coffee can help support your long-term career aspirations, especially in business development roles.

Make it your 2026 New Year’s resolution.

About the Author

Michael Wong is a Part-time Lecturer for the Wharton Communication Program at the University of Pennsylvania. As an Emeritus Co-President and board member of the Harvard Business School Healthcare Alumni Association as well as a Contributing Writer for the MIT Sloan Career Development Office, Michael’s ideas have been shared in the Harvard Business Review and MIT Sloan Management Review.

References

1. https://www.pharmexec.com/view/fortune-500-startup

2. https://www.hbs.edu/recruiting/employment-data/Pages/default.aspx, https://mitsloan.mit.edu/sites/default/files/2025-12/2025-2026-MBA-Employment-Report.pdf, https://statistics.mbacareers.wharton.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/2024-Career-Report-FINAL.pdf

3. https://www.pharmexec.com/view/talent-management-strategies-for-sales-and-marketing

4. https://www.preplounge.com/en/blog/finance/investment-banking/firms/bulge-brackets

5. https://tinyurl.com/4rmyjcb9

6. Reed, Jennifer Lea, Nearly 71% Of New Advisors Drop Out Within 5 Years, Cerulli Says, Financial Advisor, January 3, 2025

7. https://www.forbes.com/lists/wealth-management-teams-best-in-state/https://tinyurl.com/2w6vahbb