PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT APPROACH – SETTING SPEED AND DIRECTION

“Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”
 
Warren Buffett
 
Is it better to be the first to market with a disruptive technology?  Or to enter a known market with an incrementally improved product?  Or to provide me-too products for a much lower cost or a much-improved customer service?
 
And the answer is … it depends!  How you choose which products to invest in depends on your strategic plan.  What are your goals, and what do you bring to the game?  Once that’s decided, your success hinges on the development of your offering.  There are a lot of questions to be answered.  The obvious ones are around the “what.”  What does it look like?  What features should it have?  What is the cost target?  When does it need to be ready?
 
Less obvious questions are around the “how.”  How should we set the specs?  How should we run the development process – in quick sprints or with gated stages?  How much documentation and support are needed from the beginning?  How can we accomplish all the “whats” in the desired timeframe?
 
Scope creep is one of the biggest derailers. Continually adding new specifications during development can easily over burden the project. And yet, we often can’t know everything ahead of time. Choosing the best product development methodology for your situation can accommodate these challenges and make a big difference in the cost and time to get to market.
 
We have experience developing products in a start-up environment, as well as running well-funded product development organizations.  As a result, we can help you assess your unique situation, develop your product strategy and the best approach for implementation.