PRESENTING PROBLEM
Despite being early to population health analytics and having a novel and impressive platform, the SaaS company struggled to gain traction. Customers who did buy the product weren’t logging in after initial access at implementation. The client feared zero renewals and engaged Syzygy Teams to identify why customers weren’t logging in.
ANALYSIS & INTERVENTION
Through a combination of end-user interviews and observation of the client team from design-to-delivery, we identified two main problems:
(a) The client team didn’t understand their customers’ organizational structure and operations, so they were not engaging the appropriate stakeholders in either the sales or implementation processes.
(b) The Founder and Executive Team were not aligned on the product goal or company strategy – i.e., bespoke solutions v. standardized products – which kept the Product, Marketing, Sales, and Support teams from aligning on coordinated action plans.
To address the first issue, we recommended the client add a stakeholder analysis step to its sales and implementation process, then to ensure that representatives of all appropriate stakeholder groups be included in the product detailing and implementation planning meetings.
To address the second issue, we recommended the Executive Team be reorganized to better align roles with individuals’ strengths. The founder’s vision and creativity had resulted in a great product, but those strengths also made it seemingly impossible for him to settle on a standardized MVP.
RESULT
Based on our recommendations, the Board hired a CEO who had healthcare executive experience. They moved the founder to an R&D role, Chief of Product Research, and restructured the remaining team to enable the creation, sales, and delivery of a stable, repeatable product. The team implemented a product roadmap with design and code freezes and planned new version releases.
Initially, the changes enabled a better product, better customer onboarding, and increased product use – the original goal. Over time, however, it became difficult for the founder and team members to maintain role boundaries. They continued to struggle and eventually went out of business.
The takeaways from this experience are several. It reinforces the importance of Customer Discovery and domain knowledge not just for making a sale but for ensuring the effective adoption and use of the product, which was needed for both investor confidence and word-of-mouth marketing. The company’s reversion to previous habits and eventual closure serve as a reminder of the well-worn “culture eats strategy for breakfast” and the importance of reinforcement after making a change.
