Unlocking Speed: An Expert’s Insights into Rapid Product Development
By Steve May-Russell, Smallfry CEO
Maintaining the momentum to innovate year after year is undeniably challenging. For start-ups and spinouts faced with the ‘Chasm of Commercialisation’, it can be even more daunting. Regardless of scale or experience, who is honestly satisfied with their current time to market?
Frankly, the problem can often be that people “don’t know what they don’t know” but they are unlikely to publicly admit it.
So, what is the secret to launching new products and services faster?
Here’s my strategic approach to help encourage your team to do the right things, right.
My Key Secrets
1. Build on Sound Foundations:
Assign a dedicated development team to surface the most valuable opportunities and innovative solutions from your customers perspective.
Not having an insight driven product development focus can lead to aimless efforts and resource wastage.
2. Clear Product Development Roadmap
Develop a comprehensive plan outlining the steps to achieve your vision over a short, medium and long-term horizon; Now, Next and New. Begin with the appropriate end in mind.
Skipping the initial planning phase can lead to misunderstandings about the product’s intended positioning and goals within the context of your broader objectives.
3. Early and Consistent Engagement:
Ensure continuous engagement with stakeholders and end-users throughout the development process to refine the product’s value proposition for all concerned.
Lack of early and ongoing stakeholder engagement can lead to products that do not meet market needs and fail to delight the intended audience.
4. Rock-Solid Planning:
Define what the product needs to accomplish, outline key drivers, identify risks, and set realistic timelines.
By prioritising based on “Must Have” and “Should Have” (the MoSCoW framework), you can drive impactful decisions that align with qualified customer’ priorities.
5. Effective Team Collaboration:
Nurture a collaborative environment where cross-functional teams can work seamlessly towards satisfying the customers priority of needs. Ensure everyone knows what they are.
Insufficient communication and collaboration among team members will slow down the development process and affect product quality.
6. Proof of Concept (POC) and SWOT Analysis:
Utilise POC to evaluate feasibility and SWOT analysis to understand the product’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats within the context of the competitive landscape.
Ignoring the proof-of-concept stage can result in pursuing unfeasible ideas, wasting time and resources.
Reviewing the Process
For ultimate speed, you must regularly review your progress against the insight driven goals.
After this, you’ll have four options to choose from:
Go: Proceed with full implementation and scale-up.
Grow: Expand cautiously with further development or testing.
Pause: Temporarily halt to address challenges or gather more data.
Stop: Kill the project and reallocate those precious resources.
By focusing on these secrets and avoiding common pitfalls, you can streamline your product development processes and bring successful products to market faster.
The key is to fail fast and learn early, it’s cheaper!
To discuss how you can achieve rapid product development, reach out to Smallfry today.
