Have You “Roasted” Your Products Lately?

We all are looking for better ways to innovate and improve our product offerings. I found an example from 37signals in Inc Magazine (October 2011) to give an interesting example.

They put a cross-functional group together and walked through one of their software products. Everyone was encouraged to rip on the product in roast style. From this article, it sounds like they were able to accomplish this with no hard feelings and coming up with some productive next steps.

It made me wonder:

• How would your adherence product survive a review?
• What would people say about your benefit materials?
• What about mail order or 90-day retail? How would people think about these offerings?

Of course, if you went down this path, I would suggest getting some clients (e.g., employers, payers) and some consumers involved. You need to create a “safe” place for them to criticize without people being defensive.

It makes me think of one adherence product I saw lately. I stopped by a company booth at a conference. I asked them how they addressed adherence. They showed me this pad of forms. They explained how patients could self-administer the form after picking it up in the physician’s office. They could then share it with the physician for which they had prepared a book on how to interpret the results. They shared some research with me to support the findings. I was dumbfounded.

• I asked them if it was online…No.
• I asked them if they called patients to administer it using automated calls…No.
• I asked them if they really thought patients and physicians used this…Yes.

Somehow, I doubt it.