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Sometimes the only way to understand what is going on is to step back and take a panoramic view. Only with that perspective do the peaks and valleys and their relationships become clear. A macro-assessment is that kind of view.
What do we get?
The point is to quickly add value to your organization by:
1. Gaining the consensus of a senior team as to where various aspects of your product development capability lie on a maturity and effectiveness scale
2. Mapping out what capabilities are most important for where you are heading
3. Identifying key gaps that are likely to be the most productive focus areas to help you improve your capability
Who participates?
This macro-assessment requires the participation of a diverse leadership team that sees product and development from different perspectives. Ideally there are one or more business, sales, marketing, operations, support and product development leadership views present. Six to twelve active participants is an ideal size.
How is the work performed?
We will do some work in advance with a sponsor to understand enough about your situation to ensure that the work we do with you in the assessment is relevant and valuable.
The 1 day macro-assessment should be split into 2 sessions. An afternoon and the following morning are ideal though a little more time between sessions is fine. The first half day which takes 4-5 hours is focused mostly on getting the voices of the leadership team heard in data gathering. The last half of the session follows offline synthesis and analysis by PD Advantage resources. That work can be done overnight or within a day or two. The 2nd half day typically takes about 3 hours.
During the macro assessment, we begin by giving you an overview of the methodology we will use and answer your questions about it. Next, we will lead your team through 2 concurrent surveys in a group session. The first identifies the maturity of your capabilities by working through various aspects of the WhoWhatHowSM model to be sure essential capabilities are covered. The second survey, which happens concurrently, works through the importance of each of the capabilities to your near term and longer term success.
The second half of the session should have the same leadership team. In that session there is a review and discussion of the synthesized data. The balance of the time is spent in a working session to help prioritize the key leverage points for future business success.
Everyone who participates will leave with a panoramic view of the peaks and valleys of the firm's product development capability today and a basic, shared understanding of how it needs to evolve to be successful in the future!
This process is a terrific value. It is short and powerful. It provides a detailed panoramic view from the diverse perspectives of the leadership team. It isn't a complete map since some perspectives are not represented and much of the data is qualitative. It is, however, an excellent place to start. Getting a leadership team aligned is not easy but this exercise does it.
This assessment can be supplemented in straightforward ways to achieve better accuracy on the front end and more complete action planning and execution on the back end if desired.
Call or email us today to discuss a macro-assessment of your product development capability.
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