Change Management for Cross-Functional Product Launch Teams

Over the years, I've discovered the truth: Game-changing products won't succeed unless they have a unified vision across sales, marketing, and product teams. When these key functions pull in different directions, it's a death knell for go-to-market execution. Without alignment on positioning and buyer messaging, we fail to communicate value and create disjointed experiences. So, how do I foster collaboration across these functions? 1) Set shared goals and incentivize unity towards that North Star metric, be it revenue, activations, or retention. 2) Encourage team members to work closely together, building empathy rather than skepticism of other groups' intentions and contributions. 3) Regularly conduct cross-functional roadmapping sessions to cascade priorities across departments and highlight dependencies. 4) Create an environment where teams can constructively debate assumptions and strategies without politics or blame. 5) Provide clarity for sales on target personas and value propositions to equip them for deal conversations. 6) Involve all functions early in establishing positioning and messaging frameworks. Co-create when possible. By rallying together around customers’ needs, we block and tackle as one team towards product-market fit. The magic truly happens when teams unite towards a shared mission to delight users!

I’ve led significant products and successfully brought them to the finish line. Every time I take on a massive product, the first thing I do is plan for the pre-launch and post-launch activities. I brainstorm with product, UX, engineering, and QA teams to list all the different areas, milestones, risks, and dependencies. When building a new product or introducing significant enhancements, there are hundreds of things to track and align to ensure a timely launch and avoid getting stuck in an endless development cycle. Remember, coding-related activities contribute only 30% to a product's success. The remaining 70% comes from ideation, planning, communication, and adoption. Here are some of the crucial activities I focus on when I start working on a product launch: 1. Visualize the Go-Live Understand this: at this stage, most teams don’t even have a running product or final mockups yet. But we do have a high-level understanding of what it will look like. So, we start by imagining the change already in the hands of our users. Imagine the go-live day and map out every activity that comes to mind. This includes: - Product is live for consumers - Stakeholders are communicated with - A go-live support center is established - Customers and support teams are well-educated and informed Think about users, - What are they feeling? - What are they missing? - What questions do they have? - What challenges are they facing? - What do we wish we had done differently? We ensure that our entire team—engineering, product, support, marketing—knows how to support and communicate with both internal and external users about the new changes. 2. Visualize the Pre-Go-Live Map out every activity leading up to go-live. What needs to happen right before go-live? This includes: - Coding is completed - Extensive testing is conducted - Preparation for deployment - Production infrastructure is configured - Education, training, and pre-go-live communication 3. Create a Master List These brainstorming sessions result in a master list of activities—from initial development to launch. This list ensures we cover every critical step, such as: - UX design - Development - In-sprint testing - DevOps activities - Regression testing Additionally, it includes activities related to: - Risk management - Dependencies - Communication - Education & training Remember to balance the big picture with the details. We use JIRA to plan and track our day-to-day work. It’s invaluable for tracking details, but it can also be overwhelming. That’s why we need a high-level view with milestones, dependencies, and potential risks. This top-down planning approach—working backward from the launch to where we are today—has transformed how I manage and deliver big initiatives, and it can do the same for you. What approach do you follow when planning a significant initiative? Let’s discuss.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗻’𝘁 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗮𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗯𝘂𝗴𝘀. 𝗜𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗲𝗰𝗮𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗲𝗴𝗼𝘀. Everyone wanted control. Nobody had accountability. The dashboard looked promising. But behind the scenes, it was chaos. Marketing demanded a launch date yesterday. Sales promised clients things that weren’t even built yet. I was advising this Healthcare SaaS company at the time. The founders were frustrated, caught between too many voices and no clear ownership: – Who is actually driving this launch? – Who gets the final say? – Who’s just adding noise? Anyone who has lived through this knows the bitter truth: egos kill projects faster than bugs ever will. In that chaos, I needed more than experience. I needed a framework to bring accountability. That’s when I brought in the DACI framework: Driver: The product manager became the engine, responsible for pushing the launch forward. Approver: The Chief Medical Officer held the final sign-off. Nothing moved without their green light. Contributors: Engineers, marketers, and compliance experts gave their input, but didn’t own the decision. Informed: Sales and customer success were kept in the loop to avoid surprises for clients. The result was immediate. Confusion turned into clarity. Meetings stopped being battlegrounds. Ownership was visible. And the platform launched on schedule, securing its first major hospital deal within weeks. Months later, that same team expanded into more hospitals because they finally had a decision-making structure that scaled. My takeaway as an advisor: 𝗨𝘀𝗲 𝗗𝗔𝗖𝗜 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗰𝗿𝗼𝘀𝘀-𝗳𝘂𝗻𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗷𝗲𝗰𝘁𝘀 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗰𝗸 𝗶𝗻 𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗰𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗴𝗴𝗹𝗲𝘀. Don’t use it for small, fast-moving tasks; you’ll add unnecessary bureaucracy. In leadership, success isn’t just about building the right product. Have you ever been in a project where everyone wanted control but no one took accountability? How did it end? Save it. Try it. Share it. Because clarity scales. hashtag#Leadership hashtag#DecisionMaking hashtag#Frameworks hashtag#ProductManagement hashtag#HealthcareSaaS hashtag#ProjectManagement hashtag#Execution

I get a gut-wrenching feeling when my proposed launch strategy falls apart in a meeting with leadership 🤮 And it always happens right *after* alllllll the cross-functional leaders (and their mommas) have agreed to the plan, and it's time to present the launch plan to leadership... inevitably, a cross-functional leader (that had previously agreed to the plan) says..."well, I'm not sure I agree with that" and the launch plan quickly gets tossed out the window for folks that haven't been there - it feels like making an omelet that's literally *chef's kiss* and then seeing it fall apart as you attempt to flip it So, why does this happen? 🤯 I'm sure there are a ton of reasons, but in my experience it's due to what I like to call "false consensus" False consensus is when a group of people align on a plan or decision, but don't truly believe it's the right way to go they agree anyways due to group think, peer pressure, time pressure, or fear of confrontation then, when they've had some time to think about it, (usually right before a meeting with leadership🤦♂️), they decide to change their mind cue the gut-wrenching in my stomach SO, how do you overcome this? In my experience, there are three ways to mitigate false consensus: 1. Understanding your audience 2. Holding pre-meetings 3. Building in additional review time 🧠 Understanding your audience - Learn how your key cross-functional leaders think and identify when they sound hesitant - Ask them how they like to communicate - Slack, Email, Documents, Meetings, and whether they like talking through something or reading it - Also, figure out which ones think and speak quickly, and which ones need more time to analyze and consider; adjust accordingly 🤝 Holding pre-meetings - I cannot stress this enough, hold pre-meetings with your key stakeholders - If your launch team meetings have 8 people, then meet with them 1:1 (as needed 1:1) *prior* to the launch meetings - Advocate for them in the larger meetings based on their pre-meeting feedback - This also gives them more time to think since you're giving them a preview of the content/meeting. ⌛ Building in additional review time - Give people time to absorb and rethink through the launch plan - It'll allow them to consider downstream impacts and to truly align with the plan, or request adjustments BEFORE the meeting with leadership - It's like pizza on your coffee table, a few hours after you've had dinner, you decide...well maybe I will have one more slice! Do those three well and you'll reduce false consensus tremendously AND have a better product launch strategy to boot! So, how do you prevent false consensus? P.S. Now I want pizza. Can you tell I wrote this while I was hungry? #gtm #pmm #startups

🚀 Unlocking Agility Beyond Product Development: A Case from World-Class CPG 🚀 When a global leader in the consumer products space faced a daunting challenge—design and launch a next-gen product faster than ever before—they knew traditional approaches wouldn’t cut it. Market dynamics were shifting, competition was rising, and consumer behavior was evolving at lightning speed. The old ways? Too slow. Likely resulting in Integration Hell 🚫 So what did they do? Instead of a sequential "relay race," we transformed their approach into a collaborative "rugby" game by implementing a scaled Scrum framework that brought together technical, research, and commercial teams into one cohesive force. What made the difference? 1️⃣ Cross-Functional Integration: Teams from R&D, marketing, commercial insights, finance, and manufacturing didn’t just work in silos—they continuously integrated their work. Product design changes directly influenced commercial strategies, financials, and packaging—all within days, not months. 2️⃣ Holistic Go-To-Market Strategy: We focused on the entire GTM approach from day 1. By involving stakeholders frequently and tackling the highest risks first (whether they were in Desirability, Viability or Feasibility), we didn’t just build a product—we built a launch strategy that aligned every piece of the business. 3️⃣ Empowerment & Empiricism: By focusing on key leaps of faith and allowing teams to work in parallel, we unlocked new value-creation opportunities that would have been stifled in a traditional phase-gated process. “We learned that working the biggest risks first and resolving them early has changed how we look at how we’re doing the work internally.” The result? One of the most commercially successful product launches in their history, in an exceedingly competitive space, delivered ahead of schedule. 🥇 We've proven that agility isn’t just for software or product teams. It’s a powerful approach for tackling cross-functional challenges and driving a holistic, integrated GTM strategy. In parallel to leveraging Scrum for future complex products, The team also started using the same concepts for a different complex challenge - developing/evolving the company culture itself (e.g. changing how decisions are made) Curious how this could work for your team? Let's chat! 💬