Like many companies, we at Sungard Availability Services (Sungard AS) use multiple methods including CABs, surveys and individual meetings with current and prospective customers to guide our product roadmaps.įor our CTO Labs Team, which is tasked with researching and developing proof-of-concepts (POCs) beyond the current product roadmap, we also use several methods to gain access to customers and to gain empathy for what they want.

From my colleague Sue Clark’s September blog “ The Journey to Innovation,” she wrote, “The aspect stressed in both Innovator’s DNA and in Design Thinking is empathy – truly understanding the needs of all the users involved.” Author and speaker Martin Fowler talks about how developers need to be part of small business-oriented teams with a direct path to the customer.įor teams that are helping guide a company’s future roadmap, having direct access to customers and gaining empathy for what customers need is intuitive, but can be logistically challenging. There has been a lot written about how innovative product ideas are generated, vetted and brought to market. Often, new product ideas that are a significant departure from the current product roadmap are not a result of CAB input. This approach is most helpful with current product lines and near-term additions. The purpose of these groups is to get current customers together to see what they want and need. To help off-set this isolation and to increase customer empathy, organizations (usually large in size) create customer advisory boards (CABs). Although these teams are very knowledgeable, they can become isolated from the current needs of a customer. Normally these teams are staffed with members that possess solid technical hands-on ability and industry experience. These teams typically push the envelope for established companies by researching and prototyping potential future products.

Internal “skunkworks” or innovation teams have been around for a long time.

Aws yubikey