Insights on How to Productize Services and Solution Offerings

Fall is my favorite time of year. The kids go back to school (thank goodness), leaves change colors, pumpkin spice returns AND, for many organizations, budgeting season kicks off! As a Type-A planner, I love budgeting season because it's where we translate our vision and strategy into tangible spending commitments for the upcoming year.

“I don't want this new product to eat away at my existing business.”

We hear this a lot. 

So many executives get caught up in the fear that new products will detract, or worse destroy, their existing business. Total or partial cannibalization can occur when a new product moves customers away from current service offerings or product lines. It is a legitimate concern, but the right framework and strategy can help companies stay competitive and turn potential threats into opportunities.

For the past three years both of my kids have been involved in FIRST – For Inspiration & Recognition of Science & Technology – a global organization with robotics programs for kids ages 4-15, aimed at introducing children to STEM careers through fun, hands-on learning coupled with real-world problem-solving.

“People often believe that to do better work, they should do fewer things. Yet the evidence flies in the face of that assumption: Being prolific actually increases originality, because sheer volume increases your chances of finding novel solutions.”

I don’t think I am alone in this, but 2019 feels like a lifetime ago. It was August of that year that we first introduced our Product Innovation Quotient, a tool to help organizations assess their product innovation capabilities. Since then, our thinking has evolved—and so has the assessment.

Productize: The Ultimate Guide to Turning Professional Services into Scalable Products

When the world shut down a year ago, business began to slow for many professional services firms. For many, the slowdown created an opportunity – or urgent need – to try to productize their services as a strategy to grow scalably, improve valuations, and fend off new digital-first competitors.

I was explaining to a client the other day that the biggest mistake I see companies make when developing new products is developing a product that does not solve an urgent and expensive customer problem. Turns out he’d heard me say that before. Many times.

It is so much easier to innovate new products or services when we stop trying to be perfect.

Organizations that struggle with new product innovation typically don’t fail because their leader isn’t a visionary. It’s not that the team isn't creative or smart. It's because, as humans, we favor routine. Innovation takes most of us outside our comfort zones and often requires new skills and behavior change. 

A few years ago, I read the book Designing Your Life by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans. The book describes how to use design thinking innovation practices to help people proactively explore and change their lives to make them more meaningful. More fulfilling. More joyful.