Transforming Strategic Planning: How Iteright Empowered VitalSource with Disciplined Idea Validation

Discover how Iteright's unique product strategy framework empowered VitalSource's product team to streamline their strategic planning process. Explore how we implemented rigorous validation, ensuring

VitalSource, a key player in the EdTech sector, had a dynamic product team that handled strategic planning for multiple business units, each with their own sales, marketing, customer success, and business unit executives.

Each unit brought to the table its unique set of executives, each unit overflowing with innovative ideas. Amid this abundance of ideas, determining priorities posed a significant challenge, particularly when preparing for strategic planning due to the variety and volume of initiatives.

The Challenge of Strategic Planning

On one hand, VitalSource had an influx of potential initiatives, ranging from CEO mandates to customer requests, and lacked the necessary processes to ensure each was properly vetted before adding to the roadmap. This resulted in a reactive rush before strategic planning sessions, insufficient data to support or prioritize initiatives, and an ongoing struggle to justify the projected ROI.

On the other, achieving the projected $20 million revenue gain from top-tier ideas was hampered by the lack of a systematic approach to idea validation, leading to missed targets and accountability gaps.

With more than ten priorities from each unit and an expected timeline for release, the product team found themselves drowning in a sea of varied, often untested ideas.

Why VitalSource Chose Iteright

Iteright's disciplined idea validation framework would help VitalSource ensure they are working on strategic, impactful ideas for the business and the customer.

VitalSource recognized the need for a disciplined and rigorous process to handle stakeholder intake and idea validation. They sought a solution that could provide clear, data-driven projections of ROI and potential business impact for each initiative. Iteright, with its robust product strategy framework and continuous planning approach, proved to be the perfect fit.

Iteright stood out due to its promise of a personalized product strategy framework that would offer more than just discipline and rigor. Brian Hogue, Chief Product Officer at VitalSource, was eager to create "the right kind of positive accountability... for people to think harder, asl themselves the hard questions, and develop some conviction."

How Iteright Responded

Iteright's first step was to refine the intake process by developing a set of key questions stakeholders had to answer before submitting ideas. This ensured every idea was scrutinized for potential customer benefits, business impact, market uniqueness, and pricing implications before entering the development pipeline.

Iteright also facilitated a secondary internal vetting phase led by Product Managers that further investigated areas such as go-to-market strategies, delivery timelines, change management processes, and deeper testing in the market to validate desire.

Iteright was committed to transforming VitalSource's strategic planning from the get-go. By developing a unique subset of questions for stakeholders to answer prior to each idea submission, a level of discipline and rigor was enforced that was not present before. These questions ensured proper diligence was complete, enabling the product team to work with stakeholders to predict business outcomes.

The Results

The results of Iteright’s intervention have been transformative. As VP Product, Nick Brown, puts it, "We can now frontload the planning work, prioritize apples-to-apples, and the prioritization works itself out more clearly. We know exactly what we need to do.”

Planning is now more continuous, efficient, and impactful, with ideas that are clear, well-understood, and validated.

If you're also looking to transform your strategic planning and bring rigorous validation and predictable ROI to your initiatives, reach out to us at Iteright. We look forward to working with you to unlock your potential.

Product Managers at VitalSource have the ability to use their own personalized framework or our library of existing frameworks based on the type of the idea they are looking to validate

Example framework for rigorously analyzing ideas that can be personalized to your organization's needs