{"id":806,"date":"2014-03-20T12:16:01","date_gmt":"2014-03-20T12:16:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/product-pulse.planview.com\/?p=275"},"modified":"2022-04-13T16:12:05","modified_gmt":"2022-04-13T21:12:05","slug":"killing-your-product","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/","title":{"rendered":"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>My Mardi Gras hangover cure didn\u2019t involve a greasy breakfast with an aspirin, chased by a strong cup of coffee. My hangover cure was delivered via the brilliant idea Brandon Rowberry of United Healthcare Group shared at the recent <a title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.frost.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Frost &amp; Sullivan<\/a> Innovation in NPD &amp; Marketing conference in New Orleans. Brandon discussed how his team had a product that just wouldn\u2019t die.\u00a0 They would launch the product to less than rave reviews, bring it back inside for tweaks, and then launch it again only to have it fail again. Not wanting to forfeit, the team tried in vain to make it work until someone finally had the courage to put a stake in it and call it what it was \u2013 dead. Here&#8217;s why your new product development process should include having a funeral after killing a product.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve all been there.\u00a0 Every company has had that idea that they were certain was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it. There is emotional attachment and you don\u2019t want anyone to call your baby ugly.\u00a0 So much energy, time, money, creativity, and resources helped to birth it, only to see it killed. It is sad. But what Rowberry did that shook me out of my beignet stupor, was proper and perfect. He held a funeral. He gathered the entire project team, everyone that had touched the product in its rocky history, met them in the auditorium and they had a funeral.\u00a0 An executive even gave a eulogy. People mourned the loss but also got to focus on what they learned. They learned that failure isn\u2019t bad. And most important of all, it was closure.<\/p>\n<p>The image of this funeral got me thinking. I was in New Orleans after all and what a better frame of reference for killing a product or project than to have a <a title=\"Jazz Funeral\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jazz_funeral\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">jazz funeral<\/a>. For those unfamiliar, locals often have jazz funerals for their dead.\u00a0 On the way to the cemetery, it\u2019s sad jazz with a somber tone. It\u2019s the time to grieve the loss. But after the dead have been buried, the jazz turns upbeat as those closest to the dead celebrate the impact that person had on their lives.<\/p>\n<p>We can do the same thing with our killed projects and products. You tried hard and did the best you could, but let\u2019s learn from it and realize the positive impact it had on our team, our brand, and our company. Lessons were learned about what doesn\u2019t work so you can do better the next go around. (As one of my idols, Dr. Maya Angelou says:\u00a0 \u201cWhen you know better you do better.\u201d) And here\u2019s the bonus:\u00a0 by making the kill, you\u2019ve saved time, saved money, reallocated resources to winning products, and released the mental energy that was being consumed by keeping the project on life support. Hooray! Strike up the band!<\/p>\n<p>You might be asking yourself, \u201cHow do we know for certain a project should be killed?\u201d Answering this simple question is often a struggle for development teams. <a title=\"The Fourth Product Portfolio Management Benchmark Study\" href=\"https:\/\/go.planview.com\/resource-managment-capacity-planning-benchmark-study\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><i>The Fourth Product Portfolio Management Benchmark Study<\/i><\/a> shows the leading causes of this pain are the kill criteria being unclear or nonexistent and the lack of rigor in determining the highest return, highest value products.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s also a softer side. No one wants to hurt the feelings of innovators or give up on a project that\u2019s already consumed so many resources. Organizations must also change their culture so a product\u2019s success or failure isn\u2019t personal and feelings aren\u2019t a metric. Product development companies and team leaders can\u2019t be afraid of failure. They need to raise their hurricane drink (or white flag; whatever you prefer) high into the air and call it like it is. Dead.<\/p>\n<p>The jazz funeral plays out this way, dealing with the emotional side culturally and celebrating the lessons learned to make future decisions with confidence. Take a hard look at your portfolio. What projects are on life support and draining resources? It might just be time to make funeral arrangements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My Mardi Gras hangover cure didn\u2019t involve a greasy breakfast with an aspirin, chased by a strong cup of coffee. My hangover cure was delivered via the brilliant idea Brandon Rowberry of United Healthcare Group shared at the recent Frost &amp; Sullivan Innovation in NPD &amp; Marketing conference in New Orleans. Brandon discussed how his&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":1102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[168,199,233],"class_list":["post-806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-product-development","tag-innovation-management","tag-killing-projects","tag-pd-events"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.8 (Yoast SEO v26.8) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Killing a Product - New Product Development - Blog | Planview<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Planview Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Planview-Inc\/89422974772\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"300\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"216\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Carrie Nauyalis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@PDPMprincess\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Planview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Carrie Nauyalis\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Carrie Nauyalis\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/person\/080970c7905903ceebf75cf14236b25e\"},\"headline\":\"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\"},\"wordCount\":699,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Innovation Management\",\"Killing Projects\",\"PD Events\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Product Portfolio Management\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\",\"name\":\"Killing a Product - New Product Development - Blog | Planview\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00\",\"description\":\"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg\",\"width\":300,\"height\":216,\"caption\":\"killing a product\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/\",\"name\":\"Planview Blog\",\"description\":\"Leading the conversation on digital connected work\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Planview\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/planview-logo-black.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/planview-logo-black.png\",\"width\":280,\"height\":66,\"caption\":\"Planview\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Planview-Inc\/89422974772\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/Planview\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/person\/080970c7905903ceebf75cf14236b25e\",\"name\":\"Carrie Nauyalis\",\"description\":\"Carrie Nauyalis brings her passion, experience, and thought leadership in the product portfolio management industry to her current role as Executive in Residence at Planview. As an EIR, Carrie is collaborating on market research and sharing best practices with Planview prospects and customers. She is an active speaker, MBA guest lecturer, blogger, and vlogger on all things PPM, with warm places in her heart for innovation, calculating ROI, and agile. Carrie spent 19 years with Planview in various positions, including global consulting, product management, and as the solution evangelist for innovation and new product development. Prior to Planview, Carrie held multiple systems engineering positions with Emerson Process. She earned her Bachelor\u2019s degree from Truman State.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/x.com\/PDPMprincess\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/author\/carrie-nauyalis\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Killing a Product - New Product Development - Blog | Planview","description":"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product","og_description":"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.","og_url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/","og_site_name":"Planview Blog","article_publisher":"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Planview-Inc\/89422974772","article_published_time":"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00","og_image":[{"width":300,"height":216,"url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Carrie Nauyalis","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@PDPMprincess","twitter_site":"@Planview","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Carrie Nauyalis","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/"},"author":{"name":"Carrie Nauyalis","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/person\/080970c7905903ceebf75cf14236b25e"},"headline":"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product","datePublished":"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00","dateModified":"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/"},"wordCount":699,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg","keywords":["Innovation Management","Killing Projects","PD Events"],"articleSection":["Product Portfolio Management"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/","url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/","name":"Killing a Product - New Product Development - Blog | Planview","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg","datePublished":"2014-03-20T12:16:01+00:00","dateModified":"2022-04-13T21:12:05+00:00","description":"Ever had an idea you were sure was a winner and it just didn\u2019t make it? See why you should have a funeral after killing a product.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/jazz-funeral-300x931.jpg","width":300,"height":216,"caption":"killing a product"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/killing-your-product\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Mourning the Dead: Why You Should Have a Funeral After Killing Your Product"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/","name":"Planview Blog","description":"Leading the conversation on digital connected work","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#organization","name":"Planview","url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/planview-logo-black.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/planview-logo-black.png","width":280,"height":66,"caption":"Planview"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Planview-Inc\/89422974772","https:\/\/x.com\/Planview"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/#\/schema\/person\/080970c7905903ceebf75cf14236b25e","name":"Carrie Nauyalis","description":"Carrie Nauyalis brings her passion, experience, and thought leadership in the product portfolio management industry to her current role as Executive in Residence at Planview. As an EIR, Carrie is collaborating on market research and sharing best practices with Planview prospects and customers. She is an active speaker, MBA guest lecturer, blogger, and vlogger on all things PPM, with warm places in her heart for innovation, calculating ROI, and agile. Carrie spent 19 years with Planview in various positions, including global consulting, product management, and as the solution evangelist for innovation and new product development. Prior to Planview, Carrie held multiple systems engineering positions with Emerson Process. She earned her Bachelor\u2019s degree from Truman State.","sameAs":["https:\/\/x.com\/PDPMprincess"],"url":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/author\/carrie-nauyalis\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=806"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}