Product Transformation Case Studies

Case Study 1 — Turning a PSG Equity Value-Creation Plan Into Delivered Product Outcomes (E-Commerce ERP)

Exec summary

Engagement model

~6-month interim CPO (full-time), reporting to CEO and board, with PSG Equity's operating partner as de facto sponsor

Challenge

No prioritization discipline, no clear ICP, no AI strategy, PSG's value-creation plan set commercial goals with no product plan to reach them. Brought in after the prior product leadership was unable to produce a credible delivery plan.

Key stakeholders

CEO, board, PSG Equity operating partner

Approach

Stepped in as interim CPO two days after a company-wide reduction in force, and translated PSG's yearly commercial goals into a locked-scope, outcome-committed quarterly product roadmap.

Outcome

Rule of 40 improved from ~11 to ~40 in two quarters; R&D cost fell from 34% to 26% of revenue; new ARR via PLG grew roughly 3.5x. Per the PSG operating partner, "one of the best quarters in the company's history."

Engagement model

~Six-month interim engagement (full-time) as CPO of a PSG Equity portfolio company, an all-in-one ERP for e-commerce sellers, covering order management, inventory, and marketplace sync to Amazon, eBay and others. Brought in after the prior product leadership was unable to produce a credible delivery plan. Reported formally to the CEO and board; PSG's operating partner was the de facto sponsor of the engagement.

Challenge

• No prioritization discipline: a roadmap backlog that never got shorter and rarely shipped on time.
• No clearly articulated ideal customer profile.
• No AI strategy, while the market shifted toward AI-driven decision-making and agentic commerce.
• PSG's value-creation plan defined yearly commercial targets, but no product plan connected delivery to those targets.
• Two days after joining, the company underwent a ~20% reduction in force, including cutting the tech organization from 120 to under 100 people. A leaner team still had to hit the same commercial targets.

Actions

Immediate: Stabilization after the RIF

• Operated the workforce reduction that landed two days into the engagement, rebuilding team structure and delivery momentum on a tech org reduced from 120 to under 100 people.

Q1: Planned and delivered

• Translated PSG's yearly commercial goal into a top-down, locked-scope Q1 roadmap with committed outcomes, not just committed scope.
• Rebuilt the product-led growth funnel, refocusing on the SMB segment that had previously been dropped from the ideal customer profile.

Q2: Planned and mostly delivered before handoff

• Defined an AI strategy for an increasingly AI-driven market, shifting the value proposition away from breadth-driven lock-in towards better outcomes through better, data-driven decision-making, and including a roadmap for agentic commerce.
• Held the same locked-scope, outcome-committed delivery discipline through a second quarter.
• Managed a planned price increase on the legacy customer base without breaching a 5% churn ceiling, despite significant customer dissatisfaction.

Handoff

• Transitioned to the newly-hired permanent CPO with the roadmap, delivery model and AI strategy in place.

Outcomes

• Rule of 40: improved from ~11 to ~40 within two quarters.
• Efficiency: R&D cost fell from 34% (pre-RIF) to 26% (post-RIF) of revenue.
• Growth: new ARR generated through the PLG motion grew roughly 3.5x, driven by trial-to-paid conversion improving from 5% to 10% and marketing's improved top-of-funnel lead quality.
• Retention: churn held below 5% in the legacy customer base despite a planned price increase and significant customer dissatisfaction.

"Delivered one of the best quarters in this company's history & brought back strong delivery commitment."

Operating Partner, PSG Equity

Also: Fixing a Broken Delivery Model Behind a PE-Owned EdTech's Sales Engine (IU Group)

IU Group operates both online and campus-based higher education, but the business is overwhelmingly sales-led. Its Salesforce, Marketing Cloud and Twilio-based sales technology stack is core infrastructure, not a side project. Engaged directly (not through the PE sponsor) to fix a product delivery model so broken it was blocking the company's ability to scale its sales engine. Rebuilt strategy, prioritization and delivery discipline across the salestech organization.

Case Study 2 — Transforming a siloed product org to an empowered, scalable Product Operating Model (EdTech platform)

Exec summary

Engagement model

7-month interim Product Director

Challenge

Successful business with severe product bottleneck (slow delivery, disconnected to business goals, legacy tech debt) blocked expansion into new markets & AI

Key stakeholders

CEO DACH, Product leads (no CPO present) and market owners

Approach

Embedded in leadership team, leading and coaching 5 product leads in weekly 1:1 sessions, taking full ownership of day-to-day operations as Product Director

Outcome

Delivered key product capabilities to unblock tech scalability and AI roadmap while transforming product operating model towards empowered model driven by Discovery/Validation.

Engagement model

7-month interim engagement (80% capacity) as Product Director, leading 40+ FTE across Product, Analytics, Design, and Engineering. 5 Product leads as key targets for product coaching.

Challenge

• Product teams operated in silos with unclear ownership and disconnected goals.
• The organization focused heavily on delivery, lacking strategic alignment to user experience or business outcomes. This led to abundant tech debt slowing delivery and capability gaps in product discovery and strategy.
• Leadership wanted to scale to new markets and drive key AI features but lacked an operating model to connect vision, strategy, and execution.
• Product metrics were limited to top-level conversions, offering no visibility into engagement drivers or value creation.

Actions

Month 1–2: Diagnostic & Alignment

• Conducted stakeholder interviews and team workshops to surface misalignments and blockers – showing that most product teams didn't have a strong strategy (what to build in order to maximize impact) in place.
• Partnered with the CEO DACH, market owners and product leadership to articulate product vision and define strategic themes for growth.
• Created a diagnostic map & transformation plan linking strategy, organizational structure, delivery flow, and business outcomes.
• Created individual coaching plans for capability building for product leads.

Month 3–4: Design & Rollout of New Product Operating Model

• Co-designed a new product model with leadership: Clear strategy for each team, connecting product outcomes to business outcomes and thus creating accountability, and empowered PM ownership for product impact.
• Facilitated leadership workshops to align on decision-making principles and the balance between autonomy and control.
• Introduced OKR reset connecting strategic goals to product outcomes.
• Ran bi-weekly 1:1 coaching sessions (continuously) with Product Leads and tech leads to strengthen discovery, prioritization, and stakeholder communication.
• Hands-on leadership of product leads to facilitate discovery and delivery of product enhancements

Month 5–6: Coaching & Capability Building

• Established cross-functional teams and processes to break silos and increase transparency between product, markets, and engineering.
• Partnered with analytics to introduce new product metrics — moving from high-level conversions to micro-conversion along journey and key engagement indicators.

Month 7: Consolidation & Scaling

• Supported leadership in translating the new model into hiring profiles and performance structures – and hired new Product Lead for key platform.
• Mentored emerging product leads to sustain the empowered ways of working beyond the engagement.

Outcomes (3–6 months post-engagement)

• Structural: Organization shifted to product model with clear accountability; reduced cross-team friction and improved throughput.
• Cultural: PMs began leading with discovery-first mindset; teams owned outcomes instead of output.
• Measurement: Introduced new product metrics that enabled data-driven decision-making across teams.
• Leadership alignment: CEO DACH adopted the model as the new operating standard.
• Business: Delivered committed scope and accelerated roadmap items such as AI-enabled personalization, improving engagement and retention.

Case Study 3 — Redesigning Product & Monetization Strategy for Scalable Growth (Consumer Marketplace)

Exec summary

Engagement model

11-month strategic product consulting, directly reporting to CEO and board

Challenge

Biggest C2C classifieds marketplace implemented monetization strategy that severely underperformed as it didn't satisfy user needs

Key stakeholders

CEO, board, Heads of Product

Approach

Formed small strategy team, reporting to CEO, to conduct and analyze research to create a product strategy deeply rooted in user needs and business goals. Went into deep implementation detail to inform product roadmaps.

Outcome

Delivered product and monetization strategy that aligned product teams with business goals, increased adoption (from 4% to 10+%), and remains core to the company's direction today.

Engagement model

11-month strategic product consulting engagement (80% capacity), partnering with CEO, board, and Heads of Product & Business.

Challenge

• Company faced a steep decline in advertising revenue, new transactional monetization model underperformed (4% adoption).
• Teams lacked a unifying strategy linking user experience with the new revenue model.
• Leadership operated on outdated success assumptions — difficult to challenge given past growth trajectory, especially in other markets.

Actions

Month 1–2: Immersion & Diagnosis

• Immersed in available data and user research; created a meta-study combining behavioral analytics, user interviews, and competitive benchmarks.
• Identified adoption barriers and uncovered opportunity areas for trust and convenience as key differentiators.
• Built early hypotheses and validated them with product and business leads and leadership to gain alignment.

Month 3–5: Strategic Reframe & Executive Coaching

• Partnered with the CEO to reframe monetization around user value instead of revenue pressure — repositioning transactional flows as part of an improved experience.
• Facilitated a series of board workshops to challenge entrenched assumptions and align on a new strategic narrative.
• Coached leadership on connecting business model changes to customer impact — shifting discussion from "how do we monetize" to "how do we add value people will pay for."

Month 6–8: Strategy Integration & Team Alignment

• Worked with Heads of Product to translate strategic pillars into team-level roadmaps and measurable adoption goals.
• Partnered with business teams to build a scalable validation process for new monetization experiments.

Month 9–11: Embedding & Scaling

• Refined strategy based on competitor behavior calling for prompt response.
• Continued coaching with leadership and Heads of Product to embed the new strategy and maintain clarity on user-centric outcomes while reacting to market needs.

Outcomes (6–9 months post-engagement)

• Strategic: New product and monetization framework adopted as company-wide reference; remains core to the organization's strategy.
• Cultural: Shifted leadership mindset from existing revenue tactics to long-term user-value orientation.
• Operational: Product teams aligned behind a shared value narrative, improving prioritization and cross-team collaboration.
• Performance: Adoption of transactional features increased from 4% to double digits within subsequent quarters.
• Capability: Leadership now uses a repeatable, data-driven approach to connect business objectives to user outcomes.