An agreement on how your requests are raised, answered and delivered, whether that is a change to the product, a report you need, or time with our Product and Clinical teams. The objective is not fewer requests. It is faster answers you can rely on, and a plan you can build your own year around.
Between [Partner] and DialogueOwner Manager, PartnershipsReviewed Quarterly, jointlyStatus Draft v0.1
01Why we're introducing this
Worth saying plainly, because the reason matters more than the process.
We have been handling your requests one at a time as they arrive, rather than against an agreed plan. That worked while there were few of them. At the current volume it leaves both of us worse off: your team cannot see which requests are progressing, and mine cannot commit to any of them with confidence. The difficulty is not a lack of goodwill on either side. We have never agreed how these decisions get made. That is what this document sets out.
02How a request moves
One route, one owner, one clock. Nothing is handled informally, and nothing goes unanswered.
Step 1 · Day 0
Raised with one person
Your Partnership Manager, with two things attached: the problem it solves for your clients, and what it would be worth if we built it.
Step 2 · Days 1–5
We establish what it involves
Is it a change to the product, a report, a setting we can change, or something our team can do for you directly? Those carry very different costs. We size the work with Product and Clinical.
Step 3 · Days 6–10
We score it
Against the same five measures as every other partner's request, so the outcome reflects a score rather than who asked most recently or most forcefully.
Step 4 · Day 10
You receive an answer in writing
One of the four answers below, with our reasoning. Where the answer is no, we tell you what would have to change for it to become a yes.
03How requests are scored
Five measures, weighted to total 1.00. We are sharing the scoring deliberately: if you can see how we score, you can make a stronger case.
What we score
Weight
What we are asking
Impact on people's care
0.25
Does it make care better, faster or easier to reach, and for how many people? Weighted equally with commercial value, because this is healthcare.
Commercial value
0.25
A specific figure rather than an assertion: new sales it would win, clients it would help us retain, or additional services we could offer companies you have already signed. Tell us the number and the reasoning behind it.
How many partners it serves
0.20
Would this serve only you, or would other partners use it as well? That is a genuine constraint on what we can build. It also means the fastest route to getting your request built is helping us show it is not unique to you.
Effort and risk
0.20
How long it would take to build, and what we would have to set aside to do it. More demanding work scores lower. And because this is healthcare, safety and privacy requirements can rule out an otherwise good idea entirely. They are a limit, not a cost to be weighed.
Fit with our direction
0.10
Is it consistent with what we are already building, or does it pull against it? Deliberately the lowest weight, because a sufficiently strong case should be able to change our plans, not merely fit within them.
Total1.00
04The four answers you can get
Every request receives one of these within ten working days, including the fourth, which most companies avoid giving.
Score 80–100
We will build it this quarter
We commit to a date and begin work now. It appears on the shared plan.
Score 60–79
We will build it within six months
We name the period, and confirm it again at each quarterly review, so that it cannot slip without being raised.
Score 40–59
We will resolve it another way
Without building anything new: a setting we can change, a report we can produce, or a change to how our team works. Often the fastest route to a result.
Score below 40
No, with the reasons
A decline in writing, the score behind it, and what would have to change for it to become a yes. A process that cannot decline anything is not a process.
05How often we meet
Time with our Product and Clinical teams becomes scheduled rather than last-minute. You would have less of their calendar and more of their attention.
Meeting
How often
Who attends
What it is for
Monthly review
Monthly 60 min
Your Partnership Manager · your day-to-day lead
Sales performance, how many of your people are actively selling, any service issues, and the status of every open request. Most matters are resolved here and go no further.
Quarterly planning review
Every 3 months 90 min
+ Product and Clinical, always · Manager, Partnerships
We score and answer new requests, confirm what we are building, and agree priorities for the next three months. This is where product discussions belong, rather than scattered across the year.
Half-yearly leadership review
Twice a year
Your AVP · our VP of Partnerships · equivalent seniority both sides
Performance against plan, the direction of the partnership, longer-term commitments, and any decision too significant for the quarterly review.
Urgent or clinical issues
Any time
A named person on each side. No queue.
Patient safety, a service outage, or a client issue needing immediate attention. Deliberately outside the scoring process, because some things are not ranked, they are simply fixed.
06What each side commits to
This only works if the commitments run both ways.
What we commit to
A single owner for every request. Nothing is handled informally, and nothing moves ahead of others because it was pressed harder.
An answer in writing within ten working days, every time, including when the answer is no.
Nothing goes unanswered. If something slips, you hear it from us, with the reason, at the review where it slipped. You will not have to ask.
Product and Clinical attend the quarterly review prepared, rather than being drawn into last-minute calls without context.
A shared plan, available to you at any time, showing what we are building, what is scheduled, and what we have declined.
What we ask of you
Requests that state the problem they solve and what they are worth, so that we score the actual case rather than our estimate of it.
Your top three each quarter, ranked. If everything is urgent, we end up choosing on your behalf, and we will choose less well than you would.
A single owner on your side, so that we are solving the problem rather than relaying messages.
Equivalent seniority from your side at each meeting.
Visibility into which of your teams are actively selling, and where our support would make a difference.
07What this is for
None of this is intended to slow anything down. We are proposing it because you are one of our largest partners, and the volume of what we now do together has outgrown an informal approach. The trade is straightforward: you give up the ability to move any request to the front of the queue at will. In return you get a clear schedule of what we are building and when, a standing meeting where Product and Clinical arrive prepared, and a written answer to every request within ten days. The objective has not changed. More of your clients' employees getting care, and more revenue for both of us, measured in a way we can both see.