A product, AI, or roadmap bet with real momentum behind it, and an unclear next decision.
Product innovation, without expensive guesswork
Turn high-stakes product and AI uncertainty into validated action.
Working Harder helps leadership teams find the right opportunity, prove what to build, and move with a clear next decision, before momentum hardens a guess into a roadmap.
Book an Innovation Working SessionSenior-led. Built for complex decisions.The moment to call Working Harder
You have budget, momentum, and an untested assumption.
The expensive mistake is committing a quarter of engineering to the wrong direction. We make the opportunity, constraints, and next decision clear before momentum hardens a guess into a roadmap.
AssumptionTo testNext
The Innovation Working Session
Make the next product or AI decision defensible.
A fixed-scope engagement for the moment you have a meaningful initiative, but cannot yet defend what to build, where to focus, or how to move. It starts with short pre-work and one 90-minute working session with your team.
In plain terms
Short pre-work, a focused 90-minute working session, targeted synthesis, and a senior-led decision readout.
A sponsor who can act, plus 2–5 product, technical, design, operations, or commercial leads.
Not a broad discovery program, full design sprint, technical build, or open-ended ideation exercise.
How the work unfolds
- 01Intake & decision frame
Clarify the commitment at stake, the constraints around it, and the call leadership needs to make.
- 02Focused working session
Separate what is known from what is assumed, then identify the smallest useful test or input.
- 03Decision brief & readout
Document the recommendation, its evidence, its limits, and the path the team can take from here.
What you keep
01
Opportunity map
02
Evidence summary
03
Decision brief
04
Prioritized recommendation
05
Sequenced next-step roadmap
Possible decisions
AdvancePivotNarrowSequenceDo not build
What it can lead to
Your team moves
Use the decision brief and roadmap to execute internally or select a delivery partner.
Validation & Prototype
Resolve the specific trust, adoption, feasibility, or security risk named in the brief.
Product Innovation Leadership
Add senior product leadership when the direction is validated but internal capacity is incomplete.
Ways to work
Start with the question that is costing you the most.
Every engagement is scoped around a decision. The goal is not to sell the largest project; it is to remove the right risk first.
Entry engagement
InnovationWorking Session
Frame the real opportunity, make trade-offs visible, and give leadership a decision they can defend.
Outcome
An evidence-backed recommendation and a defined next move.
Next engagement
Validation& Prototype
Test the product, workflow, or AI interaction before it becomes an expensive engineering commitment.
Outcome
A testable direction and a scope your team can act on.
Leadership retainer
Product InnovationLeadership
Add the senior product leadership and purpose-built capability needed to move without drift.
Outcome
A clearer team, stronger decisions, and less external dependency.
How we work
A clear call. A testable direction. A path the team can execute.
Find the opportunity
Bring customer signal, business ambition, market context, and constraints into one honest view.
Prove the direction
Use working prototypes and the right feedback to make the decision before the build commitment.
Mobilize capability
Define the roadmap, expertise, delivery constraints, and decision cadence required to move.
Move to market
Carry intent into delivery and learning without losing the logic that made the direction credible.
Why Working Harder
Senior-led. Evidence-first. Built for the decision in front of you.
We bring product, strategy, experience, and delivery constraints into the same conversation, so a clear direction can survive the real world.
No theaterEvery phase ends in a documented recommendation and a clear next decision.
No generic teamSpecialist capability is brought in deliberately, not sold as overhead.
No false certaintyWhat is known, assumed, and still worth testing stays visible.
Background
Where the judgment comes from
Melisa Harder led innovation work at Iron Mountain and directed innovation business development at the Open Geospatial Consortium. She is also a co-owner of Gamut Innovation.
Purpose-built capability
The right expertise, only when the decision requires it.
Working Harder leads the product work from the decision forward. When the opportunity requires deeper AI, engineering, security, research, design, or domain expertise, we bring in the right capability around the work.
- 01 One senior product lead
- 02 The right specialist extension
- 03 A flexible, client-aligned delivery path
How contracting stays flexible
You keep the delivery choice.Working Harder leads the product work; selected specialists can be engaged directly when that is the right structure for your team, budget, and risk.
Decision in front of us
Should the workflow be automated before the exception cases are mapped?
KnownAssumptionTo testNext
Three exception paths are undocumented. Engineering estimates assume they do not exist.
Start with the decision
Bring us the bet you are trying to make.
In a 30-minute fit conversation, we will decide whether an Innovation Working Session is the right next move, and what it should resolve.
Common questions
Clarity before you commit.
Working Harder is a senior product innovation partner. We lead the product and experience work, then bring in the right specialist capability when the decision and delivery model require it.
No. We work on product and business opportunities where AI may be part of the answer. The question is where AI materially improves the customer, business, or operating outcome.
Usually a defined working session and then a focused engagement around the decision that needs to be made. The goal is the smallest piece of work that removes the right risk.
It starts with short pre-work and one 90-minute session with your sponsor and 2 to 5 leads. We then write up the recommendation and walk the sponsor through it.
We reply by email. If it looks like a fit, we set up a 30-minute conversation to decide whether a Working Session is the right next move.
We work remotely.
Melisa Harder leads the product work. Specialists in AI, engineering, security, research, or design join only when the decision needs them.
Start with the decision
Bring us the bet you are trying to make.
We will identify the missing evidence or capability and recommend the most useful next step. If the right answer is to narrow the question or wait, we will say so.
01No deck. No obligation. A clear first point of view.
By email
hello@workingharder.comEmail us a few lines about the decision you're facing. We reply by email.