Mike Alexander of ePatientFinder: Product Management is like Aikido
Aikido is a Japanese martial art practitioners use to unify mind and body. In this second installment of the Austin VOP series, Mike Alexander, director of product at ePatientFinder, shares how this art of directing the flow of energy can help product managers. Plus learn other insights from Mike’s product career and tenure in Austin, in this interview edited for clarity.
What was your path to product management?
It was circuitous. I was a math and science nerd in school. But in college I chose to study English and religion. With that degree you do a lot of temp work. So I went back to school on the advice of an undergrad advisor to do a masters in library science. I took some classes in systems analysis and basic web design which was my reintroduction to technology. I began doing research work for a consulting firm and then had many roles in technology like QA, DBA, project management, business process analysis. I kept ending up in roles that were focused on requirements and documentation. So these were not strategic product roles. When I went to athenahealth, it was the first time I had product in my title — product innovation manager. I worked in Operations and then on their MDP [More Disruption Please] initiative. It was a good broad role, not just focused on the product and market, but it also dealt with how we could work with partner companies and their products as part of our broader portfolio. Currently, at ePatientFinder, I do both product and QA. I enjoy the many hats you have to wear at a small company, but it can definitely be stressful.
What advice do you give to aspiring product leaders?
I believe soft skills are critical. You get to work with diverse stakeholders that can have strong opinions about the product and want you to execute on their orders.
Similar to Aikido, as a product manager you have to work with their energy and move it in the direction you need.
It is also like being a reference librarian. When someone comes to you at the library and asks for a book about Cuba, you could go to the stacks and get them a book. But what’s more important is why they want this book — to plan a trip, to write a paper. You have to ask “why” instead of just taking the order.
Your stakeholders have to trust you before they will be open to the questions you ask, and trust that you want to understand the problem and not just listen to their solution. I worked with a boss who used to be a commander in the Navy. He said that you can’t just be nice like a southern gentleman; you have to be effective and can still be direct, politely. I also think of my English degree. When you write to convince someone, you have to consider your audience — they have to accept your message and before doing something with it.
What is exciting about the product you are working on now?
ePatientFinder gives physicians and clinical trial providers a secure technology platform that allows them to leverage EHR [Electronic Health Records] data to identify patients for clinical trials. Our data scientists are great at boiling down a trial protocol, finding what is actionable and determining the best data to find patients. Historically we have been doing a lot of manual work to move data from EHRs into our platform. We have more recently been focused on getting direct API access to the EHRs, allowing us to run queries to get patient information and be ready to take the next right action. For example, in Q1 we brought on a new doctor’s practice, connected with their EHR, and automatically queried their patient population. That got the patient leads straight to our outreach team without any manual intervention so that they could begin calls immediately. So we are on the cusp of significant scalability.
What is your biggest product challenge currently?
Our challenge is dealing with diverse data. HIT [Healthcare IT] data interoperability is not a new problem. There are millions of data points to deal with, across an ever-growing HIT landscape, and when we get data we have to make it consumable for our platform, deal with missing data, deal with messy query results, etc. The question I consider is how we can work with intermediaries for this data like the CommonWell Health Alliance or Carequality that seek to improve interoperability and data sharing?
On the business side, another challenge is getting patients to consider an alternative to their current treatment. There may be a fear of clinical trials or of being treated by someone other than your doctor. I have personal experience with this having diabetes and having been in a clinical trial, so I can understand these challenges.
How do you learn and grow in this field?
I spend time reading trade publications in health IT and clinical trials, to understand more about drug and device development. While I have personal experience with clinical trials, I want to learn more from others that have been in this space for decades.
Since I am at a startup, I have done reading on lean startup — especially Ash Maurya’s books and Nir Eyal’s book, “ Hooked.” I want to understand the product mentality and different mindset needed in a startup. You can turn on a dime, which is quite different from when I was in larger organizations.
What differentiates Austin from other tech centers?
I have grown up in Austin. My grandfather brought our family here as part of his work at IBM. That was part of the first tech wave— the old Austin tech companies that made things — IBM, TI, MCC, Sematech. They were a tiny part of Austin where the state government and university dominated.
Then came the second wave — the dot-com boom — and that changed things to where Austin began to be seen as a younger sibling to the Bay Area, Boston and NYC.
We are on the third wave. We had successes in the late ’ 90’s and 2000s with companies like Bazaarvoice, Trilogy and Vignette. We are lucky to have some great founders and entrepreneurs in our community — like Brett Hurt and Josh Baer — that can provide guidance and leadership. You have a lot of young people coming up with ideas to create an app or company. It has become easier to do so — you do not need a computer science degree.
So we have grown up from being the young sibling of the Bay Area, Boston and NYC. It is a viable place for tech because of the experience and talent here, it is a good place to live, and it is still affordable compared to the coasts.
What is missing?
I think we are missing a stronger product community. We have experienced product people here, but I don’t see enough collaboration. The example I compare to is how CEOs of small companies get together to talk about their challenges. This was true at two of the small companies I worked at. Maybe I just have not looked for the product community enough. I tried to go to some Health IT meetups, but I found too much biz dev and networking to where I did not find it useful.
What is your favorite product and why?
A. It is the Dodocase for my iPad. I have an English background, so I like that the case is made from an old book. I like that it is handmade in San Francisco. It has a built-in holder for my pen, and it has a notebook on one side so that I can write on paper and on the other side is the iPad if I want to work digital. It has a pocket for business cards, a larger pocket for receipts and the strap has a clip on it so I can open it and keep it standing up. I used this when I traveled to Boston and had everything I needed for work. They have really thought about all the uses. And finally, they have great service. One time the iPad holder started to slide down. When I called them they gave me the option of fixing it myself with instructions or sending it back to them. I like that they gave me options. This case makes me happy: I feel like I am holding a book, it is useful in many ways, I like the company’s approach to crafting this product, and they provide great service.
Thanks for the insights, Mike!
Austin VOP is an interview series with product leaders in Austin. Please like, share and tweet this article if you enjoyed it. Suggest product leaders you would like to hear from by emailing me. Sign up for a weekly email update here.
