One evening over a steak dinner, Jeff Gaus, the CEO of Prolifiq Software, offered me a job. Out of the blue. Without an interview. Did I mention I wasn’t job hunting? And, never mind that I had never worked in the software or IT industry. Or, that the last time I did any software programming was in the mid-80s when I was using Fortran for Fourier analysis. In fact, all I remember about software programming now is receiving extra credit for the inadvertent spillage of perfume on the program print-out I turned in (+3 points for “best scented code” as I recall).
On the other hand, I was a huge believer in Prolifiq. My two most recent companies were Prolifiq’s first and second medical device customers. At AtriCure®, we had been hunting for a solution that provided compliant distribution of promotional materials for the sales force. Coming up empty-handed, we built our own software-validated, digital distribution system. A year later, we found Prolifiq. Prolifiq had a more thoughtful and integrated SaaS solution which allowed a sales rep speaking to a cardiac surgeon to send materials immediately from his mobile phone, all while abiding by the rules. This was exactly what we needed.
As each new rule governing promotion of medical devices emerged (and there were many), I found myself summarizing the key points and emailing it to Jeff as another valuable opportunity for Prolifiq. I knew the rules were changing and wanted to ensure it was robust for the regulatory folks yet easy for sales – so I could focus on what I did best, marketing.
In retrospect, perhaps I should not have been surprised after all.
Jeff explained that Prolifiq was hunting for deep domain expertise in a new business vertical (tech lingo for focusing on one industry). By now, you must have guessed why he was talking to me. Their new initiative was medical devices where I had spent the last 20 years comfortably ensconced.
"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference." (Robert Frost)
Next…My First Day of Kindergarten, at 44.
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I like to follow unusual paths. After four years of hard work earning a biomedical engineering degree at Duke and one year at Cordis in engineering, I lobbied my way into the Marketing department. Why? I wanted to be closer to the customer – the physicians, the patients and the clinical aspects of technology. And, I was very lucky that Bill Schwartz and Stan Rowe were willing to take a chance on a young engineer who wanted to use both sides of her brain.
Over the twenty years since, I stayed the course in medical device marketing. In mid-2008, a friend and former colleague and I started to brainstorm regularly about unmet needs and possible new medical device technologies to develop – he said that he had “one last start up in him”. One day I suggested that there had to be an opportunity in the growing breadth and depth of complex regulatory requirements surrounding promotional (sales) and educational materials in medical device companies, including Advamed Code of Ethics and the new FDA Good Reprint Practices.
Because of the increasing legislation and its influence on promotions and promotional materials, I started to joke in my last few medical device companies that I didn’t need an MBA to advance; I needed to go to law school. Ultimately, we were unable to conceive of a viable product solution to the increasing legal and regulatory hurdles faced by medical device manufacturers, and we moved on in our thinking.
Meanwhile, the answer was right in front of me.
Next…The Road Less Traveled
Read more about Maureen
Press release: Prolifiq Further Expands into Medical Markets with New Hire Maureen A. Shaffer
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