Why Every Company Needs a DDOM
- Catherine Del Vecchio Fitz
- Jun 20, 2025
- 4 min read
What Adobe got right—and how it applies to your team.
TL;DR
Adobe’s Data-Driven Operating Model (DDOM) was designed to align teams around the customer journey, using shared metrics to drive better decisions. It worked because it created clarity across functions—not just better dashboards. At Savvyn Insights, we help life sciences teams do the same. Whether you’re building a diagnostic test, scaling a biotech, or launching a medical device, you need a model that aligns your team around what matters.
Back at HBS, Rethinking the Basics
I’m back on campus this week for the final module of the Harvard Business School Program for Leadership Development. One case in particular keeps circling in my head: Adobe’s Customer Journey and their creation of the DDOM—the Data-Driven Operating Model.
The goal was simple. Adobe needed to understand what was actually happening across its customer journey—not by function or department, but as a complete system. The result was DDOM: a framework that helped the entire company align on what mattered, when it mattered, and how to measure it.
At Savvyn Insights, we don’t build dashboards. But we do help companies build their own version of DDOM. And most of the time, they don’t realize they need it until it becomes obvious that teams are no longer rowing in the same direction.
What Is DDOM, Really?
DDOM is an operating model that connects strategy, metrics, and execution to the actual customer journey. Adobe defined five stages—Discover, Try, Buy, Use, and Renew—and built shared definitions and metrics for each. Every team aligned around these stages and reported against the same goals.
This isn't about software. It’s about building a business that functions coherently. When everyone sees the same map, you can move faster, fix problems earlier, and make better decisions.
Most Teams Are Working With Conflicting Dashboards
Adobe realized they had a problem when every team was “green” on their dashboards, but overall sales weren’t growing. Marketing was acquiring leads. Product was shipping features. Sales was hitting quota. But nothing added up.
This kind of disconnect is everywhere in life sciences. I’ve seen it in biotech, diagnostics, and medical devices. Marketing and commercial are focused on physician education, while clinical is running trials, regulatory is managing submissions, and leadership is watching revenue trends without understanding what’s working and what’s noise. Each team is optimizing their own function, but no one is steering the whole system.
That’s what DDOM fixes.
DDOM for Life Sciences: Yes, Even with a Physical Product
This model applies just as much to a biotech or diagnostics company as it does to a SaaS business. In fact, it might matter more.
Here’s how:
Discover: How do physicians, payers, or patients first hear about you? What channels are driving awareness? Are you investing in the right kind of education?
Try: In software, this means a free trial. In life sciences, it could mean an early-access program, a first-use case, or the beginning of a clinical collaboration. How do people evaluate your offering? Do they understand its value?
Buy: This is not just a transaction. For a diagnostic, it might be a test order. For a device, a pilot placement. For a therapy, a formulary inclusion. Who are the decision-makers? What friction do they face?
Use: Once you’re “in,” how is the product actually used? Are physicians following the intended use? Are results being interpreted correctly? Are labs reporting consistently? Are patients adhering? This is where product feedback matters most.
Renew: For diagnostics, this could mean reordering tests. For devices, it might mean expanding use across the system. For biotechs, it could be continued engagement with your scientific or commercial content. Are customers staying? Are they advocating? Are they seeing sustained value?
Even if your product is physical, the journey is still digital, emotional, clinical, and operational. And your teams need to be aligned across all of it.
Making DDOM Work for You
We’re not building a platform. We’re helping you run your business with more clarity. That starts by mapping your actual customer journey, defining what success looks like at each stage, and aligning your team around metrics that matter.
For some companies, it means figuring out what “Try” really means in a clinical setting. For others, it’s about surfacing the right retention signals or getting clinical and commercial teams on the same page. Whatever the gaps are, we help you close them—with your workflows, your data, and your pace.
Adobe turned DDOM into a product. You don’t need to do that. You just need the discipline behind it.
Final Thoughts
DDOM works because it gets teams aligned on what’s happening and what matters most. In life sciences, where complexity is the norm, this kind of clarity turns chaos into progress.
At Savvyn, we help you put that clarity into action with a structure that works and a partner who can help you implement it. Let’s make it work for your team.
Thanks for reading,
—Savvyn (your partner in ruthless efficiency)
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From Chaos to Clarity. Amplify Your Impact.
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