You’re the First Commercial Hire. No Wonder It Feels Impossible.

Chris St-Amour
May 27
3 min read

Every early commercial hire in MedTech knows this feeling: overwhelmed and pulled in every direction, expected to close deals while simultaneously building the commercialization systems you desperately need.

You’re running back-to-back demos, chasing pilots that weren’t designed for success, wrestling with procurement, finance, and reimbursement questions. Every time you try to step back and build structure, another urgent issue demands your attention.

Founders feel it too. Investors want traction. But every pilot drags, and every update sounds the same. Different vantage points. Same reality: you can’t build and sell at the same time.

Why You’re Stuck in Firefighting Mode

This isn’t about skill. It’s about bandwidth.

You inherit expectations without the structures to match them:

Immediate pressure to deliver revenue without the foundation to support it.
Wearing every hat, from sales calls to reimbursement research to deck creation.
Deal-chasing instead of system-building, because survival feels urgent.
Missing GTM infrastructure — playbooks, VAC kits, pilot frameworks.

This isn’t about you not knowing what to do. The healthcare market is in a constant state of flux, driven by a myriad of operational and market dynamics. Success depends on having the right foundation in place, and a strategy with contingencies, so you know not just what to do, but when to act, why it matters, and what to avoid.

The Pilot Trap

Here’s the hard truth: clinical pilots demonstrate efficacy but rarely secure contracts on their own. Your technology might meet every clinical benchmark, and you may have physicians championing it, but enthusiasm alone doesn’t get you on formulary anymore.

Health systems have consolidated, physician influence has waned, and today every new product faces rigorous evaluation by Value Analysis Committees (VACs). These committees are designed to be deliberate and risk-averse, prioritizing budget protection and process standardization. Clinical evidence opens the door, but it’s far from the full story.

Procurement demands vendor stability and supply assurance. Finance requires clear ROI and alignment with budget cycles. Nursing seeks assurances around workflow integration. IT insists on airtight security and EHR integration. Without confidently addressing these dimensions, even the most promising pilot will stall.

You’re not alone. Approximately 70% of digital health pilots fail to progress beyond testing, not due to scientific shortcomings, but because the commercialization pathway is fundamentally misaligned with the realities of health system decision-making.

Where Pathova Comes In

You can’t build and sell at the same time. While chasing pilots and managing deals, there’s no bandwidth left to lay the commercialization foundation you need for repeatable revenue.

Pathova addresses this gap with our proven 6-Sprint GTM System™, a structured, targeted approach designed to move you decisively from Pilot-to-Paid.

Diagnostic: Pinpoint the hidden barriers slowing your path to revenue so you know exactly what to fix first.
Stakeholder Strategy: Craft a strategic narrative aligned to each stakeholder’s priorities. Map the full coalition required, beyond a single physician champion, to drive adoption and reimbursement.
Pilot Blueprint: Design pilots with conversion in mind, not just validation. Incorporate VAC-ready kits, success metrics, and budget alignment that set you up for scalable contracts.
GTM Infrastructure: Build playbooks, processes, and systems that make your go-to-market approach repeatable and agile, so you can adapt quickly as priorities shift and market conditions evolve.
Enablement Engine: Equip your team with the content, tools, and messaging that ensure consistent, credible engagement with every decision-maker.
Activation: Turn strategy into motion with outbound campaigns that generate traction, expand reach, and accelerate the move from Pilot to-Paid.

The system establishes the critical foundation needed for structuring future pilots with conversion at the core, establishing repeatable processes and operational rigor that drive scalable, predictable revenue growth.