Clinical Product Is Blocking by Default - And That's the Point

How to use the authority to stop a release without losing the trust of your team.

👋🏻 Hey there! This is the fifth post in the Foundation Series, exploring what clinical product actually is.

The fifth post in the Foundation Series is live, and this one gets into something most people in the role feel but rarely talk about openly.

👉 Read the full post here

Clinical product can block releases. That’s not a side effect of the role - it’s the enforcement mechanism. Without it, clinical input becomes advisory, your suggestions get weighed against speed, and speed usually wins.

I dig into the tension of being embedded in a team you genuinely care about, while also being the person who might stop that team from shipping. What good blocking actually looks like (it’s not saying no to everything), the cost of not blocking when you should have, and how you build the credibility that makes blocking work.

There’s also a bit at the end for organisations: if the role you’re hiring for doesn’t have the authority to block a release, you’re not hiring for clinical product, you’re hiring a clinical advisor.

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