Simon Hayhurst is the Chief Product Officer at Virta Health, a company on a mission to reverse Type 2 diabetes and improve metabolic health for millions. With a deep background in product strategy and a passion for tackling one of healthcare’s most pressing challenges, Simon has played a key role in scaling Virta’s innovative care model. At the intersection of technology, behavior change, and clinical excellence, Virta is reshaping what’s possible in chronic disease management. In our conversation, Simon shares his insights on: The Virta Mission and Founding Story: How a personal health journey inspired a company to tackle metabolic disease at scale. The Evolution of Virta’s Go-to-Market Strategy: Lessons from clinical validation, early patient success, and building payer relationships. Leveraging Technology for Personalized Care: How Virta combines human coaching and AI to deliver scalable, high-quality care. Frameworks for Product Success: Simon’s “three-legged stool” approach to balancing patient value, payer ROI, and operational efficiency. Doing Unscalable Things First: Why starting small is key to learning, building empathy, and refining workflows. Planning with Now-Next-Later: A simple, flexible framework for focused product strategy in dynamic environments. The Power of Retrospectives: How continuous improvement drives sustainable growth and team empowerment. AI and the Future of Member Experience: The role of AI in scaling personalized, proactive, and efficient healthcare delivery. In this episode of Concept to Care, Simon provides a fascinating look into how Virta Health is leading the charge against Type 2 diabetes and redefining health tech success. His insights into product strategy, scaling care, and leveraging AI offer actionable lessons for health tech leaders, operators, and entrepreneurs. — Where to find Simon Hayhurst LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/srhayhurst/ email: simon.hayhurst@virthealth.com Virta Health: https://www.virtahealth.com/ — Where to find Angela and Omar: Angela Suthrave LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/angela-suthrave/ X: https://twitter.com/ASuthrave email: angela@concepttocare.com Omar Mousa LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/omarmousa/ X: https://twitter.com/OmarMHealth email: omar@concepttocare.com — Referenced: Virta Health: https://www.virtahealth.com/ Virta Health Announces Record and Accelerating Growth at a Scale of More Than $100M in Annualized Revenue, Driven by Sustainable Weight Loss and GLP-1 Solutions: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250110748668/en/Virta-Health-Announces-Record-and-Accelerating-Growth-at-a-Scale-of-More-Than-100M-in-Annualized-Revenue-Driven-by-Sustainable-Weight-Loss-and-GLP-1-Solutions CNBC Coverage, High cost of weight loss drugs drives employers to require nutrition counseling, in boost for startups: https://www.cnbc.com/2025/01/10/high-cost-weight-loss-drugs-boost-nutrition-counseling.html Virta Health CEO, Sami Inkinen: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samiinkinen Virta Health’s clinical protocol: https://www.virtahealth.com/how-it-works Virta Health Research Center: https://www.virtahealth.com/research Reversing Type 2 Diabetes: An Evidence-Based Guide: https://www.virtahealth.com/reversediabetes Peterson Health Technology Institute: https://phti.org/ Digital Diabetes Management Solutions: https://phti.org/assessment/digital-diabetes-management-tools/ Now, Next, Later Framework: https://www.launchnotes.com/blog/the-now-next-and-later-roadmap-a-comprehensive-guide-for-planning-ahead Simon mentioned that after 1 month of being at Virta Health, he has most people at the company internalizing this quote, “we can do anything, but we can’t do everything”. Here is an article the capture why this sentiment matters: https://jpattonassociates.com/tension/ Learn more about the absolute MVP: https://leanstartup.co/resources/articles/what-is-an-mvp/ Paul Graham’s famous post, “do things that don’t scale”: https://paulgrah