Independent Product Diagnostics

The gap between
what you built
and what users need
is costing you.

I'm Pearl Oguchi. I find the product-user gaps behind weak activation and retention. With 22 years shipping software either at scale or to a small number of users, including 9 at Meta, I understand how products should behave and what good looks like.

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Pearl Oguchi Product Validation

“Pearl spots the gaps that those of us deep inside the product simply cannot see.”

Founder, Kin.

You are in the right place if...

  • Your product has been live for at least 6-12 months and growth is starting to flatten, even though you are still acquiring users
  • Users are signing up but not coming back after the first few sessions or weeks
  • The sales demo lands well, but the live product does not hold customers in real use
  • Your team and your agency say everything is fine, but your instinct and the numbers say otherwise
  • You are approaching a board meeting, investor update, or next raise and need a clear, evidence‑backed story about retention
  • You have been shipping features and “improving onboarding”, but traction and retention have not followed

    • From Pearl
    "You can have a good team, real investment, and a product that still is not doing what it needs to do. Users drop off. Metrics flatten. The roadmap keeps moving, but confidence does not. Everyone close to the build has an explanation for the churn and activation issues, but nobody is naming the real product–user gap plainly enough to take to a board or investor."

    That's the gap I sit in. I work with founders who have invested real money and real time into a product that is live, bringing in sign‑ups, but quietly leaking users and flattening on growth. They need someone with no stake in the existing decisions to tell them what is actually happening between the product and its users, and what to fix before more runway is burned.

    My read on that gap is not theoretical. It comes from 22 years building and shipping technology, including 9 years at Meta London, working across engineering, product, and delivery under real pressure, where what holds and what breaks shows up fast.

    It also comes from what I have chosen to build and stand for outside the job: founding Black Women in Tech, now a 52,000‑strong community; representing technology companies in policy discussions with government and regulators through ACT; serving as an elected councillor; and living with rheumatoid arthritis. All of it sharpened the same instinct: when something is not right, you do not look away. You go towards it.

    Qube Catalyst exists to give you an independent voice with no stake in the outcome except the right one – especially when your product is live, users are not sticking, and nobody inside the room can name the real gap plainly.

    Pearl Oguchi
    Founder, Qube Catalyst
    Services

    Three ways to work together

    When your software is live but users are leaving, I use my P.E.A.R.L. framework: Product, Engagement, Activation, Retention, Leverage, to find where value is being lost and what to tackle first. The framework is used across my services, with the depth of review and level of hands-on involvement depending on the package you choose. Below are three ways I can apply this framework, from a focused diagnostic to a deeper product, data, and delivery engagement.

    Product Reality Review

    A one-day diagnostic for founders whose product is live or nearly live, but whose user journey, value, or next move is unclear.

    Most teams are too close to their own product to judge it clearly. Founders, developers, and agency partners all have a stake in the outcome, which makes it harder to spot where the product is underperforming, where trust is being lost, or where users quietly drop away after the first few uses. I examine what happens between a new user arriving and reaching the product’s first meaningful outcome. I look for the points where people get confused, lose trust, fail to activate, or have no reason to return. This is useful when you’re preparing to launch, seeing weak adoption, questioning retention, or deciding whether to invest more in the product.

    What's included
    • 30-minute founder, CTO, or product lead briefing
    • Review of the target user, problem, value proposition, and core journey
    • Assessment of onboarding, activation, trust, usefulness, and obvious retention risks
    • Review of available evidence for user need, repeat use, and willingness to pay
    • One focused stakeholder conversation, where useful
    • ⁠Prioritised findings showing what to fix now, test next, monitor, or leave alone
    • ⁠Written executive action summary
    • Debrief session to agree the next decision and priorities
    Outcome
    You leave with a clear view of what is credible today, where the product is losing value or trust, which assumptions remain unproven, and the cheapest credible tests or changes to make next. This review assesses the evidence available and defines what still needs testing. It does not prove demand from the product alone, and it does not include development, implementation, user recruitment, or ongoing testing.
    1 full day to deliver
    Retention Signal Review

    A focused, data-led review for teams with a live product, weaker-than-expected retention, and no clear view of what needs attention first.

    When users stop returning, the problem is often unclear data rather than a lack of data. The wrong numbers may be getting attention, tracking may be incomplete, or the team may not know which user behaviours matter most. I review your product data and key user journeys to show where people drop off, what the data can explain, what it cannot explain, and which questions need further investigation.

    What's included
    • Review of the key user journeys beyond the first-time experience
    • what is being measured, whether important events are missing, and how reliable the data is
    • Analysis of 7, 14 and 28 days user groups, where the available data supports it
    • A clear explanation of how users are behaving and where the strongest retention signals appear
    • Identification of the biggest evidence gaps and unanswered product questions
    • ⁠A 2 to 3-page executive note in plain English
    • A handover session with the founder, CTO, or product lead
    • A prioritised plan showing what to fix now, what to investigate next, and what to test
    Outcome
    You leave with a defensible view of where users are dropping off, which problems deserve attention first, and what the data does not yet prove. Your team gets a clearer basis for deciding where engineering and product effort should go. The review can support planning for growth, fundraising, or a board discussion, but it does not guarantee a retention diagnosis from the data alone. Findings depend on the quality, completeness, and volume of the data available. The review does not include analytics implementation, development, user recruitment, or ongoing testing. Those can be scoped separately if needed.
    24-hour engagement, delivered over 3 to 4 weeks.
    Ecosystem Alignment and Oversight

    A focused 2 to 3-month engagement for funded teams and scale-ups whose product, customer promise, data, and delivery plan have started to pull in different directions.

    As products grow, problems often sit between teams. Marketing promises one thing, the product delivers another, leadership sees different priorities, and engineering keeps shipping without a shared view of the risks. I bring those views together and help leadership decide what deserves attention first. Using the PEARL framework, I review the product, user behaviour, team perspectives, and roadmap to identify where users are losing value, what the available evidence supports, and which decisions carry the greatest business risk.

    What's included
    • ⁠Review of the product’s most important user journeys and drop-off points
    • ⁠Comparison of sales messages, decks, demos, and customer promises with the live product experience
    • Structured conversations with founders, leadership, product, engineering, and user-facing teams
    • ⁠Review of available activation, usage, conversion, and retention evidence
    • Identification of gaps, contradictions, and risks across Product, Engagement, Activation, Retention, and Leverage
    • ⁠Five to ten prioritised findings, each linked to its likely user and business impact
    • ⁠A leadership roadmap note showing what to fix now, investigate next, and defer
    • Hands-on support to shape, challenge, and review the highest-priority fixes during the agreed engagement.
    • ⁠A strategic debrief with leadership to agree priorities and ownership
    • Bounded oversight during the engagement to review progress against the agreed priorities
    • ⁠One follow-up review of changes made during the engagement, where the available evidence allows it

    I work alongside the team to clarify the problem, pressure-test proposed changes, and review whether the agreed risks have been addressed. This does not mean taking ownership of engineering delivery or providing unlimited implementation support. Any delivery or implementation work beyond the agreed engagement would be scoped separately

    Outcome
    A shared, evidence-based view of what is happening in the product, where users are losing value, which risks deserve attention first, and how the roadmap should respond. Leadership gets a clearer order of attack, while the delivery team gets practical priorities rather than another list of disconnected issues. This engagement does not include software development, direct ownership of delivery, analytics implementation, user recruitment, marketing execution, or unlimited testing and rollout support. Any implementation work or continued oversight beyond the agreed cycle would be scoped separately.
    One readiness cycle, paced over 2 to 3 months around your sprint and release rhythm
    Need ongoing support after the review?

    Our Product Oversight is a bounded monthly service for teams that have agreed what needs to change, but want an independent product-quality view as releases go out.

    Each month, I:
    • ⁠Check the agreed onboarding and value flows
    • ⁠Review whether recent changes have introduced new user or product risks
    • Join one or two sprint-planning or product-review sessions
    • ⁠Send a concise note covering risks, evidence, and priorities
    Outcome
    You get a steady outside view without hiring a full-time senior product lead. I help your team stay focused on the product changes that matter most for activation, trust, and retention.
    14 hours per month · Minimum 3 month commitment.

    Available after a Product Reality Review, Retention Signal Review, or Ecosystem Alignment and Oversight engagement. It can also be added to another agreed engagement where there is a clear need.

    Case Studies

    Finding product and delivery risks before they become expensive problems

    Early-stage products can look close to launch while still hiding serious problems in the user journey, product logic, trust, security, or delivery experience.

    I review the moments that matter most: how a new user gets started, reaches the product’s value, understands what is happening, and completes the core task.

    The examples below show the kinds of risks I identify and the decisions they can inform before a product moves into a wider beta, public launch, or important demonstration.

    Case Study 1

    Making a live guidance platform easier and safer to use

    A product preparing for a high-profile demonstration and beta launch

    The platform connected users with human guides. Before a major demonstration and initial beta launch, I reviewed the first-time user journey and the core guidance experience.

    What I found
    • New users were greeted as returning users and taken to an empty dashboard.
    • Important guidance about how the platform worked was difficult to find.
    • Users could not clearly tell which operating mode they were in.
    • A large, prominent Cancel button appeared after a connection request, making the safest next action unclear.
    • A bright countdown clock made paid guidance sessions feel more pressured than reassuring.
    • The video-call journey could stall or fail during testing, creating a serious risk for live use.
    What I recommended

    I prioritised changes to the onboarding journey, role labels, button hierarchy, session notifications, and video-call experience. The aim was to help users understand what to do, reduce avoidable hesitation, and protect the core guidance experience from preventable friction.

    What this showed

    The main risk was not a missing feature. It was the number of points at which a user could lose confidence before reaching the product’s value. The review gave the team a clearer order of attack before the demonstration and beta launch.

    Case Study 2

    Finding trust, data, and security risks in an AI compatibility platform

    An AI-driven product preparing for launch and external scrutiny

    The platform used data to generate compatibility insights. I reviewed key user journeys, the consistency of the information shown to users, and the account and authentication flows.

    What I found
    • The same profile produced different compatibility scores in different parts of the product, including 72% in one view and 82% in another.
    • ⁠The facial-scan step came before registration, creating a likely dead end for users following a normal sign-up path.
    • A dismissed Install App prompt returned after every page refresh.
    • ⁠The password-reset flow returned users to the product without requiring a new password.
    What I recommended

    I mapped these issues to product trust, activation, data integrity, and security. I recommended a clearer authentication sequence, consistent rules for displaying compatibility scores, persistent handling of dismissed interface elements, and a password-reset flow that requires the new password to be confirmed before access is restored.

    What this showed

    A product can appear impressive while small contradictions and broken account journeys undermine confidence. These findings gave the team a practical set of risks to resolve before relying on the product in launch, partner, or investor conversations.

    The value of this work

    A product review should not manufacture certainty. It should show what is clear, what is risky, what the current evidence supports, and what needs to be tested next.

    My reviews help founders and product teams:

    • Find confusing or fragile parts of the user journey.
    • Identify risks in product logic, trust, security, and core functionality.
    • Separate urgent fixes from assumptions that need real-world testing.
    • Create a prioritised order of attack before more time and money go into the wrong work.
    • Avoid mistaking a product or delivery problem for evidence that the market does not want the product.

    The examples above describe findings and recommendations from product assessments. They do not claim that the assessment alone caused a commercial, adoption, retention, or investment outcome.

    Seeing similar risks in your product?

    Book a conversation to discuss whether a Product Reality Review is the right next step.

    Book a conversation
    Client Voices

    What founders say

    "

    "Pearl spots the gaps that those of us deep inside a SaaS product simply cannot see. She looked at the product over lunch and spotted a design flaw in 8 seconds. And she was completely right. Then she spotted a second. We stopped there and scheduled her to speak with the team. As we bring on early customers, design partnerships are everything. Brilliant, experienced, honest voices like Pearl's are how we make sure we hit that mark. If you're looking for someone to help coach you through those product gaps, she's your person."

    Founder, Kin.Workplace social cohesion platform · NatWest Business Accelerator
    "

    I brought Pearl in at short notice to support the build for my trades app. She delivered exactly what we needed: a fast, focused review that flagged critical issues and gave my developer clear, actionable fixes ahead of user testing. Her approach was professional, efficient and incredibly helpful. Thanks to Pearl's input, we went into testing with confidence and clarity. I highly recommend ...

    Founder, Tradys For Business
    "

    You told me the truth about things I needed to hear, and that kind of boldness is rare. Building FieldNote has required me to get uncomfortable every single day. Grateful to have connected with someone who understands exactly why that is necessary.

    Founder, FieldNote AI
    "

    Qube Catalyst was an exceptional partner throughout the development and launch of the Reel Time Fishing Tournament mobile applications for both iOS and Android... and they exceeded expectations in every area. Pearl's contributions played a major role in helping us deliver a stable, polished, and user-friendly experience across both platforms.

    Founder, Eat Big Digital
    "

    Working with Pearl on a recent web application review was exceptional. Her precision, professionalism, and ability to spot issues that others miss made a huge difference. Pearl identified improvements, highlighted strengths, and delivered feedback that was both constructive and immediately actionable.

    Founder, E&P Legal – Civil and Commercial Mediators (Dispute Resolution / Mediation / Negotiation)

    If the product is not doing what it should, the worst move is waiting.

    Start with the Product Reality Review; an early trust check on the product–user gaps, delivered in 1 day.

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    Mission & Vision

    Technology built for people, not just for shipping

    The vision To enable a world where software and technology are built not just to function, but to serve

    The mission is simple: By 2030, Qube Catalyst will empower 10,000 technology builders, founders, and organisations across at least three countries to build software that is safe, ethical, and genuinely beneficial, through direct oversight, education, partnerships, and a global movement that makes independent quality the standard, not the exception.

    When that mission meets real products, it shows up first in how people behave after sign‑up – in activation, repeat use, and whether users quietly slip away. That is why the work starts with diagnosing the product–user gap behind weak activation and retention, even though the ambition is much broader than one metric.

    Earlier is preventative. Problems get named before they become expensive. Later is reactive. The stakes are higher and the damage is closer – this is where leaking users, weak activation, and stalled growth show up. There is no wrong time to bring me in. Only a cost to waiting.

    Boldness
    Saying what needs to be said, even when it is uncomfortable. Honest challenge, not validation.
    Integrity
    No stake in the outcome except the right one. Independent judgement, every time.
    Independence
    Having no stake in your outcome except the right one.
    Excellence
    Rigorous, practical, and precise. The standard that means something.
    Humanity
    Technology exists to serve people, not the other way around