How can you develop a program that meets the unique needs of older adults?

Personal interview would be most effective particularly with the focus on their pain areas or the emptiness that they would be experiencing. Also, it is important to have someone of older generation or a peer conducting these interviews

Don't get me wrong... evaluating what users want is essential, but.. it's important not to solely rely on user feedback when you present an entirely new solution. Remember the response in 2007 to the iPhone's touchscreen? Users were overwhelmingly critical, dismissing it as 'useless' and scoffing at the concept of 'typing on glass'. Well, look how that has turned out since... It's key to pay close attention to your audience's needs, but take into consideration that at the core, people often resist change. So negative feedback, doesn't always imply a solution isn't right.

Realize the many older adults, especially men, may be hard to reach through surveys, interviews, focus groups, etc. To reach them and to involve them your chances of success will go up if you go to them directly. Widowers can be especially withdrawn and isolated during their first two years of grieving. Online websites (e.g. Widowers Support Network and National Widowers Organization) are great vehicles for reaching them.

Assessing needs is a crucial part of planning any product, service, activity or program. A major part of this assessment is also examining current offerings. What competitor is already out there? How do they stack up against your initial planning? Pricing is always a concern, as is staffing and also needs of family members. This situational analysis is best hired out to an organization that has no skin in the game and therefore can be impartial in gathering and interpreting data.

I, like many others, have participated in many strategic plans which ended up on a shelf never to see the light of day again. To avoid this pitfall (and a massive waste of time) be sure to schedule monthly (if possible) reviews with the entire team to measure your progress (or lack of it) to date, and hold those assigned to complete their tasks responsible.

Use technological tools to communicate within your team! My students used Slack to "talk" directly from their various locations.

In my experience the starting point could be a data base including some basic information of participants: Experience , know how, interests. aivalabilty to try new opportunities. Who could be the owner? The mission of the project?. Many questions to clarify..

Throwing people or money at a project doesn't make it go faster or make it more successful. Large teams create more dependencies, complexity and extra layers of communication. The 3D foetal images we used for our Pregnancy+ App (>150 million users to date) were all created by a single, exceptionally talented artist, and animated by just one engineer. Exceptional results come from working with exceptional people, not necessarily more people. Bootstrapping your company also has advantages over seeking external capital. It's not easy, but it forces a more focussed approach, and it's a great way to grow your business without incurring debt.

Power your business via networking and partnerships. You can't do it alone! Diverse perspectives, lead to more innovative ideas and solutions. Partnering with others also provides support and accountability.

Staff who will be called upon to implement a new program should always be included in planning. It may be a strange analogy, but if I'm the chef for a major event I want to be included in assembling the shopping list.

Using these strategic frameworks and tools would certainly help, but involving bunch of individuals from the elderly community at every stage is crucial to bring out the real impact