Using a David Letterman-inspired “Top 10” format, the conversation highlights common feasibility pitfalls faced by sponsors, CROs, and clinical trial sites, including overly complex questionnaires, unrealistic enrollment expectations, delayed communication, and last-minute fire drills.

The discussion goes beyond surface-level frustration to explore how sponsors and CROs can rethink clinical trial site feasibility by simplifying processes, questioning legacy requirements, and focusing on identifying and supporting sites with the highest potential for success. Ted and Liam also examine how better feasibility strategy can improve enrollment outcomes, reduce operational burden, and ultimately lead to more efficient clinical trials.

This episode is for professionals involved in site feasibility, trial startup, enrollment strategy, and clinical operations, and for those who want to move beyond broken processes and drive better trial performance.

Why do clinical trials struggle even when teams are experienced and well-intentioned?

In this episode, Liam and Ted explore why these outcomes are rarely about individual performance and far more often about system-level misalignments. They unpack how incentives, information flow, and decision rights across sponsors, CROs, and sites shape behaviour and why execution tends to break down logically, not randomly.

The discussion reframes “execution issues” as predictable outcomes of how trials are designed and governed, offering a clearer lens for understanding why good teams can still produce fragile results.

Eligibility criteria are meant to bring clarity to clinical trials, but in practice, they often do the opposite.

In this episode of Innovating Clinical Trials, Liam and Ted unpack how poorly worded, ambiguous, or misaligned eligibility criteria quietly slow enrollment, frustrate sites, and introduce risk later in development.

They explore:

- Why small wording choices create big downstream problems

- How “gray areas” force sites into interpretation rather than execution

- The disconnect between healthcare documentation and research expectations

- Why enrollment challenges often originate long before the first patient is screened

- What sponsors can do to design criteria that work in the real world- not just on paper

This conversation is a practical reflection on how better protocol design can remove friction, protect sites, and keep trials moving.

In this episode, Liam and Ted unpack why enrollment behaves more like an operating system rather than a standalone process. They explore the question of ownership, the role sponsors play through protocol design, and how operational practices, healthcare realities, and human behavior all influence who ultimately makes it into a study.

The conversation moves through multiple lenses from eligibility criteria and healthcare documentation to behavioral science, site motivation, patient experience, and operational execution, highlighting why small decisions made early can have outsized effects later.

Tune in to explore why improving enrollment starts with rethinking how the system is built.

In this episode of Innovating Clinical Trials, Liam and Ted explore why building strong relationships with clinical trial sites requires more than dedicated relationship teams, it requires fixing problems at their source.

They discuss how many site challenges stem from outdated processes, one-sided agreements, and preventable operational friction that relationship teams are left to manage after the fact. Using real-world examples from confidentiality agreements to lab and portal issues, the conversation highlights the need for sponsors and CROs to look inward, modernize systems, and address root causes before sites feel the impact.

This episode is for professionals looking for a practical perspective on how proactive leadership, smarter vendor decisions, and more thoughtful processes can reduce site burden, improve trust, and strengthen trial execution.

Tune in to learn why the future of site engagement depends on prevention, not escalation.

In this episode of Innovating Clinical Trials, Liam and Ted explore what determines the trajectory of a clinical trial and why success often depends on preparation, collaboration, and the ability to adapt when things don’t go as planned. They discuss how factors outside a site’s control, such as vendor selection and monitoring approaches, can significantly influence trial momentum.

Through real-world examples, the conversation highlights how thoughtful planning, supportive site interactions, and small human touches can have an impact on study performance.

Tune in to learn how anticipating challenges and strengthening collaboration can help keep trials moving steadily toward their goals.

In this episode of Innovating Clinical Trials, Liam and Ted challenge a familiar question in clinical research: “How do we increase enrollment?” Instead, they argue that progress starts by asking a better one- “What makes enrollment challenging in the first place?”

They explore how study design, existing therapies, operational factors, and most importantly, the lived experience of participants and their families all shape recruitment outcomes. Ted shares a practical framework for slowing down, asking deeper questions, and creating space for ideas that don’t emerge when teams jump straight to solutions.

Tune in to learn how reframing the problem can unlock more meaningful, effective approaches to enrollment.

In this episode of Innovating Clinical Trials, Liam and Ted explore why clinical research is, at its core, a people-driven business. Drawing on real-world experiences from both patient and site perspectives, they discuss how trust, communication, and human connection directly influence recruitment, retention, and study success.

From participant consent conversations to site selection and prioritization, the discussion highlights how “soft skills” often have a measurable impact on trial performance, yet are frequently overlooked in favor of technical experience alone.

Liam and Ted reflect on how small moments of empathy, transparency, and genuine engagement can transform transactional interactions into long-term partnerships.

Tune in to understand why focusing on people not just processes can dramatically improve how trials are delivered.