1st Edition
The Mastery of Innovation A Field Guide to Lean Product Development
What do Ford Motor Company, Steelcase, Scania, Goodyear, Novo Nordisk, and Philips Electronics have in common? They all need to get their best ideas to market as fast as possible. They need to achieve the mastery of innovation.
When these companies needed to accelerate time-to-market, get more new products to customers, and improve their ROI from investments in R&D, they turned to Lean Product Development to help them master the process of innovation. By adapting Lean ideas to their specific product development challenges, they learned how to focus innovation on the problems that would maximize customer and business value, and deliver on their best ideas.
Winner of a Shingo Research and Professional Publication Award!
The Mastery of Innovation: A Field Guide to Lean Product Development describes the experiences of 19 companies that have achieved significant results from Lean Product Development. Their stories show that Lean Product Development delivers results:
- Ford Motor Company completely reinvented its Global Product Development System and put decades of knowledge about automotive design at its engineers’ fingertips
- DJO Global, a medical device company, more than tripled the number of products they released to the market and cut development time by 60%
- Playworld Systems cut time-to-market in half–twice
The diverse set of North American and European case studies in this book range from very small product development organizations (three engineers) to very large (more than 10,000). Some of the industries represented include automotive, medical devices, industrial products, consumer electronics, pharmaceuticals, scientific instruments, and aerospace.
These companies have generously shared their knowledge about Lean Product Development to help you get your best ideas to market faster.
LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT: THE MASTERY OF INNOVATION
Lean Product Development: The Mastery of Innovation
We Already Do All of This—Have We Mastered Innovation?
How Does Lean Product Development Deliver Results?
The Engine of Knowledge Creation
Value and Waste in Product Development
Value and Waste in Product Development
The Four Value Streams of Lean Product Development
The Lean Product Development Benchmarking Study
A Diverse Set of Companies
What Surprised Me
Suggestions for Using the Case Studies
THE PIONEERS OF LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
DJO Global: The Fundamentals of Lean Product Development
Protostorming
LAMDA and A3 Problem Solving in Product Development
Metrics to Drive a Lean Product Development Culture
Results and Next Steps
Scania Technical Centre: A Pioneering Lean Product Development Champion
Lean Improvement Coaches
Product Development Team Engagement
Product Development Leadership at Scania
Visual Planning
Ford Motor Company: How to Revitalize an American Icon
Lean Product Development at Ford
The Chief Engineer
Example: Reducing Wind Noise
Results and Next Steps
LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT TO MAKE THE RIGHT PRODUCTS
Buckeye Technologies: Lean Tools for Strategic Alignment
Systematic Problem Solving for Product Strategy Development
The Power of Pull Factors
Lean Ideation with Convergence
Results and Next Steps
Steelcase: Go-and-See New Customers to Open New Markets
Customer Intimacy Intelligence in Action
Go-and-See
Value and Price Validation
Value-Driven Design
Results
Philips: Comprehensive Lean Scheduling
Lean Scheduling
Team-Based Planning Process
Status Updates
Results and Next Steps
LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT TO MAKE PRODUCTS BETTER, FASTER, CHEAPER
Novo Nordisk: Metrics to Drive Change
The Interpretation of Lean at Novo Nordisk R & D: Six Basic Principles
Transactional versus Knowledge Creation Processes
Critical Questions Mapping
Keeping Progress Visible: Metrics and KPIs
Results and Next Steps
Visteon: Knowledge at the Engineer’s Fingertips
Simple Process Models
Lean Process Audits
Reusable Knowledge
Results and Next Steps
A-dec: Project Chiefs to Speed Decision Making
First Step: Team Leadership
The Project Chief
Product Development Organizational Structure
Go-and-See Customer Visits
Results and Next Steps
LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT TRANSFORMATION
Nielsen-Kellerman: Just Start Somewhere
Lean Product Development at Nielsen Kellerman
Inefficient Meetings: Visual Project Planning
Knowledge Capture and Retrieval: The Knowledge Library
Nielsen-Kellerman’s Product Development Process
Systematic Problem Solving to Solve Technical Problems
Results
Vaisala: From Pilot Projects to Global Transformation
Vaisala’s Countermeasure for Travel Expense Allocation
Product Portfolio Management
Widespread Training
Vaisala’s Next Steps
Playworld Systems: How to Cut Time to Market in Half—Twice
First Attempts with Lean Thinking in Product Development
Lean Product Development at Playworld
Cutting Time to Market in Half—Twice
What’s Next for Playworld?
THE PATH OF INNOVATION MASTERY
The Path of Mastery: How to Begin with Lean Product Development
The Phases of Lean Transformation
Start Wherever You Are
Epilogue: Just Start Somewhere, Just Do Something
Appendix 1: The Mastery of Innovation Self-Assessment
Appendix 2: A Guide for Book Study Groups
Appendix 3: List of Participating Companies
Appendix 4: Suggested Reading List and Other Resources
Index
Biography
Katherine Radeka has a rare combination of business acumen, scientific depth, and the ability to untangle the organizational knots and remove the barriers to change. In the past seven years, her consulting firm, Whittier Consulting Group, Inc., has engaged with clients such as Steelcase, Hewlett- Packard, and more than 50 other leading organizations.
In 2010 and 2011, Katherine conducted the Lean Product Development Benchmarking Study to document Lean Product Development practices at more than 60 companies in North America and Europe. In 2005, she logged more than 11,000 miles driving around the country to research how the best companies got more ROI from product development. In 2007, she co-founded the Lean Product & Process Development Exchange, a nonprofit organization to promote the use of Lean Thinking to improve ROI from product development.
Katherine has climbed seven of the tallest peaks in the Cascade Mountains and spent 10 days alone on the Pacific Crest Trail until an encounter with a bear convinced her that she needed a change in strategic direction.