Ready for kick off

Michael Ryan — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 13:28:33 +0000

This weekend is the Manchester derby

If I knew anything about football, I would write a long metaphor about a team talk in advance of the big match. The manager would walk in as the team are getting ready. He’d talk about their opponents and say something inspiring about how everything depends on this game. The team would talk about what they were going to do. The manager would draw some sweeping lines on a chalk board and everyone would show that that they understood by saying “Yes Guv”. As you can probably tell, I don’t know anything about football strategy apart from what I’ve seen in films or TV programs. I have been involved in a few project kick off meetings though. The project kick off meeting should be first team activity once your project has been approved. In yesterday’s blog, I gave you some of the questions to ask:

Do we know what we are doing this for?
Is what we are doing it for measurable?
What needs to happen for it to be success (or what would we stop the project for if it wasn’t happening)?
Which individuals are going to do deliver what and by when?

So why is this meeting so important?

It gets everybody focussed on the goal (pun?) as well as the process. It’s not just about them delivering something; it’s about them delivering something that creates a benefit.
It makes sure that everybody understands what they are doing before the game begins. The manager can still guide from the side lines but the team has a focus to carry them through.
It also helps the team understand how the game is going to be played. As well as agreeing the goal and the steps to deliver it, the kick off meeting should also help the team understand how they are going to communicate with each other or what to do if they see a risk or issue.

Here are some common reasons why they might not happen:

Who needs any more meetings?
That sounds like it would take a really long time
Not everybody involved will attend

If the excuses look familiar remember that it might take a change in behaviour but it is an important step in getting your product development process working, especially if it is new to some. Do you hold a meeting like this? If so, do you find it useful? If not, would it help?

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM)

Nina Dar — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:37:28 +0000

Software Implementation – An Alternative Way… anything but an IT project

A few facts…

Products are the lifeblood of all companies
We now operate in a global market
Our desires as consumers are remarkably similar, despite geographic location and culture
You do not buy things in the same way your parents did
Your children are not going to buy things in the same way you are
Today’s consumer demands innovation and continual product progression

Execution

As a company you will have already decided your strategy. Innovator, recognised brand leader, happy to reap the rewards of copying with pride, whatever the strategy clean execution makes the difference.

There is a need to link processes and tools creatively around innovation, brand development and product delivery to achieve that clean execution. This can be defined as; generating the required speed, flexibility and cost of getting the right product, in the right market at the right time consistently. Of course companies that do this survive all market conditions.

We see more examples now of products that generate such desire they transcend all normal classifications (social class, age, sex, geographic location, etc) e.g. mobile phones, flat screen TV’s, laptops, MP3 players. These products can be applied globally with alarming speed.

Those who find ways to combine entrepreneurial intelligence with the obvious benefits of standardisation will be the winners. Creating a dynamic chain reaction which balances creativity with the structure and discipline required for clean and cost effective execution within a network that can operate globally, is the new utopia.

Weak Points

PLM software tools focus on making product delivery efficient. They are a mirror of your process that cries out loud when something is not happening correctly! Doing this makes it very visible where the weak points are in the chain:

Product portfolio planning?
Strategic business planning process?
Communication of direction?
Innovation process?
Brand development?
Project management?
R&D?
Marketing?
Supply chain?
Sales?
In market execution?

Practically it is usually a combination of several of the above coupled with business legacy issues such as data integrity, roles & responsibilities, skills and capabilities and organisational reporting lines.

Building Blocks

The building blocks of implementing a PLM software tool are specific:

Capture best practice
Provide a knowledge backbone
Enable global collaboration
Improve project visibility

Benefits

The benefits are an enabler to the delivery of hard financials that come from:

Sales through faster and right first time NPD
Margin through standardisation, quality, control and global sourcing
Strategy through supporting a networked organisation that allows rapid roll out of best practice and product knowledge
Risk management through improved legal and customer compliance

If you treat PLM implementation as an IT project, you will go through the upheaval of a software implementation to give people a fantastic tool, that after launch becomes a frustration because it serves to highlight many of the things people already know are wrong.

Surely, a better way is to focus on what PLM is to your business first?

Examine PLM in the context of what the business is trying to deliver and why?

3 keys stages

The diagram below shows PLM within the 3 keys stages of product planning.

Our Approach

Our approach integrates business planning and strategic direction with innovation as the essential feeds into the PLM software which becomes the efficient delivery mechanism. Without doing this you will create a very fast and transparent way of delivering garbage.

Partnering the stage and gate process with key project management tools bridges a gap that so often exists in NPD project delivery where the temptation to “JFDI” pushes people away from process and usually ends up taking longer!

This process is flexible enough to cover pure NPD, margin improvement projects, extensions, brand re-energising or a simple label change. Of course to complete the cycle you have to know what you are going to do with it next and moving back to the product portfolio plan and business plan provides that direction.

This is underpinned with a behavioural change programme focusing on key roles and responsibilities that are required to drive this model:

New Activities Filter
Project Board
Project Leaders / Managers
Functional Heads
Project Team Members (cross functional)

Engaging people in behavioural change early has had a dramatic effect on adoption of the new process, model and software. In fact at the point of software go live we have experienced 100% adoption rates because the IT becomes the last piece in the puzzle.

Is PLM an IT project? Not in our experience.

For more information and or to discuss your PLM implementation call Nina on 07837 536979

Cheeky Monkey Business Solutions » Stage & Gate