This presentation will look at how an organization changes its new product development approach to adopt agile development techniques. Examples from three different development projects [two software and one hardware] at MDS SCIEX will be used to show how the organization is making the transition from a one size fits all development approach to one that adapts to the project's needs. The two software projects will highlight the use of iterative planning, co-location with product specialist, daily meetings. The hardware project will show how active risk management is used to drive project decision making and activities.

Influencing the Cost of Change: Moving from Structured and Controlled Process to an Agile One
Pat Baird, Project Manager, Baxter Healthcare and Michelle Keyzer, Project Manager (Software), Baxter Healthcare

It is inevitable that change will happen and that there is an associated Cost of Change. Methodologies/philosophies such as Agile/Lean Development are based on the premise that the Cost of Change can be reduced. In each stage of a project, the actions that will effectively reduce the Cost of Change are different. This presentation will focus on the Requirements and Testing stages where Baxter has both successfully managed the cost of change -- and made mistakes that increased the cost of change.

There are several actions that have worked to reduce the cost of change as well as actions that unintentionally increased the cost of change. Learn why it is important to uncover hidden costs of change and get stakeholder buy-in to recognize its existence.

Take-aways:
a) Change is inevitable and cannot effectively be discouraged
b) However, the Cost of Change CAN be influenced
c) Example ways of reducing costs in the Requirements phase and Testing phase of a project

Track A: Innovative Processes and Techniques

The Next Generation in Innovative New Product Development
Kevin Dabb, Director, Program Management, Iomega Corporation. Rich Penman, Director, Program Management, Iomega Corporation.

This session will discuss the innovative methods and lessons learned to achieve these results. A few key areas to be covered are:

• How PMBOK principles were merged into the institutionalized phase gate development process
• How 6 Sigma is utilized and integrated into the development process to reduce variation in designs and processes and enhance time to market.
• How to create a high performing team in a downsizing economy- leading a high performing team, leadership's role, team fundamental principles of compliance, removing roadblocks and obstacles through executive involvement, methods to elevate team performance.
• How to achieve process compliance and process understanding at all levels in the organization.

Using Project Contracts to Reduce Complexity, Enhance Research & Development Success
Jay Burris, Product Manager, Halliburton Energy Services 

The need for accelerated product and service development continues to increase the complexity in ‘Research and Development’ projects.  This increased complexity is due to the necessity of conducting concurrent research and development activities in-house with vendors, outside agencies, customers, etc. where communication is a key to success.  At Halliburton, a Project Contract system is used as the key communication tool between management and product developers.  The Project Contract establishes an understanding of the expected outcomes and deliverables of the project.  Over the last several years, Halliburton has refined a project-contract system that is easy to set-up, maintain and update.  The Project Contract is owned by the Project Leader and is used to 1) define project deliverables, 2) assess risks, 3) establish milestones, 4) identify and authorize resources, 5) track costs, 6) report progress, and 7) record deviations.

In this presentation, Jay Burris will cover the reasons for adopting the Project Contract system, difficulties experienced during implementation, successes seen to date, challenges to continue momentum, and efforts to maintain simplicity in the system itself.   Additionally, he will cover the basics of a Project Contract with examples to help you set up your own project-contract system.

Take-aways:

• Why establish a Project Contract system?
• What implementation hurdles to expect
• How to sell Project Contracts to management and developers
• How to maintain momentum
• How to keep it simple

Leading Your Customer in Managing a Co-Development Project
Curt Raschke, Ph.D, Senior Member, Technical Staff , Texas Instruments, Inc.

With all the recent emphasis on supply chain management, the other critical component of the product value chain, the customer, is often overlooked. In co-development projects, for example, the Project Manager must often spend more effort leading and influencing the customer than managing the suppliers to optimize the value of the project to the portfolio of both partners. Based on his over twenty years experience with co-development projects, Curt will give examples of how to do this, following the concept of align and adapt. First, align your business processes with your customer's, at multiple levels, to ensure long term portfolio success. Then, adapt your project team roles and responsibilities to the customer decision making process in order to lead the customer by influencing the near term project decisions and long term portfolio decisions.

As entrepreneurial product development companies grow larger, they often deal with the difficulties of slower product development. In many cases this is due to the all-inclusive culture that was developed in the beginning and continued as the company grew larger. Project decisions are difficult to make when the whole team feels that they have equal say. Electronic Theatre Controls is attempting to remove this barrier by implementing a consistent team structure that minimizes the number of decision makers, while ensuring that everyone feels they have been heard.

At the same time, the project leader's role must change. Many Project Managers are viewed as only keeping the schedule, reporting progress and to some extent keeping the project moving. They are not always viewed as being the project leader. By determining what both management and the team need in a Project Leader, Electronic Theatre Controls is transforming its Project Managers from Project Monitors to Project Leaders.

Take-aways:

• Roles and responsibilities for fast-paced decisions
• Changing the culture from design-by-committee to leadership-by-design.
• Provide a voice to the project team.

Got Six Sigma? Applying Six Sigma to Product Innovation and Growth Initiatives
Kim Johnson, Product Development Manager, Medtronic

This presentation discusses Raytheon's "Six Sigma with Suppliers" Process, a technique that leverages key supplier technical expertise with proven cost reduction tools, and how working with suppliers from the early design stages has had extremely positive results.

Reeves and Russell will discuss the process used to ensure cost savings and quality in all stages of the product lifecycle, including product development. They will also share lessons learned from their often-benchmarked IPD program.

Overcoming Resource Constraints and Unpredictability, Achieving Real Results
Sterling Mortensen, R&D Section Manager and Bret Dodd, R&D Section Manager, HP LaserJet Lab

Are you facing increasing demand on your resources, without the ability to increase resources? Do you have to share your resources across many parallel projects? Are you being asked to make your schedules much more predictable in a very dynamic environment?

HP LaserJet R&D lab faced these problems and identified solutions that helped achieve a much higher level of business results. Sterling Mortensen and Bret Dodd believe the lessons they learned can be applied to most product development environments. Techniques used on HP products like the LaserJet 4100,4200,4300, 2500, 4600, 5500, 9000, 4100mfp, 9000mfp and more.

Allocating and Managing Resources to Maximize Growth and Return
Brad Fevold, Research and Development, Marvin Windows and Doors

In today's every changing environment it is vitally important to assure valuable R&D resources are allocated to the "right" projects. Brad Fevold's presentation will focus on how to plan, report, and manage resources so that the resources are focused on the key business plan

activities that maximize growth and return.

Take-aways:

1. Project Prioritization in NPD

2. Resource planning tools.

3. Resource tracking and reporting tools.

Managing Trade-offs: Avoiding the "Chokes" of Slow Decision-Making
Brian Shaw, Sr. Engineering Manager, Baker Oil Tools Safety Systems

To move and take action as quickly as possible, a field development team must have a clear path and direction, the best tools for the job and the ability to use them well, and strong motivation to finish the work on schedule. One of the potential "chokes" to the speedy delivery of new products and oil/gas wells is the decision-making process – the on-going debate between various interested and influential parties within the organization as to which aspects of the project are most important. The consideration of multiple/conflicting priorities is often overlooked by project management teams when developing project schedules, but it is frequently the cause of frustration, delays, and disappointments during and after the execution of the project.

As exemplified by Preston G. Smith in his book Developing New Products in Half the Time (co-authored with D.G. Reinertson), "managing the trade-offs" should be a major consideration when planning and executing a new product development project. Managing the trade-offs means being aware of the four major priority considerations inherent in all NPD projects, and actively managing the six potential interactions between these four priorities.

In this talk, Brian Shaw draws on his experience as new product development manager for a major service company coupled with his stint as a member of the completions execution team for a major operator during a recent deepwater sub-sea project located in the Asia Pacific region. He will discuss lessons learned and how they can be applied within a cross-functional NPD team.

Real World Deployment of IT Solutions
Tracy Allen, IT Project Leader, Texas Instruments, Inc.

In the real world of New Product Development, IT solutions are not "magic bullets" or ends in themselves. While sold to management in terms of potential ROI, their potential can be realized only to the extent that they can be effectively deployed in the target businesses by bringing value to all the stakeholders. Most difficulties with IT application deployments have very little to do with the software itself and everything to do with how well the software makes it easier for the actual users to carry out their portion of the NPD process. This presentation will give examples of successful real world deployment of IT solutions by following a four-step process. First, the NPD process improvement needs of the four major stakeholder groups (business managers/executives, project managers, NPD team members, and IT support team members) are captured. Next, these needs are prioritized in terms of their ability to make each group’s job easier and then the prioritized needs are mapped to desired software capabilities. Then, software is either selected, or developed, based on the needs mapping of all the groups, not just some, and the deployment is driven by focusing on the value added to each stakeholder using the software.

Take-aways: