The most visible innovating activity in most organizations is New Product Development. NPD encompasses both the Invention Loop and the Introduction Loop in an NPD Process.
New Product Development can be frustratingly complex work as it goes through repeating cycles of divergent and convergent activities.
↪ The divergent activities of Idea and Concept generation converge in Proof-of-Technology validation.
↪ Divergent Design activities converge in Solution Specification.
↪ Divergent Development activities converge in Proof-of-Development.
↪ Divergent Deployment activities converge in Proof-of-Deployment.
The practical impact of these divergent / convergent cycles is that NPD velocity is consistently variable. The progress being made during the divergent activities can be frustratingly slow, whereas the progress made during the convergent activities can be surprisingly fast. It is a natural consequence of this sequence that makes creating detailed planning timelines for NPD projects difficult.
The planning integrity limitations caused by the variable velocity NPD stages lead to the 6 common sources of trouble encountered in NPD projects.
1. Projects are considered “late”, and subject to time compression pressure, from day 1.
2. Under-allocation and poor coordination of project resources during the divergent stages (because of uncertainty and perceived low resource productivity) lead to unrecognized and unplanned increases in total development time.
3. Schedule compression pressure increases throughout every stage of the project leading to compromised decisions and decision points.
4. Project Management attempts to accelerate the project by starting Development activities before Solution Specification has been settled. Project timelines grow without constraint as new requirements emerge because of Solution Specification instability.
5. Project Management prioritizes time frame compression over design quality, redefining intermediate testing and verification activities as “delays”.
6. Intermediate releases are made while the project is still in Development before Proof-of-Development activities are completed. This can increase the scope of divergent activities associated with Deployment, further expanding the project timeline.
NPD management is as much an art as a science. Managing the variable velocity divergent / convergent activities by stages is an essential project management discipline. Managing NPD projects based upon a pre-determined overall project timeline is a prescription for too slow, too long, too late frustration.