Project Management for Development of New Products (3 PDUs)

The objective of the new product development project manager is to enable the development, sales, delivery and support of products and services. To achieve this objective for all but the simplest of products, you will need to coordinate resources from various organizations into an integrated and effective project.

A fully mature product development management culture means that, other than recurring production and administrative work, the company organizes all activities in terms of projects, with a customer and deliverables.

How do you organize a large project, possibly involving hundreds of people? Like with a corporate organization, it makes sense to break the project into a hierarchy of teams.

Depending on the nature of the product and the company culture, the product core team will follow one of the methodologies described in this section. If the company has a diverse portfolio of product offers, it is possible that the PMO will use more than one methodology.

In the context of New Product Development, the project manager transitions the concept from the business unit's Integrated Master Plan and create a specific project for the product development team.

In this class we will learn the tools and techniques of Phase Gate Product Development to deliver successful new products that deliver value to customers, as well as to your organization.

The first phase of new product development is Concept Discovery and Initiation. The objective for this phase is to deliver a business case for leadership to approve and initiate the project team.

During Definition and Scoping, the core team will elaborate the product concept into a detailed set of requirements and characteristics that they can design and build to.

During the Project Planning phase, the core team evaluates the PRD requirements to develop detailed plans for the development, validation, and production of the ultimate product. The project manager will assemble those detailed plans into an overall project plan to establish a Plan of Record schedule for the development and delivery of the product.

During the Development and Validation Phase, the core team executes the project plan to develop a working design that meets functions and performance under all specified conditions. Other team members perform detailed analysis and verification and provide feedback for ongoing product optimization.

During the Product Launch and Monitoring Phase of the project, the product transitions from development to production. The core team formally releases the product, and the company prepares to produce, sell, deliver, and support the product.

A brief introduction to the topic of product quality, covering some quality tools and techniques, explaining how quality impacts scheduling, and wrapping up the unit with some examples of how quality can be a key driver in planning a product development project.

• Total Quality Management (TQM)

• Statistical Process Control (SPC)

• Pareto Analysis

• Cost of Quality

• Earned Value

Because scope and schedule are the most visible tools to manage a project, they are the most effective ways to embed quality assurance into each task and ensure that the project follows a methodical, disciplined quality process.

For a new product to be successful, the development team must build quality into the deliverable, not just stamp it on during inspection. An effective method to achieve this is to define all requirements in the specifications in terms of quality, not just function and performance.

Sometimes project management is described as herding cats. To reverse this stereotype and build positive group dynamics, you should collaborate with the team to develop a constructive, productive, understanding, and self-correcting relationship.

A project manager must also possess judgment to make tradeoffs between cost, schedule and scope throughout the project and make complex decisions to keep the project moving. The project manager must also be an advocate for the project, making sure that company resources continue to be allocated and applied.

Leadership is the art and skill of inspiring, motivating, and guiding a group of people to collaborate toward accomplishing a common goal. Effective leaders often lead by example, encouraging quality by doing things right the first time.

Developing new products is a risky and uncertain activity compared with ongoing production. Customer needs, time to market criticality, and competing resources affect the usual constraints of scope, schedule, and cost for all potential products in the pipeline.