Developing new product or redesigning new product helps in meeting customer requirements and tapping the market.
NPD teams of many companies who develop a physical product are seen in firefighting mode many times.
In few cases, teams struggle to create designs on time, few struggle to procure material on time, few struggle with quality of product, few struggle in convincing customer about product performance, few struggle to build products within target cost thereby reducing the profits.
Common reasons of firefighting:
- Customer requirements are not captured fully. Most importantly, exclusions are not agreed upon with customer hence work becomes never ending.
- Skill mapping of resources is not done properly, and right training is not given to team.
- There are internal clashes between teams which lead to multiple changes.
- Other departments do not support wholeheartedly.
- Resource allocation is not done properly.
- In most cases, there is no Project Manager who is responsible for complete project. Due to this, every function works as per their convenience.
- When Requirements are not clearly signed off, customer keeps changing the scope.
- Salespeople commit Moon and Sun to customer without getting into product requirements.
- Sufficient time is not given for planning hence teams end up doing rework and firefighting every day.
- In some cases, risks are not identified at the beginning hence things get stuck half the way.
- Sometimes, it is required to bring in external Subject Matter Experts, but companies are not willing to spend money and want to reinvent the wheel.
- Proper documentation about Lessons Learnt from past projects is missing hence teams make same mistakes again.
- For critical things, plan B is not kept ready.
- In most cases, short term gain is seen, and long-term impact is neglected.
5 ways to avoid firefighting:
# 1: Tailored NPD Process:
First thing one should do to avoid firefighting is, have a tailored NPD process in place. The NPD process should be customized as per the kind of business environment in which your organization operates.
Every organization, their products, customer needs are different. Hence process should be such that it is quick yet without ignoring important aspects like risk and quality.
Best way to do this is, preparing process chart from purchase order to delivery / installation. It gives a fair idea about inter department interactions, supplier interactions and customer interactions.
Process chart can give lot of clues about processes which become bottleneck and you can eliminate those processes or simplify them.
# 2: Appoint Project Manager
If you want to have smooth execution, there should be one person responsible for running the show. When you appoint Project Manager, it is his/her responsibility to integrate everything to deliver results.
Project Manager should be a person who has clear understanding of overall business. Person may not be an expert in everything, but he should be a good listener, observer and facilitator.
A good Project Manager can coordinate things with other functions and help all the members to agree on common objective of organization.
# 3: Make Risk Planning integral part of NPD
Risk is an untoward incidence which can crop up along the way. Organizations which make risk planning integral part of NPD process are better positioned to handle uncertain situation.
Risks could be related to Product, Vendors, Processes or any other external factors beyond your control. When you brainstorm and prepare Risk Breakdown Structure, you can think of risk mitigation plans.
Risks are not always bad. There are positive risks (opportunities) also sometimes and identifying them can help you exploit the opportunities in right way.
# 4: Review is the Key
Only plan is of no use if you don’t work on it and only actions are not useful if you do not review results. Timely review of activities helps in understanding risks emerging on the fly and you can tap the pulse of project.
Review mechanism should be such that you do not miss on important aspects of Project. Some of the points you can review are – project schedule against plan, cost estimates, any quality issues, execution of change orders etc.
Project review and product review are different things. In most cases, risks and quality issues arise if product review is not done properly. Hence, technical team should perform technical review against customer specifications.
# 5: Set up Project Information Management System (PIMS)
Working on projects is a learning process for teams as well as Project Managers. That learning experience can be useful for future projects if it is documented well.
Project information should be available at a centralized location for easy access by stakeholders. It could be a SharePoint Site or Network Access Storage, having project information at single place helps in faster retrieval of the same.
PIMS is useful to store – project schedule, cost estimates, resource estimates, customer specifications, change notes, risk register, stakeholder register, contracts and other documents. When all these details are available at a click of button, you can save lot of time in looking for critical information.
Most important aspect of PIMS is lessons learned register where you should compile lessons team learned during the project. It can be useful for other project managers in smoothly completing future projects.
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