Biz 6033 Seminar on Technological Innovation(11/30): Review/Critique
Kyung Hee Song
“Accelerating Adaptive Process: Product Innovation in the Global Computer Industry”
< Summary>
The authors had an interest to find out what make firms shorten the process of product development based on two theoretical models, compression model and experimental model. How do firms develop quickly? Literaturecategorized as compression model suggested that planning, the use of CAD, supplier involvement, powerful project leaders, and multifunctional teams could quicken the pace of product development. Another literature named experimental model suggested that fast pace could be achieved by relying on iterative experiences, flexibility, and improvisation under the highly uncertain situation. In organizational theory, authors describe how conditions of low uncertainty are best adopted to bureaucratic or mechanical organizations, while in conditions of high uncertainty, more flexible, adaptive, and organic organizations are appropriate. The authors hypothesized six propositions from compression theory: ①more time spending in planning/②more supplier involvement/③more designer using CAD/④a higher degree of project overlap/⑤reviewed the theories of multifunctional teams/⑥great reward for schedule attainment is associated with shorter development time. In addition, they extracted four hypotheses from experimental theory:①more design iterations/②more time spent in testing throughout the development process/③less time between milestones/ ④Greater power of the project leader is associated with shorter development time.
36 computer companies participated in the study about the two projects (one medium-sized development project and one major development project). 50 percent of firms were from the U.S., 30 percent from Asia, and 20 percent from Europe.
The results of the study showed that only the use of cross functional teams led faster product development, while planning, supplier involvement, use of CAD lengthened product development time rather than reducing it. Reward for schedule and overlap were not significant. On contrary, experimental strategy( the four hypotheses) significantly shortened productdevelopmenttimes. In the entire model, while all variables from the experimental model is significant, planning and CAD significantly lengthened product development time and supplier involvement, overlap, reward for schedule were dropped because of lack of
< Contribution and critiques
This paper contributed to enlargeunderstanding on what could shorten product development by testing comprehensive hypotheses that were come from two theoretical models. The results of the research especially on the compression theory were quite different from what we knew from the existing literature. The results implicate that fast product development is more likely to emerge asuncertain than predictable, more experimental than planned, and more iterative than linear. CAD and supplier involvement may be more suited for faster development of predictable products like automobiles and heavy industrial equipments.
The difficulty of applying the results to the real industrial situation would be how well firms can define the degree of uncertainty of their industry situation and the product development, since environment is often mixed and complicated. To shorten the product development time, firms need to decide their strategy on whether to choose all or some variables of compression model or those of experimental models. As the compression model would be applicable to all situations and even some variables would lengthen the development time, firms need to be prudent in deciding strategy for faster development. The following are things we need to more consider in applying the study to real world.
(1)The authors suggested computer industries as an example of fast moving industry while mentioning automobiles and heavy industrial equipments as examples of predictable and mature product development. But in fact, many industries are in the fast moving and competitive environment. What industry or products can we think of more as an example we can apply experimental model for faster product development?
(2) This paper provides firms with strategies for faster product development. In applying these results to the real industrial world, what are difficult things?