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1. Please describe how the R&D/NPD process is viewed and measured in your organization? How are R&D/NPD efforts linked to corporate strategy and success? How has this played a role in what you have been able to achieve? How did you measure the success of your specific project(s)?
The R&D and NPD processes are an integral part of the Johns Manville (JM) organization and its growth. The NPD process within my division of Johns Manville is actually contained within its own organization called I&C, or “Innovation & Commercialization”. We are organized as one of the functions that support the overall division, and as such, we are strongly linked to operating plans and results. At a high level, our success is best measured by delivering value in terms of revenues & profits to the business. As such, we are specifically structured as part of the business unit, with the intention to develop products in the pipeline and bring them to fruition in order to generate increasing business from new products or applications. On a more simplistic level, our progress is gauged against performance against established timelines and degree of success/failure in managing these. Periodic project review and/or formal Gate Reviews are the best monitoring mechanisms for measuring this progress.
Regarding my specific development project, we did utilize the methods outlined in JM Gate, our internal version of the StageGate® product development process. We held periodic Gate Review meetings with internal stakeholders, and have conducted other report-outs to other external customer/partners. This has enabled us to achieve clarity in communication of project status and goals, communicate expected results and timing, and to better manage expectations of the business. For our project, we also had financial goals in terms of planned revenues and operating margins, which were to effectively materialize only during the final Gate of the project (after launch).
2. You have described yourself as being instrumental in the development of a new product that enabled Johns Manville to serve an entirely new market. Please explain your leadership role in Johns Manville’s approach to QFD, the issues that you addressed, the specific steps/tools/practices introduced, and the accomplishments achieved.
I was the lead project manager for a new ‘game-changer’ product that would potentially enable Johns Manville to enter an entirely new marketspace. This project had initially started approximately (9) months prior to my arrival at JM, and although it was begun with good planning and Six Sigma rigor, robust QFD had not been adhered to throughout the process. Production trials went poorly and had not generated a capable product, communication was sporadic, timelines had continued to slip and deliverables had not been met. At this point there was no longer a great confidence level in the project’s prospects for success and launch.
I have had some training and experience in QFD efforts in previous industries, but within this role in JM product development I had the opportunity to really put these skills to use and to develop them further with an explicit focus on a single product. My position came with both relative creative freedom to manage the project with a long leash and with sufficient guidance and pressure to take ownership of the issues.
While working to expedite my learning on the technology side, I jumped into the project and attended (3) production trials within my first month. Solving our technical problems required patience but also demanded use of robust problem-solving tools to help frame problems and potential solutions. An internal version of the StageGate® product development process was the basic framework for our overall project planning lifecycle. MGPP (Multi Generational Project Planning) enabled us to properly scope the outline of our product and deliverables. We reviewed and redeveloped our business case. FFU (Fitness For Use) exercises gave us direct feedback on product performance requirements in the field. HOQ (House of Quality) techniques helped connect what was required in the market by product end-users with how to better target our processes and design. Thinking through and thoroughly planning multiple DOEs enabled us to quantify learnings and move the development process forward in bite-size steps. Performance benchmarking of related products became a strong interest of our technical team as a means to evaluate our own developmental product. All of these tools were used at different stages in the development, but HOQ and our DOEs were particularly effective in helping us pinpoint areas of focus and allowing us to achieve small wins throughout the development process.
Through a more methodical approach the project, a better understanding of the production issues (and some good luck), we had our first successful production trial approximately (3) months later. There was quite a buzz amongst the team after this, but this was also tempered with the need to fully understand the product technology and finish the development and prepare for scale-up in a manufacturing plant. Other major accomplishments following this include being able to fully understand all the nuances of manufacturing our product (through DOE analysis), making continual advances and improvements in the product design, developing intellectual property around this product, and ending up with very interested customers giving positive feedback (and purchase orders)!
3. What motivated and inspired you to drive these particular initiatives?
The need to perform and deliver results (good or bad) was my motivation personally! I was challenged with a project with loads of potential that had stalled, but really had a great chance to use some fantastic development tools in the Six Sigma realm. I was also fortunate to have a very special group of leaders which definitely supported me and the use of these tools – and who were never remiss to push and challenge our team when necessary. I was completely comfortable with this type of organization and level of visibility.
I have also been fortunate to have been involved in some great projects in my previous (automotive) industry – some great success and a few failures – all of which I have taken something away from and still use as personal examples. To push a project to completion, to check things off a list, to prove or disprove a concept in a trial – just to help drive progress efficiently – these are inspiring to me.
4. Since product development is a team sport, please tell us what the team was like and why it succeeded. Who were the key players? Did you add/delete team members along the way?
Our team changed somewhat over the long course of the project. I was one of the co-developers when I joined JM and the project, and later became its technical leader, responsible for bringing the project through the development phase and beyond to production launch.
During the concept and early development phase, the team was primarily technical in scope and consisted of (2)-(3) scientists and/or engineers. After multiple successful product trials, the product began the final stages of development and the technical team was pared down to just myself full-time. As we readied for launch, we brought in (2) other team members focused specifically to support efforts around commercialization and marketing. We are now calling this initial version of the product ‘done’ with development, and are looking forward to building the brand (and working on developing product extensions and other applications)!
This team and its varying structure over time worked for a few reasons. Yes it was dynamic and went through a number of changes, which of course required a bit of a learning curve for the team several times. However, each time it allowed us to better understand explain our product value proposition and get feedback internally. Also, the team was cross-functional when it was most appropriate, and allowed us to tap into expertise where our product development & launch required it over the last (8) months.
5. How did you go about building organizational support for your program? What was your biggest challenge in doing this? What was your biggest success? What were the major lessons learned?
We were fortunate at the beginning to have some external pull from a potential customer who was interested in this product development; this was an initial spark that obviously helped generate interest internally and motivate support around our efforts. However, the main consensus builder to support this program was our level of communication at all levels across our team and our leadership. Bi-monthly division leadership reviews, monthly team presentations and down to weekly conference calls and communications with the plants and R&D labs were all essential in driving a continuous level of feedback, information flow and support for our development program.
The biggest challenge in gaining additional support was probably rooted in the history of this product’s development itself. Especially at first, our new team understandably had to prove our mettle more with actions and results than words. The level of visibility of this particular development program also demanded a greater level of communication transparency at all levels, as we gained more experience with the product technology and development trials.
My biggest successes are actually two-fold. First, leading our first successful production trial mid-way during the development phase, where our key customer product criteria was first met and proven feasible; what a great “eureka!” moment. Second, fully executing the development phase of the project and pushing it completely through the scale-up and launch phase has been remarkable.
As mentioned above, I have been involved in a wide range of product development efforts in the past, some of which have been quite successful, model development programs, and some of which have been the opposite. It has been great to draw from this gamut of experiences – personal lessons learned and benchmarking – in order to shape my actions and drive my efforts from this perspective. First, there is no such thing as over-communication so long as it is effective and frequent. In this case, I took the responsibility seriously to keep leadership engaged in product development progress and milestones – both advances and setbacks. Communication through formal meetings and e-mails were certain, but informal face time was just as critical. Next, contingency planning is a necessity. Timing will slip, trials will fail to produce desired results, and things will fall through; note the lessons learned but be prepared with actions to address them in advance. My direct leadership was admirable and persistent in their guidance on this front. Finally, my group activity reporting demands on the product development were weekly – this was a good thing. Taking five minutes at the end of each week to reflect on project status and accomplishments was beneficial in assessing the real ‘pace’ of the product development program over the course of time.
6. What obstacles stood in your way and what did you do to overcome them?
Everyone has obstacles – if not, they’re probably not in the right job! In my case, I was relatively new to the company and was joining a totally different industry and technology than anything I had ever done prior. I had also joined a project that had endured numerous delays, still had yet to develop a feasible technical solution and whose long-term viability was uncertain.
Delays will inevitably happen in a complex and/or lengthy development process, but it is predicting, mitigating and responding to these delays that made all the difference. Contingency plans, timelines, and taking action with a task-oriented mindset were critical in moving our project forward effectively. We were pushed, but as we began to show progress, we built more confidence to negotiate and made realistic commitments we could support.
To tactically deal with previous setbacks and to go forward on a new path, we utilized FFU (Fitness For Use) exercises with customers, developed HOQs (House of Quality) to help guide our development focus, and designed several DOEs to control our trials and isolate our learnings. These tools were each effective in enabling us to understand our product better and to better plan our development timeline rationally.
7. What are you most proud of? What do you feel has contributed the most value to your organization?
I have become a relative technology ‘semi-expert’ (are we ever really experts?) in a new field, and this has been rewarding to look back on how quickly it has happened and the amount of ‘absorbing’ I have done. I owe much of this to some great tutelage from coworkers, support from industry associations, and just plain time spent working at it. Also, in working on this product, I am fortunate to be able to tell a great product development story, one that was conducted with a careful approach to product design using basic but effective Six Sigma and QFD tools.
In addition, I am proud that our product has been successful in terms of delivering a product brand for a new Johns Manville business segment and generating profits to the income statement – and having done so with a wholly innovative product to the marketplace. Knowing the uphill struggle from where this project has come and the length of time people have worked on this, I take great pride in having our team be recognized internally and externally for our efforts and successes. I am also proud of having developed tangible intellectual property for myself and my company.
The ability to work with other internal groups – stakeholders, R&D, across divisions and sales channels – and external customers and labs is something I am pleased to have had the opportunity to do. Also, believing in my product and having a passion for the daily and weekly variety in my job have made it fun to boot.
8. What are your next steps (i.e. will you be building on your earlier efforts, or are you now tackling new challenges)?
My next steps definitely constitute building on my earlier efforts taken over the past year and a half. I have recently taken a new position to follow this product out of our development group and help lead its commercialization, as we continue to grow it as a business and in the marketplace. This will draw heavily on my technical background and development experience specific to this product, but will also allow me more opportunity for end-user and customer interaction.
I will also have the benefit of continuing to work with our product development group in supporting product extensions and new applications based on this technology. I am particularly excited to continue working with this group going forward, my ‘roots’!
2006 Product Development and R&D MVP Award: Finalist Steve Payne
Steve Payne of Johns Manville was a finalist for the 2006 Management Roundtable Product Development and R&D MVP Awards, an annual event recognizing excellence in managing product development. Finalists participated in structured interviews regarding their company's processes and measures. The interview discusses the role of leadership, the composition of teams, and the challenges of a world-class development organization.
1. Please describe how the R&D/NPD process is viewed and measured in your organization? How are R&D/NPD efforts linked to corporate strategy and success? How has this played a role in what you have been able to achieve? How did you measure the success of your specific project(s)?
The R&D and NPD processes are an integral part of the Johns Manville (JM) organization and its growth. The NPD process within my division of Johns Manville is actually contained within its own organization called I&C, or “Innovation & Commercialization”. We are organized as one of the functions that support the overall division, and as such, we are strongly linked to operating plans and results. At a high level, our success is best measured by delivering value in terms of revenues & profits to the business. As such, we are specifically structured as part of the business unit, with the intention to develop products in the pipeline and bring them to fruition in order to generate increasing business from new products or applications. On a more simplistic level, our progress is gauged against performance against established timelines and degree of success/failure in managing these. Periodic project review and/or formal Gate Reviews are the best monitoring mechanisms for measuring this progress.
Regarding my specific development project, we did utilize the methods outlined in JM Gate, our internal version of the StageGate® product development process. We held periodic Gate Review meetings with internal stakeholders, and have conducted other report-outs to other external customer/partners. This has enabled us to achieve clarity in communication of project status and goals, communicate expected results and timing, and to better manage expectations of the business. For our project, we also had financial goals in terms of planned revenues and operating margins, which were to effectively materialize only during the final Gate of the project (after launch).
2. You have described yourself as being instrumental in the development of a new product that enabled Johns Manville to serve an entirely new market. Please explain your leadership role in Johns Manville’s approach to QFD, the issues that you addressed, the specific steps/tools/practices introduced, and the accomplishments achieved.
I was the lead project manager for a new ‘game-changer’ product that would potentially enable Johns Manville to enter an entirely new marketspace. This project had initially started approximately (9) months prior to my arrival at JM, and although it was begun with good planning and Six Sigma rigor, robust QFD had not been adhered to throughout the process. Production trials went poorly and had not generated a capable product, communication was sporadic, timelines had continued to slip and deliverables had not been met. At this point there was no longer a great confidence level in the project’s prospects for success and launch.
I have had some training and experience in QFD efforts in previous industries, but within this role in JM product development I had the opportunity to really put these skills to use and to develop them further with an explicit focus on a single product. My position came with both relative creative freedom to manage the project with a long leash and with sufficient guidance and pressure to take ownership of the issues.
While working to expedite my learning on the technology side, I jumped into the project and attended (3) production trials within my first month. Solving our technical problems required patience but also demanded use of robust problem-solving tools to help frame problems and potential solutions. An internal version of the StageGate® product development process was the basic framework for our overall project planning lifecycle. MGPP (Multi Generational Project Planning) enabled us to properly scope the outline of our product and deliverables. We reviewed and redeveloped our business case. FFU (Fitness For Use) exercises gave us direct feedback on product performance requirements in the field. HOQ (House of Quality) techniques helped connect what was required in the market by product end-users with how to better target our processes and design. Thinking through and thoroughly planning multiple DOEs enabled us to quantify learnings and move the development process forward in bite-size steps. Performance benchmarking of related products became a strong interest of our technical team as a means to evaluate our own developmental product. All of these tools were used at different stages in the development, but HOQ and our DOEs were particularly effective in helping us pinpoint areas of focus and allowing us to achieve small wins throughout the development process.
Through a more methodical approach the project, a better understanding of the production issues (and some good luck), we had our first successful production trial approximately (3) months later. There was quite a buzz amongst the team after this, but this was also tempered with the need to fully understand the product technology and finish the development and prepare for scale-up in a manufacturing plant. Other major accomplishments following this include being able to fully understand all the nuances of manufacturing our product (through DOE analysis), making continual advances and improvements in the product design, developing intellectual property around this product, and ending up with very interested customers giving positive feedback (and purchase orders)!
3. What motivated and inspired you to drive these particular initiatives?
The need to perform and deliver results (good or bad) was my motivation personally! I was challenged with a project with loads of potential that had stalled, but really had a great chance to use some fantastic development tools in the Six Sigma realm. I was also fortunate to have a very special group of leaders which definitely supported me and the use of these tools – and who were never remiss to push and challenge our team when necessary. I was completely comfortable with this type of organization and level of visibility.
I have also been fortunate to have been involved in some great projects in my previous (automotive) industry – some great success and a few failures – all of which I have taken something away from and still use as personal examples. To push a project to completion, to check things off a list, to prove or disprove a concept in a trial – just to help drive progress efficiently – these are inspiring to me.
4. Since product development is a team sport, please tell us what the team was like and why it succeeded. Who were the key players? Did you add/delete team members along the way?
Our team changed somewhat over the long course of the project. I was one of the co-developers when I joined JM and the project, and later became its technical leader, responsible for bringing the project through the development phase and beyond to production launch.
During the concept and early development phase, the team was primarily technical in scope and consisted of (2)-(3) scientists and/or engineers. After multiple successful product trials, the product began the final stages of development and the technical team was pared down to just myself full-time. As we readied for launch, we brought in (2) other team members focused specifically to support efforts around commercialization and marketing. We are now calling this initial version of the product ‘done’ with development, and are looking forward to building the brand (and working on developing product extensions and other applications)!
This team and its varying structure over time worked for a few reasons. Yes it was dynamic and went through a number of changes, which of course required a bit of a learning curve for the team several times. However, each time it allowed us to better understand explain our product value proposition and get feedback internally. Also, the team was cross-functional when it was most appropriate, and allowed us to tap into expertise where our product development & launch required it over the last (8) months.
5. How did you go about building organizational support for your program? What was your biggest challenge in doing this? What was your biggest success? What were the major lessons learned?
We were fortunate at the beginning to have some external pull from a potential customer who was interested in this product development; this was an initial spark that obviously helped generate interest internally and motivate support around our efforts. However, the main consensus builder to support this program was our level of communication at all levels across our team and our leadership. Bi-monthly division leadership reviews, monthly team presentations and down to weekly conference calls and communications with the plants and R&D labs were all essential in driving a continuous level of feedback, information flow and support for our development program.
The biggest challenge in gaining additional support was probably rooted in the history of this product’s development itself. Especially at first, our new team understandably had to prove our mettle more with actions and results than words. The level of visibility of this particular development program also demanded a greater level of communication transparency at all levels, as we gained more experience with the product technology and development trials.
My biggest successes are actually two-fold. First, leading our first successful production trial mid-way during the development phase, where our key customer product criteria was first met and proven feasible; what a great “eureka!” moment. Second, fully executing the development phase of the project and pushing it completely through the scale-up and launch phase has been remarkable.
As mentioned above, I have been involved in a wide range of product development efforts in the past, some of which have been quite successful, model development programs, and some of which have been the opposite. It has been great to draw from this gamut of experiences – personal lessons learned and benchmarking – in order to shape my actions and drive my efforts from this perspective. First, there is no such thing as over-communication so long as it is effective and frequent. In this case, I took the responsibility seriously to keep leadership engaged in product development progress and milestones – both advances and setbacks. Communication through formal meetings and e-mails were certain, but informal face time was just as critical. Next, contingency planning is a necessity. Timing will slip, trials will fail to produce desired results, and things will fall through; note the lessons learned but be prepared with actions to address them in advance. My direct leadership was admirable and persistent in their guidance on this front. Finally, my group activity reporting demands on the product development were weekly – this was a good thing. Taking five minutes at the end of each week to reflect on project status and accomplishments was beneficial in assessing the real ‘pace’ of the product development program over the course of time.
6. What obstacles stood in your way and what did you do to overcome them?
Everyone has obstacles – if not, they’re probably not in the right job! In my case, I was relatively new to the company and was joining a totally different industry and technology than anything I had ever done prior. I had also joined a project that had endured numerous delays, still had yet to develop a feasible technical solution and whose long-term viability was uncertain.
Delays will inevitably happen in a complex and/or lengthy development process, but it is predicting, mitigating and responding to these delays that made all the difference. Contingency plans, timelines, and taking action with a task-oriented mindset were critical in moving our project forward effectively. We were pushed, but as we began to show progress, we built more confidence to negotiate and made realistic commitments we could support.
To tactically deal with previous setbacks and to go forward on a new path, we utilized FFU (Fitness For Use) exercises with customers, developed HOQs (House of Quality) to help guide our development focus, and designed several DOEs to control our trials and isolate our learnings. These tools were each effective in enabling us to understand our product better and to better plan our development timeline rationally.
7. What are you most proud of? What do you feel has contributed the most value to your organization?
I have become a relative technology ‘semi-expert’ (are we ever really experts?) in a new field, and this has been rewarding to look back on how quickly it has happened and the amount of ‘absorbing’ I have done. I owe much of this to some great tutelage from coworkers, support from industry associations, and just plain time spent working at it. Also, in working on this product, I am fortunate to be able to tell a great product development story, one that was conducted with a careful approach to product design using basic but effective Six Sigma and QFD tools.
In addition, I am proud that our product has been successful in terms of delivering a product brand for a new Johns Manville business segment and generating profits to the income statement – and having done so with a wholly innovative product to the marketplace. Knowing the uphill struggle from where this project has come and the length of time people have worked on this, I take great pride in having our team be recognized internally and externally for our efforts and successes. I am also proud of having developed tangible intellectual property for myself and my company.
The ability to work with other internal groups – stakeholders, R&D, across divisions and sales channels – and external customers and labs is something I am pleased to have had the opportunity to do. Also, believing in my product and having a passion for the daily and weekly variety in my job have made it fun to boot.
8. What are your next steps (i.e. will you be building on your earlier efforts, or are you now tackling new challenges)?
My next steps definitely constitute building on my earlier efforts taken over the past year and a half. I have recently taken a new position to follow this product out of our development group and help lead its commercialization, as we continue to grow it as a business and in the marketplace. This will draw heavily on my technical background and development experience specific to this product, but will also allow me more opportunity for end-user and customer interaction.
I will also have the benefit of continuing to work with our product development group in supporting product extensions and new applications based on this technology. I am particularly excited to continue working with this group going forward, my ‘roots’!
