GGI RapidNews: Volume 9, Issue 10 - R&D

GGI RapidNews R&D Product Development eZine: Volume 9, Issue 10 - October 16, 2008
GGI RapidNews is published approximately once a month.

Research Execution: The study was conducted by a combination of mailer surveys, and e-mails with links to download web sites. 7094 mailer surveys were distributed, 476 surveys were downloaded from web sites. Of the total of 7570 surveys distributed, 1256 mailer surveys were returned as undeliverable. Net total surveys distributed was 6314. A total of 218 completed surveys were received. Four (4) surveys were determined to be invalid and were eliminated. Five (5) duplicate responses were eliminated, yielding a total of 209 valid responses included in the 2008 results database. The response rate was 3.31%.

Research Participants: About two-thirds of respondents were from public companies, about one-third were from private companies. Over fifty percent had a title of Director or greater, less than 20% held a title of Manager or lower. Over eighty-five percent of respondents were from R&D-Product Development and/or Senior Management. About half of respondents were from companies with sales less than $.5B, forty percent were from $.5B to $5B, and twelve percent were greater than $5B. All industries were represented, including a number of software-only companies.

Research Description: The research was focused on areas in the Innovation Body of Knowledge where Innovation is "tangible," meaning that "it can be directed by executives and is actionable by employees." GGI's focus since 1998 is to investigate the actual processes and practices that companies use that cause their results. The five subjects GGI researched between August 2007 and February 2008 were:

Research Findings - Part 4 - Innovation Tools: The survey investigated the penetration and the degree of usage of "generally available" Innovation Tools in corporations. A list of 67 "most easily identifiable" Innovation Tools were presented, out of a list of over 250 tools that we track. Innovation Tools span a great range of functionality, capability, and price. An Innovation Tool could be a simple technique such as "KJ," or an extremely complex multi-module interactive software suite. Individuals to large groups use them in-person and/or virtually. The purpose of most of the tools is to help to get "out of the box" during a busy day. However, some are actually capable of expanding domain knowledge. The vast majority of these tools have been created in the past ten years, although several of them have been around for a couple of decades and are tried and true.

Under the definition GGI uses for a tool, the Microsoft Office Suite contains three tools: MSWord Outliner Feature, MSWord Thesaurus, and MS Powerpoint (storyboarding and brainstorming). Naturally, the responses to these 3 tools dwarfed all other responses. Excluding these, of the remaining 64 tools, only five tools have exceeded a 15% penetration rate including the tools that are free of charge. The top 5 tools are: USPTO Website, Wikis, Triz, Blue Ocean Strategy, and MindManager. "Penetration" means that the tools are "internally available and/or owned by" companies. "Usage" is different. GGI researchers investigated two levels of usage, used occasionally versus used frequently. The free tools get the most usage. But it is interesting that some tools that have only penetrated a small amount rise up when one looks at usage. The outliners/text manipulator/sketchpad tools, "Mindmanager" and "MINDMAP" and "Brainstorm" if owned are used. "Storyboarding" tools are also showing activity.

Research Conclusions: Clearly the market is in its early stages. Only five tools have penetrated more than 15% of the market. Only five tools are used occasionally by more than 8% of the market. Only five tools are used frequently by more than 2% of the market. Proceed cautiously when picking specific innovation tools. Free, or has a low acquisition cost, tools that can be learned quickly pose little risk. If the tool is expensive and/or has a long or expensive training period, make sure you do your homework. In emerging markets, many initial entrants will not be the long run survivors.

Condensed from Man Yawns, Best Friend Follows, by Susan Milius, Science News Magazine of the Society for Science & the Public, Williamsport, Pennsylvania, USA, August 30, 2008, Volume 174, Number 5, Page 13, ISSN 0036-8423.

Atsushi Senju, University of London, and his colleagues will be reporting the details of this study in an upcoming issue of Biology Letters. The study included 29 dogs ranging from dachshunds to Dobermans. One student opened his mouth slightly and quietly for the "control mouth" sample. One student gave wide-open sighing yawns for the "test mouth" sample.

None of the 29 dogs yawned while watching control mouth movements while 21 of the dogs yawned at least once while watching test mouth movements. Gordon Gallup at SUNY Albany says the study strongly suggests dogs may have a primitive empathic capacity.

Though it is not clear why the yawns spread, studies do suggest that domesticated dogs have evolved superior powers to read and react to the waves and shouts of the primates that fill the food bowls.

The New Age Of Innovation: Driving Cocreated Value Through Global Networks, by C. K. Prahalad and M. S. Krishnan, Copy right 2008, McGraw Hill, New York, New York, USA, 278 Pages, MIHD 0-07-159828-6, ISBN 978- 0-07-159828-6.

This is C. K. Prahalad's 4th book. He wrote the infamous book that defined Core Competencies for the world in the mid-1990s and has progressed steadily since in the global respect accorded to his thinking. He is one of the "must read" authors of this decade, his work influences trends in several disciplines including R&D and product development.

The basic tenants of this book are simple and elegant. First, products of the future must be customizable to each individual that owns them. To represent this, Prahalad uses the term "N=1." Second, no firm is big enough satisfy one consumer at a time. Therefore, resources from multiple and likely global vendors are needed. To represent this, Prahalad uses the term "R=G." His message is about having access to resources and not ownership of resources.

Prahalad's "New House of Innovation" is supported by the two pillars, N=1 and R=G. The "technical architecture" of the firm provides the foundation, while the "social architecture" of the firm provides the roof. Flexible but mandated business processes and targeted metrics and analytics hold the extended enterprise together.

If Prahalad is correct, the future approach to value creation will be the direct opposite of the approach that started the industrial revolution. Several compelling case studies are presented including Apple's entry into the digital music space through the iPod and iTunes. Individuals can personalize their own music libraries to match their overall tastes and further refine the libraries to fit their different moods, and times of the day. N=1. The iPod components are provided by companies scattered around the globe. R=G. Examples from iGoogle, Unilever's Ponds Institute, and selected McDonalds service approaches are also cited.

The book has eight chapters and starts by explaining how business will transform. Chapters 2-5 address the two pillars and the two architectures. Chapters 6-8 offer insights on: how to manage the new tensions, how to dynamically reconfigure talent and resources based on changing needs, and what managers should focus their attention on in the New House of Innovation. There are several attention-getting tables at the back of the book that list over a hundred companies that are contributing to the evolution of the two pillars and the two architectures.

The ability of top management to direct Innovation in their companies is the focus of the sixth R&D - Product Development Innovation Summit. The Innovation Summit will be held Tue/Wed/Thur December 9-11, 2008 in metro Boston. The Innovation Summit is an intensive facts and data driven three-day seminar and workshop covering a number of the "Current Best Practices across the Innovation Body Of Knowledge" and a number of the "Emerging Tools, Techniques, and Innovation-Enabling Software."

At this Summit, GGI will be sharing for the first time the comprehensive set of results of our 2008 Primary Research on Changing Innovation Environments - Strategy & Processes, Innovation Branding, Emerging Innovation Tools, and Top C-Level Innovation Metrics. Industry Week, Machine Design, Knowledge Roundtable and others have published selected findings. Summit attendees will see the comprehensive research that shows there are some strategic and tactical changes happening that are worth knowing. As we plan on sharing the entirety of the 2008 Primary Research at the Summit, we will also be giving each Summit participant a complimentary license to a .pdf copy that may be put on your company intranet for the use of all employees. This is fully explained on our Summit website. This is a significant value when combined with the Summit.

The Innovation Summit and the Primary Research that GGI performs are aimed at benchmarking and discovering trends related to issues that C-Level, CXO-Level, and Director-Level professionals have and the decisions they have to make. People who manage groups of people and have to set direction and provide resources and funding will benefit the most from the content of this Summit. We have been producing Innovation and Metrics Summits for the past four years. A number of companies that have brought management teams have called us back and shared that they attained critical mass and have been able to make a difference.

The content of the Summit is categorized into eight modules. The duration of each module and the flow over the three days is in our Summit ATaGLANCE. There is a Summit Brochure. Companies who have participated in prior GGI Summits may be of interest, along with selected Testimonials. In summary, the eight modules are:

1. Best Practice Innovation Processes
2. C-Level & CXO Innovation Drivers

There will be three guest speakers covering the subjects of Lateral Thinking, Six Hats, Semantic Technology, Knowledge-Enabled Innovation, and Intellectual Property Directed At Maximizing Market Capitalization.

We look forward to seeing you in December! The Summit is equidistant from either Logan or Providence airport, which offers some great rates. The Summit hotel is completely wi-fi, has all amenities, and a five star chef.

The 2008 Biennial Survey theme was "Tangible Innovation." Much is said and written about the "perceived to be somewhat soft" topic of innovation. GGI's research focused on selected aspects of the innovation body of knowledge that are tangible and can be actively managed by companies and their executives. We also dedicated one question to refresh our ongoing research of the past decade on the usage of R&D and product development metrics and analytics by industrial and high tech companies. Thank you to the 209 people who responded for their companies in our biennial primary research project of North American industry.

Industry Week has recently published the "Top 10 Metrics In 2008" and contrasted them to our research from 1998 to identify the changes during the past decade. McKinsey & Company, Texas Instruments, Rockwell, Kimberly Clark, Pepsico, JDS Uniphase, Shure, Curtiss Wright Flight Systems, and Datacard are representative of companies that use market research from GGI.

For more information please visit our 2008 Biennial Survey web site. Here you can find our Research Description, Survey Questionnaire, Product Description, Product Brochure, and Tables Of Contents for the reports we publish.

We have two published reports available that address each question of the research across the population of respondents. MR42 is entitled "Summary" and includes text and full color graphics for each question. MR41 is entitled "Highlights" and includes just the text portions of MR42. All reports are available in hard copy, or electronic.pdf format for posting on company intranets, in the Primary Research section of The Wisdom iStore.

GGI's Featured Item changes approximately every other month and is always offered at 40% discount. To order this material, please go to GGI's Featured Item on the GGI Home Page or find this item in the Primary Research section of The Wisdom iStore.

A75 ..... Bradford L. Goldense and Ervin Kule, "New Research On Product Development & Innovation Management: Top Metrics Used By Corporate R&D Organizations [PIECE 5]," 2PLM e-zine, www.johnstark.com, Volume 11, Number 12, September 19, 2008.

A74 ..... Bradford L. Goldense and Ervin Kule, "New Research On Product Development & Innovation Management: Innovation Tools [PIECE 4]," 2PLM e-zine, www.johnstark.com, Volume 11, Number 11, September 8, 2008.

A73 ..... Bradford L. Goldense and Ervin Kule, "New Research On Product Development & Innovation Management: Innovation Identity [PIECE 3]," 2PLM e-zine, www.johnstark.com, Volume 11, Number 10, August 25, 2008.

A72 ..... Bradford L. Goldense and Ervin Kule, "New Research On Product Development & Innovation Management: Innovation Processes [PIECE 2]," 2PLM e-zine, www.johnstark.com, Volume 11, Number 9, August 11, 2008.

A71 ..... Bradford L. Goldense and Ervin Kule, "New Research On Product Development & Innovation Management: Innovation Environment [PIECE 1]," 2PLM e-zine, www.johnstark.com, Volume 11, Number 8, August 4, 2008.

A70Š.. Bradford L. Goldense," Intellectual Property Practices Lag Product Development Practices," Concurrency, Society Of Concurrrent Product Development, Dedham, Massachusetts, USA, Summer 2008, Volume 17, Number 1.

T72h, T72c, T72sc.....Bradford L. Goldense, "Linked Metrics Portfolio® Method Š 5 Teams Measuring 2 Strategies," Product Development Metrics: Linked Portfolio Method Seminar, Goldense Group, Inc., Norwood, Massachusetts, USA, June 19, 2008, 54 Pages, GGI ISBN-10 1-932468-66-8 and GGI ISBN-13 978-1-932468-66-3

T71, T71c, T71sc.....Bradford L. Goldense, "Linked Metrics Portfolio® Method Š 7 Teams Measuring 3 Strategies," Product Development Metrics: Linked Portfolio Method Seminar, Goldense Group, Inc., Norwood, Massachusetts, USA, January 31, 2008, 65 Pages, GGI ISBN 1-932468-67-6 and GGI ISBN 978-1-932468-67-0

2004 Product Development Metrics Survey - Product Selection, IP Management, and Top Corporate Metrics: The Summary Report (MR32h) and Highlights Report (MR31h) for GGI's 2004 Biennial Product Development Metrics Survey are now available for purchase by the public through GGI's Wisdom iStore. These reports are completely based on primary research performed by GGI researchers. The research includes 202 respondent companies. There was a 5% response rate.

McKinsey & Company, Texas Instruments, Rockwell, Kimberly Clark, JDS Uniphase, Shure, Curtiss Wright Flight Systems and Datacard are representative of companies that purchase market research from GGI.

The 2004 Survey focused on the following five areas of product selection and IP management:

We have already shared many results with GGI RapidNews readers since we began this line of business in 1998. 2004 Survey results ran in six RN issues, RN V5I11 - RN V6I5, which may be found in the RN archives, along with results from prior years.

The three commercial versions of the survey results that we currently offer for public purchase are:

1. 2004 SURVEY HIGHLIGHTS: A text-only report (75 pages), including the full text of all the results and analysis of the survey population analyzed as a whole, and
2. 2004 SURVEY SUMMARY: A report of composite results, where the survey respondents are analyzed as a whole (149 pages, includes a full set of graphed answers for every survey question).
3. 2004 SURVEY RESULTS: A report of composite results, where the survey respondents are analyzed as a whole AND five different cross-sections of the survey data contrasting Public vs Private, High Tech vs Low Tech, Big vs Small Revenues, Large Number of Employees vs Few Employees, and Process vs Repetitive, vs Discrete vs Job Shop (313 pages, includes a full set of graphed answers for survey questions).

Individual sections of the research reports, as well as logical combinations of sections are also available. All reports are available in printed or electronic versions.

2002, 2000, 1998 Product Development Metrics Survey: The Summary and Highlights Reports for GGI's prior Biennial Product Development Metrics Surveys are also available for purchase by the public through The Wisdom iStore. Information about the purpose and focus of prior surveys may be found in our Biennial Survey Archives.

GTK- Gateway To Knowledge is a DIRECTORY OF THOUSANDS OF LINKS to providers of engineering, purchasing, and manufacturing technologies and services. If you hit the right subjects, it is more useful than a search engine! The "main entrance" to GTK can be found at:

For those of you that do not want to go through the main entrance above, some of the Gateways that we believe you will find useful or entertaining are highlighted below.

GGI's Calendar of Industry Events contains an up-to-date listing of links to Conferences, Seminars, Distance Learning Centers, Colleges & Universities, Executive Education, and Corporate-Sponsored Universities. The calendar has just been updated with 60 upcoming conferences and seminars throughout 2007. The categories we follow are:
Seminars
Distance Learning Centers
Colleges & Universities
Executive Education
Corporate-Sponsored Universities

The categories of conferences, seminars, and distance learning are further organized into the following subject areas:
Strategic, Knowledge & General Management
Marketing & Sales - Mechanical, Electro-Mechanical, Electrical, & Electronic
Marketing & Sales - Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology, & Life Sciences
Product Development - Mechanical, Electro-Mechanical, Electrical, & Electronic
Product Development - Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology, & Life Sciences
Manufacturing & Automation - Mechanical, Electro-Mechanical, Electrical, & Electronic
Manufacturing & Automation - Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology, & Life Sciences
Software, Internet & IT
Project Management
Metrics

If you are looking for a conference or other learning opportunity, check out the Calendar. This free service for our readers is front and center on GGI's Home Page. Or, go directly to the Calendar of Industry Events MEGA Gateway.

Alexander Haig's World Business Review: Brad Goldense has made several appearances on Alexander Haig's World Business Review. Streaming video is available for all shows, which aired on August 4, September 29 and December 15, 2002 and on May 20, 2003. See below for details.

May 20, 2003 Broadcast of September 29th In-Studio with Alexander Haig (22.5 minutes): Streaming video for this segment is available on GGI's web site.

December 15, 2002 In-Studio with Alexander Haig (7.5 minutes) on CNBC paid programming: Streaming video for this segment is available on GGI's web site.

September 29, 2002 In-Studio with Alexander Haig (22.5 minutes): Streaming video for this segment (as well as the entire 30-minute show) is available on GGI's web site.

August 4, 2002 On-Location at GGI (3.5 minutes): This On-Location field report is available in streaming video on GGI's web site.

The web page includes links to download a streaming video player, if you do not currently have one installed on your computer.

GGI RapidNews is an e-mail publication from Goldense Group, Inc (GGI). Its subject matter includes survey findings, company news, book and article reviews, key industry conferences and R&D information of interest to clients and associates. Please send communications to rn(at)goldensegroupinc.com. Thank you.