Product Innovation Research Results

This week’s assignment was to blog on the recent article in Business Wire about innovation challenges in the consumer goods markets.  The article can be found at: https://exchange.wpi.edu/owa/redir.aspx?C=fcbe91f5dab140c38d81c45377af0ff5&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.businesswire.com%2fnews%2fhome%2f20111011005513%2fen%2fResearch-Study-Uncovers-Product-Innovation-Challenges-Facing%2520.

The article mentions two things that to me are interrelated.  The first is the fact that only 20 percent of the ideas generated resulted in highly innovative products.  The second is that 60 percent of the respondents indicated that development resources were stretched too thin.  It seems that consumer goods manufacturers are not properly funding their new product development teams.  I know that some companies put great pressure on getting a project done on time and this leads the project teams to ‘dumb down’ the overall scope into a small fraction of the original intent.  These teams are under funded and under staffed.  This lack of resources leads to launches that are late and underwhelming.

What I find in most new product launches is that the managers lack the intuitiveness to really see through what needs to happen.  Commitments are then made that are unrealistic.  The launch team will start getting behind or going over budget.  Next features of the design are dropped and process steps are ‘forgotten’.  Ultimately the launch falls prey to the capability trap.

Chris