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《中国科学院院刊》（中文版）是中国科学院主办的以战略与决策研究为主的科技综...
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FINA北京站次日中国包揽三冠 谢思埸施廷懋连霸
代表建议建中低档月子会所 避免过度消费护理市场
国乒教练批世界排名新规 打压中国乒乓球路人皆知
昆明市高新区原管委会常务副主任郭松被双开
highsociety:宁波江北发生
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    俄罗斯卫星网2月19日报道，2月18日在美国佛罗里达州场集会人群前，美国总统特朗普宣称，要想解决难民危机，必须在叙利亚和其他战争频发的国家建立安全区，特朗普还特别强调，海湾国家应当负担安全区费用。特朗普说：我的想法是在叙利亚和其他类似的地方建立安全区，这样难民们就可以安全地在那里生活。并且，我计划让海湾国家为此出资，他们最不缺的就是钱。这样一来，我们就不用让成千上万的难民涌进美国，我们需要的是爱美。
    日，米歇尔在北卡罗来纳州夏洛特的民主党大会上发表演讲。新华社发今年1月20日，美国当选总统特朗普将正式宣誓就职，而现任总统奥巴马也将卸任，结束8年白宫生涯。与此同时，米歇尔和梅拉尼娅这两位第一夫人也要进行交接。相比引人注目的总统权力移交，第一夫人之间的“交棒”却鲜为外界所知。那么，第一夫人之间又是如何交接的？畅销书《第一夫人》的作者凯特安德森布劳尔近日在美国有线电视新闻网上撰文讲述她所了解的第一夫。
    对等方式”加以回应,但普京却淡然宣布,俄方不会驱逐任何一名美驻俄外交官。非但如此,普京还邀请美驻俄外交官的所有孩子参加克里姆林宫的新年和东正教圣诞节庆典活动,一反以往一贯冷言相向咄咄逼人的普京风格。美国《外交政策》杂志网络版评论称此为“巧妙的一步棋”,而美国候任总统特朗普更是揶揄那些对普京的表态鼓噪不休、又摸不到头绪的美国媒体有点“傻”。新华社内罗毕１月１日电通讯：在困难中看到索马里重建的希望——。
    ，将美国的就业问题同中国直接挂钩，认为中美贸易额变大了，中国人的饭碗多，美国人的饭碗就会相应减少。在这些人看来，美国的就业问题，转变成了怎样让中国人的饭碗重新变成美国人的饭碗。真正的问题是，美国人能不能拿走中国人的饭碗，拿走了能不能端得住？微型钢铁厂技术令美国钢铁厂在50年内减少了75%的雇员，同时产量维持不变。图片来自/规律使然资本往低成本、高收益的地方走，这是基本规律，也是导致多年来美国无法重。
    息称赞普京就美国对俄制裁的回应：“（普京）此举非常伟大！——我一直都知道他是非常聪明的人！”美国12月29日对俄情报部门和一系列个人实施制裁，指责他们“干涉选举”，并宣布将35名被总统奥巴马称为“情报人员”的俄外交官驱逐出境。韩国爆发大规模Ｈ５Ｎ６禽流感，疫情扩散导致鸡蛋价格持续上涨，不少居民已开始将鸡蛋称为“金蛋”。韩国《中央日报》２８日报道，某超市中一板３０个鸡蛋的标价为１.２万韩元（约合６９。
     分钟报》29日称，美国总统当选人特朗普追求的目标是成为世界的。然而他遭到了前任最大的阻碍。不管是外交、劳工政策，还是环保、能源战略，善于承诺的特朗普，未来将遭遇严重的“奥巴马效应”。新华社首尔１２月３０日电（记者杜白羽耿学鹏）据韩联社３０日报道，韩国朝野四大政党院内代表当天在国会首次举行会谈，商定将于２０１７年１月９日至２０日召开国会临时会议，商讨尽早组建修宪特别委员会，改善国家权力结构。本月２７。
（责任编辑：宦谷秋）highsociety_东方家园
院领导集体
中国科学院大学
上海科技大学
《中国科学院院刊》（中文版）是中国科学院主办的以战略与决策研究为主的科技综...
《科学通报》是自然科学综合性学术刊物，力求及时报道自然科学各领域具有创新性...
覆盖数学、物理、化学、生命科学、地球科学、信息科学、技术科学与天文学等学科...
津媒:张修维已与恒大会合 荣昊是否打包交易待定
男子为溶肾结石每天喝两大瓶可乐 两年后患怪病
平昌冬残奥首批韩国运动员3日将入村
张雨生这首遗作沉寂21年 点燃亿万中国人家国情怀
highsociety:大火后北京清退
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    务的方式被认为“很经济”。在许多人的印象里，火箭发射是一件有国家象征意义的事情，无论是军事情报卫星还是民用通信技术卫星的升空，都事关国防军事安全和航天顶尖技术。在这样一件“国家大事”上考虑“经济效益问题”的思路其实并不常见。然而在美国看来，这是宇航技术下放，提升整体航天工业效率的一个缩影。在可预见的2018年，甚至承接了美国军事卫星的发射合同。随着各路创新型科技公司的崛起，美国商业航天的运营模式日。
    进入多事之秋经历了2015年的爆发到2016下半年的骤冷，如今进入2017年，虚拟现实硬件市场萎缩，融资遇冷，呈现出不断“退烧”的迹象。日前，美国脸谱公司旗下的知名虚拟现实头戴显示设备生产商奥克卢斯传出，近期内将关闭在北美地区零售商百思买店内设立的500个免费体验站当中的200个，比例高达四成。这一消息已得到奥克卢斯公司方面的证实，其官方回应称，此举属于“季节性调整”。去年4月，奥克卢斯与百思买达。
    意提前５年修改２０１３年制定、为期１０年的防卫计划大纲，进一步强化日美军事同盟。以解禁集体自卫权为核心内容的日本新安保法去年３月正式实施后，日美军事一体化的动作明显加快。美国新政府上台后，美日军事一体化进程预计仍将推进。被关押一晚后，韩国三星电子副会长、三星集团实际掌权人李在镕18日下午被带往负责调查“亲信干政”事件的特别检察组办公室接受问讯。抵达后，戴着手铐的他径直走进特检组办公地，没有回答任何。
    耀的星星，连接照亮了全世界。它不仅让人体会到阅读的静雅，更让人享受分享的快乐。一枚小小的书箱，在世界各地生根发芽，它装的是知识，分享的却是信任、善意和美好。中国日报网2月19日电据美联社报道，当地时间2月18日，美国总统唐纳德特朗普的两个儿子——埃里克和小唐纳德——现身阿拉伯联合酋长国迪拜，为特朗普国际高尔夫俱乐部揭幕，他们二人还与当地精英阶层私下会面。这使得外界质疑，倘若特朗普的商业帝国继续顶着。
    元，同比名义增长7.9%，增速比1~6月份回落0.6个百分点；商品房销售面积86351万平方米，同比增长14.0%，增速比1~6月份回落2.1个百分点。从上述几个指标性的数据看，今年7月经济放缓是不争的事实。不过需要说明的是，7月份经济数据回落有其客观原因。主要包括，7月份全国大面积的罕见高温天气，高温酷暑下，停产检修的企业比上年明显增加；按照新的发展理念要求，中央环保督查组在今年下半年开始密集出。
     ，中铁总将有序实施铁路企业混合所有制改革和资产资本化。如制定《关于发展混合所有制经济的意见》，按照运输企业、非运输企业、混合所有制企业三个类别，推进实施混合所有制改革；此外，在稳妥推进铁路企业上市方面，印发了《控股合资铁路公司开展资产专项支持证券化业务的实施意见》、《关于加强企业上市及上市公司内部信息管理的规定》等文件，并研究制定了有关企业资本运营和再融资方案，正在推进落实。一位来自券商研究机构的。
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《中国科学院院刊》（中文版）是中国科学院主办的以战略与决策研究为主的科技综...
《科学通报》是自然科学综合性学术刊物，力求及时报道自然科学各领域具有创新性...
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澳观光小火车撞上旅游巴士 致四名中国游客受伤
中超金靴进球数有望破纪录 扎哈维受到空前挑战？
外援MVP晒与马尚合影：对手也能成为好朋友
毛大庆：桑拿天里和冬奥冠军同跑
highsociety:李家西路爆炸是什么原因
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    活动。新华社记者贺灿铃摄新华社伊斯坦布尔1月1日电(记者易爱军)土耳其最大城市伊斯坦布尔一家夜总会1日凌晨遭遇恐怖袭击。伊斯坦布尔省省长瓦西皮沙欣说,这起跨年夜袭击已造成35人死亡,40人受伤。据中国驻伊斯坦布尔总领馆消息,目前未发现有中国公民伤亡消息。沙欣说,袭击系一名武装人员所为。一名不愿公开姓名的安全人士对新华社记者说,这名枪手开枪打死了夜总会保安人员,然后闯入夜总会,袭击者在开枪扫射过程中。
    包括在停火协议之中。土耳其官方媒体28日爆料，土耳其已经与俄罗斯就在叙利亚全国范围内实施停火达成框架性协议，最早将于当地时间29日零时落实停火。土耳其、俄罗斯和叙利亚冲突相关方没有证实这一报道。土耳其阿纳多卢通讯社当天援引匿名消息源报道，土耳其和俄罗斯同意将阿勒颇停火协议推广到叙利亚全境，依照俄美之前在叙利亚达成的停火先例，“伊斯兰国”和“征服阵线”等恐怖组织不属于停火对象。报道称，如果停火协议落。
    一天失踪的小型飞机的残骸，确认机上4人全部死亡。华盛顿州交通运输部门说，这架塞斯纳单引擎飞机29日下午从西雅图起飞，计划飞往安吉利斯港，起飞45分钟后与空管人员失去联系。经过一天搜寻，救援人员借助飞机紧急定位系统在杰斐逊县的山谷中找到飞机残骸，确认机上无人生还。目前暂不清楚机上人员身份。此外，一架载有6人的小型飞机29日从克利夫兰湖岸机场起飞，随即在伊利湖附近失踪。机上载有美国一家饮料公司的高管约。
    学”为展览思想，从“本土”“主体”“语言”三个视角呈现当代中国绘画的样貌与生态，表达了中国当代艺术创作群体的独特面貌。青年画家周松的作品《熵ＮＯ．３》通过描绘人工智能之眼，表达了画家对“艺术与科学”关系的思考。他告诉记者，当下的后工业文明时代以科技、智能、互联网等为主题，艺术创作应该结合时代背景进行跨学科的思考，并通过艺术去呈现未来。希望通过作品向国际受众展示中国青年艺术家的独立思考。在韩国素有三。
    与特朗普“二王争夺”，美国人到底支持谁？美国民调公司盖洛普28日发布的最新民调显示，奥巴马被选为最受美国人敬仰的男性，特朗普位居第二。这也是奥巴马第九次被选为最受美国人敬仰的男性。希拉里被选为最受美国人敬仰的女性。日本《朝日新闻》29日称，马萨诸塞州大学进行的以年轻人为对象的调查中，比起特朗普，希望奥巴马继续执政的人为66%。复旦大学美研中心副主任宋国友对《环球时报》记者表示，目前奥巴马和特朗普互。
     往前走了。他还说，为了美国及美国人民的利益，他下周将与情报界的领袖会晤，以了解相关情况的最新事实。摩洛哥执政党消息人士２９日说，摩洛哥执法部门逮捕了５名涉嫌庆祝俄罗斯驻土耳其大使安德烈卡尔洛夫遇害的青年男子。法新社援引公正与发展党消息人士的话报道，这５名男子来自这一执政党的青年团体。摩洛哥《今日消息报》报道，另有一名男子已经接到警方传唤通知。摩洛哥首相阿卜杜拉本基兰领导的公正与发展党尚未就此置评。。
（责任编辑：野嘉丽）The New New Product Development Game
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The New New Product Development Game
<stream-item class="stream-item"
data-id="tag:hbr.org,:36-86116"
data-title="The New New Product Development Game"
data-url="/1986/01/the-new-new-product-development-game"
data-topic="Leading teams"
data-authors="Hirotaka TIkujiro Nonaka"
data-content-type="Digital Article"
data-content-image=""
data-summary="In today’s fast-paced, fiercely competitive world of commercial new product development, speed and flexibility are essential. Companies are increasingly realizing that the old, sequential approach to developing new products simply won’t get the job done. Instead, companies in Japan and the United States are using a holistic method—as in rugby, the ball gets passed within […]
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In today’s fast-paced, fiercely competitive world of commercial new product development, speed and flexibility are essential. Companies are increasingly realizing that the old, sequential approach to developing new products simply won’t get the job done. Instead, companies in Japan and the United States are using a holistic method—as in rugby, the ball gets passed within the team as it moves as a unit up the field.
This holistic approach has six characteristics: built-in instability, self-organizing project teams, overlapping development phases, “multilearning,” subtle control, and organizational transfer of learning. The six pieces fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, forming a fast flexible process for new product development. Just as important, the new approach can act as a change agent: it is a vehicle for introducing creative, market-driven ideas and processes into an old, rigid organization.
The rules of the game in new product development are changing. Many companies have discovered that it takes more than the accepted basics of high quality, low cost, and differentiation to excel in today’s competitive market. It also takes speed and flexibility.
This change is reflected in the emphasis companies are placing on new products as a source of new sales and profits. At 3M, for example, products less than five years old account for 25% of sales. A 1981 survey of 700 U.S. companies indicated that new products would account for one-third of all profits in the 1980s, an increase from one-fifth in the 1970s.1
This new emphasis on speed and flexibility calls for a different approach for managing new product development. The traditional sequential or “relay race” approach to product development—exemplified by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s phased program planning (PPP) system—may conflict with the goals of maximum speed and flexibility. Instead, a holistic or “rugby” approach—where a team tries to go the distance as a unit, passing the ball back and forth—may better serve today’s competitive requirements.
Under the old approach, a product development process moved like a relay race, with one group of functional specialists passing the baton to the next group. The project went sequentially from phase to phase: concept development, feasibility testing, product design, development process, pilot production, and final production. Under this method, functions were specialized and segmented: the marketing people examined customer needs and perceptions in develop the R&D engineers selected th the production enginee and other functional specialists carried the baton at different stages of the race.
Under the rugby approach, the product development process emerges from the constant interaction of a hand-picked, multidisciplinary team whose members work together from start to finish. Rather than moving in defined, highly structured stages, the process is born out of the team members’ interplay (see Exhibit 1). A group of engineers, for example, may start to design the product (phase three) before all the results of the feasibility tests (phase two) are in. Or the team may be forced to reconsider a decision as a result of later information. The team does not stop then, but engages in iterative experimentation. This goes on in even the latest phases of the development process.
Exhibit 1 Sequential (A) vs. overlapping (B and C) phases of development
Exhibit 1 illustrates the difference between the traditional, linear approach to product development and the rugby approach. The sequential approach, labeled type A, is typified by the NASA-type PPP system. The overlap approach is represented by type B, where the overlapping occurs only at the border of adjacent phases, and type C, where the overlap extends across several phases. We observed a type B overlap at Fuji-Xerox and a type C overlap at Honda and Canon.
This approach is essential for companies seeking to develop new products quickly and flexibly. The shift from a linear to an integrated approach encourages trial and error and challenges the status quo. It stimulates new kinds of learning and thinking within the organization at different levels and functions. Just as important, this strategy for product development can act as an agent of change for the larger organization. The energy and motivation the effort produces can spread throughout the big company and begin to break down some of the rigidities that have set in over time.
In this article, we highlight companies both in Japan and in the United States that have taken a new approach to managing the product development process. Our research examined such multinational companies as Fuji-Xerox, Canon, Honda, NEC, Epson, Brother, 3M, Xerox, and Hewlett-Packard. We then analyzed the development process of six specific products:
FX-3500 medium-sized copier (introduced by Fuji-Xerox in 1978)
PC-10 personal-use copier (Canon, 1982)
City car with 1200 cc engine (Honda, 1981)
PC 8000 personal computer (NEC, 1979)
AE-1 single-lens reflex camera (Canon, 1976)
Auto Boy, known as the Sure Shot in the United States, lens shutter camera, (Canon, 1979)
We selected each product on the basis of its impact, its visibility within the company as part of a “breakthrough” development process, the novelty of the product features at the time, the market success of the product, and the access to and availability of data on each product.
Moving the Scrum Downfield
From interviews with organization members from the CEO to young engineers, we learned that leading companies show six characteristics in managing their new product development processes:
1. Built-in instability
2. Self-organizing project teams
3. Overlapping development phases
4. “Multilearning”
5. Subtle control
6. Organizational transfer of learning
These characteristics are like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Each element, by itself, does not bring about speed and flexibility. But taken as a whole, the characteristics can produce a powerful new set of dynamics that will make a difference.
Built-in Instability
Top management kicks off the development process by signaling a broad goal or a general strategic direction. It rarely hands out a clear-cut new product concept or a specific work plan. But it offers a project team a wide measure of freedom and also establishes extremely challenging goals. For example, Fuji-Xerox’s top management asked for a radically different copier and gave the FX-3500 project team two years to come up with a machine that could be produced at half the cost of its high-end line and still perform as well.
Top management creates an element of tension in the project team by giving it great freedom to carry out a project of strategic importance to the company and by setting very challenging requirements. An executive in charge of development at Honda remarked, “It’s like putting the team members on the second floor, removing the ladder, and telling them to jump or else. I believe creativity is born by pushing people against the wall and pressuring them almost to the extreme.”
Self-organizing Project Teams
A project team takes on a self-organizing character as it is driven to a state of “zero information”—where prior knowledge does not apply. Ambiguity and fluctuation abound in this state. Left to stew, the process begins to create its own dynamic order.2 The project team begins to operate like a start-up company—it takes initiatives and risks, and develops an independent agenda. At some point, the team begins to create its own concept.
A group possesses a self-organizing capability when it exhibits three conditions: autonomy, self-transcendence, and cross-fertilization. In our study of the various new product development teams, we found all three conditions.
Autonomy. Headquarters’ involvement is limited to providing guidance, money, and moral support at the outset. On a day-to-day basis, top manageme the team is free to set its own direction. In a way, top management acts as a venture capitalist. Or as one executive said, “We open up our purse but keep our mouth closed.”
This kind of autonomy was evident when IBM developed its personal computer. A small group of engineers began working on the machine in a converted warehouse in remote Boca Raton, Florida. Except for quarterly corporate reviews, headquarters in Armonk, New York allowed the Boca Raton group to operate on its own. The group got the go-ahead to take unconventional steps such as selecting outside suppliers for its microprocessor and software package.
We observed other examples of autonomy in our case studies:
The Honda City project team, whose members’ average age was 27, had these instructions from management: to develop “the kind of car that the youth segment would like to drive.” An engineer said, “It’s incredible how the company called in young engineers like ourselves to design a car with a totally new concept and gave us the freedom to do it our way.”
A small group of sales engineers who originally sold microprocessors built the PC 8000 at NEC. The group started with no knowledge about personal computers. “We were given the go-ahead from top management to proceed with the project, provided we would develop the product by ourselves and also be responsible for manufacturing, selling, and servicing it on our own,” remarked the project’s head.
Self-transcendence. The project teams appear to be absorbed in a never-ending quest for “the limit.” Starting with the guidelines set forth by top management, they begin to establish their own goals and keep on elevating them throughout the development process. By pursuing what appear at first to be contradictory goals, they devise ways to override the status quo and make the big discovery.
We observed many examples of self-transcendence in our field work. The Canon AE-1 project team came up with new ideas to meet the challenging parameters set forth by top management. The company asked the team to develop a high-quality, automatic exposure camera that had to be compact, lightweight, easy to use, and priced 30% lower than the prevailing price of single-lens cameras. To reach this ambitious target, the project team achieved several firsts in camera design and production: an electronic brain consisting of integrated circuits custom-made by Texas I modularized production, which made automation and mass and reduction in the number of parts by 30% to 40%. “It was a struggle because we had to deny our traditional way of thinking,” recalled the head of the AE-1 team. “But we do that every day in the ongoing parts of our business,” responded another Canon executive. The entire organization makes daily, incremental improvements to strengthen what the president calls “the fundamentals”: R&D, production technology, selling prowess, and corporate culture.
The Honda City project team also achieved a breakthrough by transcending the status quo. The team was asked to develop a car with two competitive features for the youth segment: efficiency in resources and fuel, and uncompromising quality at a low price. The team’s natural instinct was to develop a scaled-down version of Honda’s best-selling Civic model. But after much debate, the team decided to develop a car with a totally new concept. It challenged the prevailing idea that a car should be long and low and designed a “short and tall” car. Convinced that an evolution toward a “machine minimum, human maximum” concept was inevitable, the team was willing to risk going against the industry norm.
Cross-fertilization. A project team consisting of members with varying functional specializations, thought processes, and behavior patterns carries out new product development. The Honda team, for example, consisted of hand-picked members from R&D, production, and sales. The company went a step further by placing a wide variety of personalities on the team. Such diversity fostered new ideas and concepts.
While selecting a diverse team is crucial, it isn’t until the members start to interact that cross-fertilization actually takes place. Fuji-Xerox located the multifunctional team building the FX-3500—consisting of members from the planning, design, production, sales, distribution, and evaluation departments—in one large room. A project member gave the following rationale for this step: “When all the team members are located in one large room, someone’s information becomes yours, without even trying. You then start thinking in terms of what’s best or second best for the group at large and not only about where you stand. If everyone understands the other person’s position, then each of us is more willing to give in, or at least to try to talk to each other. Initiatives emerge as a result.”
Overlapping Development Phases
The self-organizing character of the team produces a unique dynamic or rhythm. Although the team members start the project with different time horizons—with R&D people having the longest time horizon and production people the shortest—they all must work toward synchronizing their pace to meet deadlines. Also, while the project team starts from “zero information,” each member soon begins to share knowledge about the marketplace and the technical community. As a result, the team begins to work as a unit. At some point, the individual and the whole become inseparable. The individual’s rhythm and the group’s rhythm begin to overlap, creating a whole new pulse. This pulse serves as the driving force and moves the team forward.
But the quickness of the pulse varies in different phases of development. The beat seems to be most vigorous in the early phases and tapers off toward the end. A member of Canon’s PC-10 development team described this rhythm as follows: “When we are debating about what kind of concept to create, our minds go off in different directions and list alternatives. But when we are trying to come to grips with achieving both low cost and high reliability, our minds work to integrate the various points of view. Conflict tends to occur when some are trying to differentiate and others are trying to integrate. The knack lies in creating this rhythm and knowing when to move from one state to the other.”
Under the sequential or relay race approach, a project goes through several phases in a step-by-step fashion, moving from one phase to the next only after all the requirements of the preceding phase are satisfied. These checkpoints control risk. But at the same time, this approach leaves little room for integration. A bottleneck in one phase can slow or even halt the entire development process.
Under the holistic or rugby approach, the phases overlap considerably, which enables the group to absorb the vibration or “noise” generated throughout the development process. When a bottleneck appears, the level of noise obviously increases. But the process does not c the team manages to push itself forward.
Fuji-Xerox inherited the PPP system (see type A in Exhibit 1) from its parent company, but revised it in two ways. First, it reduced the number of phases from six to four by redefining some of the phases and aggregating them differently. Second, it changed the linear, sequential system into the so-called “sashimi” system. Sashimi is slices of raw fish arranged on a plate, one slice overlapping the other (see Exhibit 2.)
Exhibit 2 Fuji-Xerox’s product development schedule
The sashimi system requires extensive interaction not only among project members but also with suppliers. The FX-3500 team invited them to join the project at the very start (they eventually produced 90% of the parts for the model). Each side regularly visited the other’s plants and kept the information channel open at all times. This kind of exchange and openness—both within the project team and with suppliers—increases speed and flexibility. Fuji-Xerox shortened the development time from 38 months for an earlier model to 29 months for the FX-3500.
If sashimi defines the Fuji-Xerox approach, then rugby describes the overlapping at Honda. Like a rugby team, the core project members at Honda stay intact from beginning to end and are responsible for combining all of the phases.
In the relay-like PPP system, the crucial problems tend to occur at the points where one group passes the project to the next. The rugby approach smooths out this problem by maintaining continuity across phases.
The Auto Boy project proceeded with much overlapping across phases as well. Canon’s design engineers stayed alert throughout the process to make sure their design was being converted into what they had in mind. The production people intruded onto the design engineers’ turf to make sure that the design was in accord with production scale economies.
The overlapping approach has both merits and demerits. Greater speed and increased flexibility are the “hard” merits. But the approach also has a set of “soft” merits relating to human resource management. The overlap approach enhances shared responsibility and cooperation, stimulates involvement and commitment, sharpens a problem-solving focus, encourages initiative taking, develops diversified skills, and heightens sensitivity toward market conditions.
The more obvious demerits result from having to manage an intensive process. Problems include communicating with the entire project team, maintaining close contact with suppliers, preparing several contingency plans, and handling surprises. This approach also creates more tension and conflict in the group. As one project member aptly put it, “If someone from development thinks that 1 out of 100 is good, that’s a clear sign for going ahead. But if someone from production thinks that 1 out of 100 is not good, we’ve got to start all over. This gap in perception creates conflict.”
The overlapping of phases also does away with traditional notions about division of labor. Division of labor works well in a type A system, where management clearly delineates tasks, expects all project members to know their responsibilities, and evaluates each on an individual basis. Under a type B or C system, the company accomplishes the tasks through what we call “shared division of labor,” where each team member feels responsible for—and is able to work on—any aspect of the project.
Multilearning
Because members of the project team stay in close touch with outside sources of information, they can respond quickly to changing market conditions. Team members engage in a continual process of trial and error to narrow down the number of alternatives that they must consider. They also acquire broad knowledge and diverse skills, which help them create a versatile team capable of solving an array of problems fast.
Such learning by doing manifests itself along two dimensions: across multiple levels (individual, group, and corporate) and across multiple functions. We refer to these two dimensions of learning as “multilearning.”
Multilevel learning. Learning at the individual level takes place in a number of ways. 3M, for example, encourages engineers to devote 15% of their company time to pursuing their “dream.” Canon utilizes peer pressure to foster individual learning. A design engineer for the PC-10 project explained, “My senior managers and some of my colleagues really study hard. There is no way I can compete with them in the number of books they read. So whenever I have time, I go to a department store and spend several hours in the toy department. I observe what’s selling and check out the new gadgets being used in the toys. They may give me a hint or two later on.”
Learning is pursued emphatically at the group level as well. Honda, for example, dispatched several members of the City project team to Europe for three weeks when the project reached a dead end at the concept development phase. They were told simply to “look around at what’s happening in Europe.” There they encountered the Mini-Cooper—a small car developed decades ago in the United Kingdom—which had a big impact on their design philosophy.
While it was developing the PC-10 copier, Canon team members left the project offices to hold a number of meetings in nearby hotels. In one of the early meetings, the entire project team broke up into subgroups, each with a representative from the design team and the production team. Each subgroup was told to calculate the cost of a key part and figure out ways of reducing that cost by one-third. “Since every subgroup faced the same mandate and the same deadline, we had no choice,” recalled one project member. Learning took place in a hurry.
Learning at the corporate level is best achieved by establishing a company-wide movement or program. Fuji-Xerox, for example, used the total quality control (TQC) movement as a basis for changing the corporate mentality. TQC was designed to heighten the entire organization’s sensitivity toward simultaneous quality and productivity improvement, market orientation, cost reduction, and work simplification. To achieve these goals, everyone in the organization had to learn the basics of techniques like statistical quality control and value engineering.
Hewlett-Packard embarked on a four-phased training program in marketing as part of the corporation’s aim to become more market-oriented. The company now brings in top academics and business consultants to spread the marketing message. It also applies techniques borrowed from the consumer packaged goods industry, such as focus group interviews, quantitative market research, and test marketing. Further, the company has created a corporate marketing division to accelerate what one insider calls “the transition from a company run by engineers for engineers to one with a stronger marketing focus.”
Multifunctional learning. Experts are encouraged to accumulate experience in areas other than their own. For instance:
All the project members who developed Epson’s first miniprinter were mechanical engineers who knew little about electronics at the start. So the leader of the project team, also a mechanical engineer, returned to his alma mater as a researcher and studied electrical engineering for two years. He did this while the project was under way. By the time they had completed the miniprinter project, all the engineers were knowledgeable about electronics. “I tell my people to be well-versed in two technological fields and in two functional areas, like design and marketing,” the leader said. “Even in an engineering-oriented company like ours, you can’t get ahead without the ability to foresee developments in the market.”
The team working on NEC’s PC 8000 consisted of sales engineers from the Electronic Devices Division. They acquired much of the know-how to develop the company’s first personal computer by putting together TK 80, a computer kit, and introducing it on the market two years in advance of the PC 8000; and by stationing themselves for about a year, even on weekends, at BIT-IN, an NEC service center in the middle of Akihabara, talking with hobbyists and learning the user’s viewpoint.
These examples show the important role that multilearning plays in the company’s overall human resource management program. It fosters initiative and learning by doing on the part of the employees and helps keep them up to date with the latest developments. It also serves as a basis for creating a climate that can bring about organizational transition.
Subtle Control
Although project teams are largely on their own, they are not uncontrolled. Management establishes enough checkpoints to prevent instability, ambiguity, and tension from turning into chaos. At the same time, management avoids the kind of rigid control that impairs creativity and spontaneity. Instead, the emphasis is on “self-control,” “control through peer pressure,” and “control by love,” which collectively we call “subtle control.”
Subtle control is exercised in the new product development process in seven ways:
1. Selecting the right people for the project team while monitoring shifts in group dynamics and adding or dropping members when necessary. “We would add an older and more conservative member to the team should the balance shift too much toward radicalism,” said a Honda executive. “We carefully pick the project members after long deliberation. We analyze the different personalities to see if they would get along. Most people do get along, thanks to our common set of values.”
2. Creating an open work environment, as in the case of Fuji-Xerox.
3. Encouraging engineers to go out into the field and listen to what customers and dealers have to say. “A design engineer may be tempted to take the easy way out at times, but may reflect on what the customer had to say and try to find some way of meeting that requirement,” noted an engineer from Fuji-Xerox.
4. Establishing an evaluation and reward system based on group performance. Canon, for example, applied for patents for products from the PC-10 project on a group basis.
5. Managing the differences in rhythm throughout the development process. As mentioned earlier, the rhythm is most vigorous in the early phases and tapers off toward the end.
6. Tolerating and anticipating mistakes. Engineers at Honda are fond of saying that “a 1% success rate is supported by mistakes made 99% of the time.” A Brother executive in charge of R&D said, “It’s natural for young engineers to make a lot of mistakes. The key lies in finding the mistakes early and taking steps to correct them immediately. We’ve taken steps to expedite the trial production cycle for that reason.” A 3M executive noted, “I believe we learn more from mistakes than from successes. That’s not to say we should make mistakes easily. But if we do make mistakes, we ought to make them creatively.”
7. Encouraging suppliers to become self-organizing. Involving them early during design is a step in the right direction. But the project team should refrain from telling suppliers what to do. As Xerox found out, suppliers produce better results when they have the problem explained to them and are allowed to decide how to furnish the parts.
Transfer of Learning
The drive to accumulate knowledge across levels and functions is only one aspect of learning. We observed an equally strong drive on the part of the project members to transfer their learning to others outside the group.
Transfer of learning to subsequent new product development projects or to other divisions in the organization takes place regularly. In several of the companies we studied, the transfer took place through “osmosis”—by assigning key individuals to subsequent projects. A Honda executive explained, “If the factory is up and running and the early-period claims are resolved, we dismantle the project team, leaving only a few people to follow through. Since we have only a limited number of unusually able people, we turn them loose on another key project immediately.”
Knowledge is also transmitted in the organization by converting project activities to standard practice. At Canon, for example, the Auto Boy project produced a format for conducting reviews that was used in later projects. One team member recalled, “We used to meet once a month or so to exchange notes on individual subprojects in progress and once in three months or so to discuss the project from a larger perspective. This pattern later became institutionalized into the monthly and quarterly progress reviews adopted from the PC-10 minicopier project.”
Naturally, companies try to institutionalize the lessons derived from their successes. IBM is trying to emulate the personal computer development project—which was completed in 13 months with outside help—throughout the company.
At Hewlett-Packard, the personal computer group is reprogramming the way the entire company develops and sells new products. In the past, the company was famous for designing a machine for a particular customer and charging a premium price. But it recently engineered its ThinkJet—a quiet inkjet printer—for low-cost mass production and priced it low. Within six months of its introduction, the printer captured 10% of the low-end market. Hewlett-Packard began to apply what it had learned from designing and pricing ThinkJet to its minicomputer line. Within months of putting ThinkJet on the market, the company introduced a minicomputer system for a broad corporate audience at a modest price.
But institutionalization, when carried too far, can create its own danger. Passing down words of wisdom from the past or establishing standard practices based on success stories works well when the external environment is stable. Changes in the environment, however, can quickly make such lessons impractical.
Several companies have tried to unlearn old lessons. Unlearning helps keep the development team in tune with the realities of the outside environment. It also acts as a springboard for making more incremental improvements.
Much of the unlearning is triggered by changes in the environment. But some companies consciously pursue unlearning. Consider these examples:
Epson’s target is to have the next-generation model in development stages as a new model is being introduced on the market. The company tells its project teams that the next-generation model must be at least 40% better than the existing one.
When Honda was building the third-generation Civic model, its project team opted to scrap all the old parts and start anew. When the car made its debut before the public, all the new parts were displayed right next to the car at the request of the project members. The car won the 1984 Car of the Year Award in Japan.
Fuji-Xerox has refined its sashimi approach, first adopted for the FX-3500. Compared with that effort, a new product today requires one-half of the original total manpower. Fuji-Xerox has also reduced the product development cycle from 4 years to 24 months.
Some Limitations
Some words of caution are in order. The holistic approach to product development may not work in all situations. It has some built-in limitations:
It requires extraordinary effort on the part of all project members throughout the span of the development process. Sometimes, team members record monthly overtime of 100 hours during the peak and 60 hours during the rest of the project.
It may not apply to breakthrough projects that require a revolutionary innovation. This limitation may be particularly true in biotechnology or chemistry.
It may not apply to mammoth projects like those in the aerospace business, where the sheer project scale limits extensive face-to-face discussions.
It may not apply to organizations where product development is masterminded by a genius who makes the invention and hands down a well-defined set of specifications for people below to follow.
Some limitations also stem from the scope of our research. Our sample size was limited to a handful of companies, and our findings were drawn, for the most part, from observing how the development process was managed in Japan. General conclusions, therefore, must be made with some caution. But as new approaches to product development gain acceptance in the United States, the difference between the two countries may not be so much a difference of kind as a difference of degree.
Managerial Implications
Changes in the environment—intensified competition, a splintered mass market, shortened product life cycles, and advanced technology and automation—are forcing managements to reconsider the traditional ways of creating products. A product that arrives a few months late can easily lose several months of payback. A product designed by an engineer afflicted with the “next bench” syndrome—the habit of designing a product by asking the coworker on the next bench what kind of a product he or she would like—may not meet the flexible requirements of the marketplace.
To achieve speed and flexibility, companies must manage the product development process differently. Three kinds of changes should be considered.
First, companies need to adopt a management style that can promote the process. Executives must recognize at the outset that product development seldom proceeds in a linear and static manner. It involves an iterative and dynamic process of trial and error. To manage such a process, companies must maintain a highly adaptive style.
Because projects do not proceed in a totally rational and consistent manner, adaptability is particularly important. Consider, for example, situations where:
Top management encourages trial and error by purposely keeping goals broad and by tolerating ambiguity. But at the same time, it sets challenging goals and creates tension within the group and within the organization.
The process by which variety is amplified (differentiation) and reduced (integration) takes place throughout the overlapping phases of the development cycle. Differentiation, however, tends to dominate the concept development phase of the cycle, and integration begins to take over the subsequent phases.
Operational decisions are made incrementally, but important strategic decisions are delayed as much as possible in order to allow a more flexible response to last-minute feedback from the marketplace.
Because management exercises subtle forms of control throughout the development process, these seemingly contradictory goals do not create total confusion. Subtle control is also consistent with the self-organizing character of the project teams.
Second, a different kind of learning is required. Under the traditional approach, a highly competent group of specialists undertakes new product development. An elite group of technical experts does most of the learning. Knowledge is accumulated on an individual basis, within a narrow area of focus—what we call learning in depth.
In contrast, under the new approach (in its extreme form) nonexperts undertake product development. They are encouraged to acquire the necessary knowledge and skills on the job. Unlike the experts, who cannot tolerate mistakes even 1% of the time, the nonexperts are willing to challenge the status quo. But to do so, they must accumulate knowledge from across all areas of management, across different levels of the organization, functional specializations, and even organizational boundaries. Such learning in breadth serves as the necessary condition for shared division of labor to function effectively.
Third, management should assign a different mission to new product development. Most companies have treated it primarily as a generator of future revenue streams. But in some companies, new product development also acts as a catalyst to bring about change in the organization. The personal computer project, for example, is said to have changed the way IBM thinks. Projects coming out of Hewlett-Packard’s personal computer group, including ThinkJet, have changed its engineering-driven culture.
No company finds it easy to mobilize itself for change, especially in noncrisis situations. But the self-transcendent nature of the project teams and the hectic pace at which the team members work help to trigger a sense of crisis or urgency throughout the organization. A development project of strategic importance to the company, therefore, can create a wartime working environment even during times of peace.
Changes affecting the entire organization are also difficult to carry out within highly structured companies, especially seniority-based companies like the ones commonly found in Japan. But unconventional moves, which may be difficult to pull off during times of peace, can be legitimized during times of war. Thus management can uproot a competent manager or assign a very young engineer to the project without encountering much resistance.
Once the project team is formed, it begins to rise in stature because of its visibility (“we’ve been hand-picked”), its legitimate power (“we have unconditional support from the top to create something new”), and its sense of mission (“we’re working to solve a crisis”). It serves as a motor for corporate change as project members from a variety of functional areas begin to take strategic initiatives that sometimes go beyond the company’s conventional domain and as their knowledge gets transferred to subsequent projects.
The environment in which any multinational company—from the United States or Japan—operates has changed dramatically in recent years. The rules of the game for competing effectively in today’s world market have changed accordingly. Multinationals must achieve speed and flexibility in to do so requires the use of a dynamic process involving much reliance on trial and error and learning by doing. What we need today is constant innovation in a world of constant change.
A version of this article appeared in the
issue of Harvard Business Review.
Ikujiro Nonaka () is a professor emeritus at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.
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