The “Pivot” is synonymous with successful startups. Experts love to tell the stories about how pivots are the key to success. Paypal, Starbucks, and Twitter all found fortune through a pivot. And you’ll also hear business school and consulting jargon thrown at the topic. Phrases spring to mind like strategic agility and business model re-alignment. […]
Innovation can drive business growth. It’s a key to every organization’s well-being. But many companies carry out innovation haphazardly. They’re more likely to count on serendipity, not strategic thinking, to drive gains from innovation. Unfortunately, management teams have little clarity on why, how, or when to advance product offerings. No wonder Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen […]
If you’re interested in NPD and R&D portfolio management, here is an important insight: Most Portfolio Management presentations discuss only development projects. They do not show, analyze, or rationalize front-end work. Anyone new to product development might assume Portfolio Management should only be about products under development. But if that’s all, then portfolio management misses its greatest opportunity for […]
I have a simple message for everyone involved in product development. This message is especially important for PMOs. These are the manager’s responsible for analyzing project portfolios. They calculate resources and priorities to determine who should work on which projects. “Portfolio Balance” is misguided. The problem is no one knows what the “balance” should be. […]
Project prioritization is difficult. As a result, senior managers who govern portfolios often make things up as they go. Why not? Somebody must figure what’s more important and what’s not. It might as well be whoever is looking at the bubble charts. There are two big challenges with figuring out project prioritization. First, product lines […]
A Framework for Deconstructing and Improving Product Lines Strategies Business strategy is interesting. To many managers, business strategy seems monolithic. In reality, it wraps around many functional strategies. Supply chain management has a strategy. Sales has a strategy. Manufacturing has a strategy. Plus, companies can stress strategies for areas like brand management, engineering, information technology, […]
Stage Gate Portfolio Management? If you are interested in NPD and R&D portfolio management, here is an important insight: Most Portfolio Management discussions, presentations, and articles address only the management of those projects that are under development. To state this in terms of process management, the insight is that portfolio management focuses only on those […]
Interested in Product Line Strategies or Product Line Roadmaps? Here are eight (of many) important facts: The biggest mistake companies make regarding product line strategies is to do nothing at all. Orientation toward one-off product development seldom beats a competitor’s “proactive” multi-generation product line strategy, no matter how good innovation techniques, portfolio management, and project […]
