
Is Digital Transformation about Adoption or Innovation?
Digital transformation is a popular phrase in business today. The pandemic has created a massive shift to work from home, remote work, online ordering, and other digital transformation efforts. It has been a frequent topic in strategy forums, webinars, C-suites, and more. There is no question that we are experiencing
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The Value of Building Granularity into Product Development
I suspect first we will have to define what is meant by granularity. This means that we plan, manage, execute our work at a more granular or detailed level. This applies to the work itself; it’s not just “execute test” but design the test, plan the test, execute the test,
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Why should you have a Chief Engineer?
I’ve had conversations with numerous advisory clients this year about the role of the Chief Engineer. To be clear, I don’t generally advocate that an organization install this role. It is heralded in the lean product development community as a key aspect of such a transformation. Other than having clear
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Generating Knowledge Through Lean Product Development
Effectively and efficiently generate knowledge through lean product development. Ask someone in product development what they produce, and they will likely say specs, tests, drawings, models, and other such artifacts. But those are only artifacts. They are manifestations of what you are truly producing, which is knowledge. Knowledge of what
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Trust in Product Development
What does trust have to do with product development? I have written quite a bit about product development, and also about trust (for links, see the bottom of this article). But what do they have to do with one another other than the fact that one is important and the
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Successful Lean Steering Committees [from the archives]
Do you have a group of people leading lean? Whether formal or informal, there is often such as group particularly early in the lean journey (meaning the first several years). I get a lot of questions by email, some by clients and others by readers. Many are two specific to
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The Invincible Company
I recently read The Invincible Company, the latest in a series that began as Business Model Generation. This very much depends on that first book. But if you’re currently rethinking your strategy and business model, then this book might be for you. The Invincible Company: https://amzn.to/3kIX2xt Business Model Generation: https://amzn.to/3mHjOaY
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Is the Right Attitude Enough?
Robert Fritz is the person who best articulated the concept of creative tension which I brought into the lean community as a perspective that in many ways personifies the lean thinking process. Because the book that exposed this concept to the majority of people is The Fifth Discipline by Peter
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What Job Does Your Product Do?
Especially now, if your company has been disrupted by the pandemic, or you’re looking for new strategies to grow into the situation, people are thinking about new products, services, and value propositions. Most companies think about what they already have, what they are already doing, and just focus on better
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The Board of Directors’ Role in the 2020 Crises
2020 has been a year to stress-test people, governments, and companies. On August 19th, 2019, the Business Roundtable shocked many with a statement that the purpose of business was not just to make money for shareholders, but all stakeholders have interests that mattered: “The CEOs of Business Roundtable adopted a
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