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HOW A ROADMAP CAN LEAD TO COMPANY GROWTH IN A COMPETITIVE MARKETPLACE
A sustainable company should have a planning process in place that attempts to improve the steps it takes toward achieving business excellence. This is especially true for its process of bringing a product to market, also known as the product development process (PDP).
The plan should be progressive, must be able to project the performance progression of the PDP and the maturity of organization capability (MOC), and show what technologies and methods are needed to continuously improve the PDP and MOC. All of that can be achieved with a product development improvement roadmap (PDIR).
Understanding the structure and progression of a company's plan allows its employees to be proactive by communicating the company's vision, encouraging collaboration, accruing necessary resources and expertise to improve, and creating contingency plans. Ultimately, the end result will be business excellence.
Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) can help evaluate a system in terms of what functions it needs to perform and what form it needs to take to be effective and reliable.12 Figure 1 illustrates a method for implementing DFSS for PDP, while Figure 2 illustrates how DFSS principles are applicable to stages in the product development lifecycle.
As a means of developing economical solutions to technical problems, DFSS can be simultaneously perceived as an indicator and catalyst to measure the MOC of a company and the progression of its PDP. In other words, deploying DFSS can help a company measure the success of its business.
Generally, company executives are accountable for developing a PDIR. Deployment directors, with the help of the functional champions, are responsible for ensuring the employees comprehend the PDIR. The following is an example of how a PDIR can be introduced and how DFSS can determine the maturity of the PDP within an organization.
Building a PDIR
The PDIR model in this example covers three fundamental elements of PDP (see Table 1). The first element is infrastructure and leadership, which provides an underlying foundation and direction for a company to bring a new or redesigned product to market. The second element is operations management, which provides a set of value-added activities, including resource management and the distribution of goods and services to customers....