The PDMA Handbook of New Product Development

5.12. NPD Process as Part of the Culture

The NPD process, over time, becomes an expected part of the organizational culture. Naturally, the process is looked to for aid in solving new problems with portfolios and individual projects. However, roles in the process evolve too.

For instance, the role of the process champion becomes increasingly invisible as the culture itself champions the NPD process. In a learning organization, the NPD process champion would transition to new corporate change initiatives.

Another evolution would be the role of the process manager. This role would become less taxing and less time-consuming because personnel would understand what responsibilities they individually and collectively own. Accordingly, the process manager would concentrate on metrics and improvements. One process manager may be able to serve that role for several related business units or for several related business processes. Full implementation of an NPD process should provide impetus for rethinking new technology development, new business development, technical service, sales development, and other business activities as key business processes; the experience of the process manager would be useful in addressing these issues.

The role of the process analyst could also be broadened. The data for analyzing pipelines and portfolios would become more readily available and more credible. As a consequence of more and better data, gatekeepers, portfolio managers, and resource managers would ...