Networking By Design - PDMA Mix & Mingle Event

Thursday, June 6, 2013
6:00 - 8:00 p.m.
Bally Design
810 Penn Avenue
PIttsburgh, PA 15222

As our chapter begins its fourth year, we want to conclude the Spring 2013 Program Series with a sincere Thank You for your support and participation. We invite our members and guests to join us at Bally Design for a mix and mingle networking session on Thursday, June 6, 2013 at 6 pm.

You’ll get an inside look at the tools and techniques that drive innovation and creativity in product design for industrial, medical and consumer products while enjoying a “taste of Pittsburgh” and connecting with friends and colleagues—all by design!

Cost: Members: $10;  Non-Members: $20

We hope you can join us.  

REGISTER TODAY

PDMA Pittsburgh Sponsors, Gold Sponsors, and Sponsoring Partners

The free admissions that you receive with your sponsorship apply to this event.

Intentional Insight - McKesson's Process for Innovation

Yesterday afternoon at the PDMA Pittsburgh Innovation Forum, Speaker Jeff Thompson, Director of Innovation Programs at McKesson Automation, provided an overview of the company's innovation process: Intentional Insight. It was a great opportunity to 'look under the hood' and learn how a Fortune 14 company approaches innovation. 

Many thanks to everyone who joined us yesterday for the event - now that you've had a chance to process the presentation, we'd love to hear your key takeaways.

Here are some of ours: 

The mission statement: “Create a sustainable stream of significant growth opportunities for leadership consideration”  

At McKesson it’s about market-driven innovation: "strive to learn more about customers than they know about themselves" 

People matter when doing innovation.  It’s important to have individuals on your team who can handle ambiguity and the right set of partners that will work “shoulder to shoulder” with you on your innovation journey.

We'd love to hear from you!

Post comments to the blog or connect on Twitter @PDMApittsburgh #InnovationForum  

Global Reach with a Local Touch

OUR MISSION

The Product Development and Management Association (PDMA) is the premier global advocate for product development and management professionals. The PDMA Pittsburgh Chapter is dedicated to sharing industry knowledge and best practices through professional development, education, collaboration, and networking opportunities.  We continue to build a vibrant community of academics, practitioners, and service providers that share experiences and knowledge principles, practices, and processes of effective product innovation. 

     

VALUE

Through a well-integrated combination of resources encompassing professional development, education, networking, collaboration, certification, and recognition, PDMA aims to improve the effectiveness of individuals and organizations in product innovation and management. Participation in the Pittsburgh Chapter will result in professional growth for individuals, an innovation-related competitive advantage for their enterprises, and continued economic growth of the Western Pennsylvania Region. 

BENEFITS

• Receive member-only discounts on local events, international conferences, certification, webcasts, presentations, and more.
• Network with other product development professionals through the national conference, webcasts, and local chapter events.  An online membership directory also provides access to members across the country.
• Access information on the latest tools, processes, and best practices of product innovation and management through the PDMA website.
• Keep up with the latest issues and industry information that affect new product development (NPD) through your subscription to Visions, JPIM, and PDMA’s monthly e-newsletter, Connections.
• Gain personal and professional growth by taking on a leadership role. The vision and dedication of PDMA volunteer leaders are the association’s biggest asset.

JOIN PDMA

Leveraging the "Lean Start-up" methodology for adaptable new product development

Faced with constant disruptions, now more than ever companies need to employ effective innovation processes to remain competitive. Harvard Business Review May 2013 - Why the Lean Start-up Changes Everything by Steve Blank looks at how we can apply the "lean start-up" methodology used by many young tech ventures for a more nimble process:

  “Lean Start-up” favors: 

• Experimentation to elaborate planning
• Customer feedback over intuition
• Iterative design over traditional “big design up front” development 

Break with conventional wisdom - writing an upfront plan based on the initial series of untested hypothesizes is a waste of time - in the word of boxer Mike Tyson, “Everybody has a plan until you get punched in the mouth”.

Agile development: a "Get out of the building" approach

• Don't develop in 'stealth mode' instead test hypotheses early and frequently 
• Customer insights drive small adjustments or 'iterations'
• If the customer feedback reveals that you've got it wrong - 'pivot' to new hypotheses 

What do you think about this borrowed approach?

PDMA Pittsburgh Chapter Sponsors

Click here to learn more about PDMA Pittsburgh Chapter sponsorship opportunities

How strategic is your intellectual property?

Commentary from Jeff Thompson - PDMA Chapter President 

We recently retained IP Capital Group out of Vermont to help us put some meat around this for one of our major innovation programs.   Early this week I saw a preview of the output and the strategy suggestions – wow does this look like money well spent!

It was a bit of a project and took some engagement of our teams to get all the right data to IPCapital but it is clear this is opening our eyes and helping us focus better on opportunities and issues.   I’m definitely seeing the IP strategy issues more clearly even with the preliminary work.

To help team members prepare for the discussion I sent a few of the early slides to the team; I had one of our VP’s respond already speaking about how effective the work was in helping surface issues and opportunity – a great start!

Registration is open for the upcoming May 16th Innovation Forum featuring Jeff Thompson on   

Intentional Insight - McKesson's Process for Innovation

May 15 Webcast: A Look Under the Hood of Outstanding Corporate Innovators

May 15, 1:00 pm CDT

Presented by:

Sally E. Kay, Chair, PDMA OCI Selection Committee

Thomas P. Hustad, Professor Emeritus of Marketing, Kelley School of Business, Indiana University

Suzanne Thompson, Vice President, Global Stewardship & Innovation, The Clorox Company

Meredith Baratz, Vice President, Strategic Insight and Innovation, UnitedHealthcare

Moderated by:

Krishna Kalyan, Manager, PricewaterhouseCoopers

Lessons learned from proven successful practitioner companies provide very effective techniques for companies facing challenges in improving their own new product/service development performance. The 47 companies which have won PDMA’s prestigious Outstanding Corporate Innovator Award (OCI) for sustained quantifiable innovation success have provided a valuable set of such lessons. This webcast details the lessons learned and shows how they have changed during the 25 years in which OCI has been awarded.  It will also take a ‘look under the hood’ at the practices that have contributed to the success of  recent OCI Winners.  Presenters Thomas Hustad ( Professor Emeritus of Marketing, Kelly School of Business, Indiana University) and Sally Kay (Principal, Strategic Product Development  and retired Dow Chemical  and GlaxoSmithKline) will lead the webcast. Participants also will have the opportunity to hear directly from executives at several winning firms about they achieved innovation success in the face of the innovation challenges they have faced.  This webcast is based on materials that can be found in Chapter 24 of The PDMA Handbook of New Product Development, 3^rd Edition.

Join us and Register Today!