Project Management in Product Development: Leadership Skills and Management Techniques to Deliver Great Products is written for new and aspiring project managers in product development. Although texts on project management are common, the material presented here is unique, instead focusing on product development, a challenging segment of project management because of the high level of uncertainty, the need for a robust set of problem-solving techniques, and a demand for broad cross-functional teams.
The book also focuses on more than just project management techniques, including a thorough treatment of transformational and transactional leadership. Other topics covered include problem-solving techniques, development, and continuous improvement of processes required in product development, risk recognition and management, and proper communication with mangers and other stakeholders.
Finally, project management techniques used in product development are presented, including the critical path method, scrum and XP, and Kanban/lean project development, along with the strengths and weaknesses of each.
- Provides ways to successfully manage product development projects by teaching traditional and advanced project management techniques like Gantt, CPM, Agile, Lean, and others
- Covers transformational and transactional leadership, how to create a vision and engage the team, as well as tactics on how to manage a complex set of tasks
- Uses a practical, common sense approach to the day-to-day activities of a project manager, including project planning, project process development, problem-solving, project portfolio management, reporting, and more
- Presents a thorough comparison of popular project management tools
- Includes many examples, cases, and side-bars that are included throughout the book
George Ellis is Director of Technology Planning and Chief Engineer of Servo Systems at
Kollmorgen Corporation, a leading provider of motion systems and components for original
equipment manufacturers (OEMs) around the globe. He has designed an applied motion
control systems professionally for over 20 years He has written two well-respected books
with Academic Press, Observers in Control Systems and Control System Design Guide, now
in its third edition. He has contributed articles on the application of controls to numerous
magazines, including Machine Design, Control Engineering, Motion Systems Design, Power
Control and Intelligent Motion, and Electronic Design News.
Project Management in Product Development: Leadership Skills and Management Techniques to Deliver Great Products is written for new and aspiring project managers in product development. Although texts on project management are common, the material presented here is unique, instead focusing on product development, a challenging segment of project management because of the high level of uncertainty, the need for a robust set of problem-solving techniques, and a demand for broad cross-functional teams. The book also focuses on more than just project management techniques, including a thorough treatment of transformational and transactional leadership. Other topics covered include problem-solving techniques, development, and continuous improvement of processes required in product development, risk recognition and management, and proper communication with mangers and other stakeholders. Finally, project management techniques used in product development are presented, including the critical path method, scrum and XP, and Kanban/lean project development, along with the strengths and weaknesses of each. - Provides ways to successfully manage product development projects by teaching traditional and advanced project management techniques like Gantt, CPM, Agile, Lean, and others - Covers transformational and transactional leadership, how to create a vision and engage the team, as well as tactics on how to manage a complex set of tasks - Uses a practical, common sense approach to the day-to-day activities of a project manager, including project planning, project process development, problem-solving, project portfolio management, reporting, and more - Presents a thorough comparison of popular project management tools - Includes many examples, cases, and side-bars that are included throughout the book
Autorentext
George Ellis has worked in product development for 35 years. He first experienced the concept of continuous improvement two decades ago through the Danaher Corporation, one of the world's foremost lean thinking companies. Danaher transformed itself in the 1980s, modeling its Danaher Business System (DBS) on the Toyota Production System. Ellis has had numerous leadership roles at Danaher, including Vice President of Global Engineering for X-Rite from 2015 to 2018.
In 2019, Ellis joined Envista Holdings Corporation, a new spin-off from Danaher for the dental industry, as Vice President of Innovation. There he spends every day immersed in lean knowledge work, deploying, improving, and sustaining new product development workflows in EBS, Envista's brand of lean knowledge. He also wrote Project Management for Product Development, Control System Design Guide (4th edition), and Observers in Control Systems, all from Elsevier.
Leseprobe
Preface
Project management has undergone a revolution over the last two decades, especially for product development. Effective new methods and powerful tools abound. The results are in: they work. But in the face of so many advances, schedule and quality problems still dog product development projects in every industry. Project managers have better tools and are working as hard as ever, but too often the results are disappointing. What's happening? For one thing, the role of leadership in project management is widely misunderstood. Many companies treat a project manager (PM) almost as administrator: "If projects are not going well, we need the PM to follow process better." There's no doubt that managing to process is essential for success: stay organized, follow up, work the issues, report regularly. This is transactional leadership and every PM must master these skills. This book has ample material to help readers grow in this area. But this is only half the story. PMs must also grow as transformational leaders. They must build a vision for the product and create common purpose within the team. They must also be connected with their team, understanding the needs, abilities, and goals of each member. And they must display the kind of character people can follow. These are the skills that are required for a PM to inspire their team to care, to want to win, to do their best. Transactional and transformation skills work together to create total leadership. Too many writers present PMs with a false choice: "be a great manager or be a visionary." The outstanding PM will be both and this book accentuates that point throughout. Projects that develop new products are fundamentally different from other project types. First, PMs are typically dealing with complex technology, partially understood customer needs, and team members that don't always have the best interpersonal skills. The PM is not always the technical expert, but must understand enough to make tough decisions when the team is not fully aligned. They also need knowledge of multiple project management techniques if they are to create the optimal plan for each project. Also, PMs need to know enough about patents to understand where there's an opportunity to protect an invention and when to seek legal counsel. This book addresses those topics, presenting numerous project management methods as different tools in the toolbox. There's even a chapter dedicated to patents for PMs. And every chapter focuses on prod…