Reducing project related uncertainty in the “ fuzzy front end ” of innovation – A comparison of German and Japanese product innovation projects
Reducing project related uncertainty in the “ fuzzy front end ” of innovation – A comparison of German and Japanese product innovation projects
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减少创新“模糊前端”中与项目相关的不确定性——德国和日本产品创新项目的比较
DOI：
10.1007/3-540-31248-x_16
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发表时间：
2003
影响因子：
10.5
通讯作者：
A. Nagahira
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
A. Nagahira
在本文中，我们将报告一项探索性研究的结果，该研究涉及14家德国公司和13家日本公司为减少项目不确定性而开展的28个创新项目中的典型前端相关活动。在所有情况下，我们观察到一系列活动，以减少项目的具体风险，并揭示了德国和日本公司在创新管理实践中的差异。我们采访了13家日本和14家德国企业的经理，涉及14个日本和14个德国新产品开发项目。我们的研究重点是所谓的“模糊前端”，活动和典型的可交付成果的创新过程中，可能会受到前端管理实践。总的来说，在德国和日本的项目中，受市场或技术影响的不确定性在“模糊前端”期间可以成功地减少，大多数项目实现了目标和效率指标。然而，我们的研究显示，日本和德国的公司在减少这种不确定性方面存在差异。总体而言，14个日本项目依靠全面的规划、前端活动的授权和严格的控制机制，以尽量减少后期创新过程中与前端规范的偏差，从而实现效率。与此相反，在14个德国项目中的大多数项目中，我们既不能观察到这样一个正式的计划，也不能观察到这样一个由方法和工具支持的密集控制程序，就像日本项目一样。相反，我们德国样本中的公司从创新过程的一开始就整合了研发、营销、销售、生产或客户服务等相关职能，通常已经在创意阶段，以确保从一开始就考虑到所有关键信息和观点，以减少不确定性和后期偏差，并提高效率。在模糊前端期间分配职责，在项目实施期间很少改变。
In this paper, we are going to report on the results of an exploratory piece of research about the typical front-end-related activities in 28 innovation projects carried out by 14 German and 13 Japanese companies to reduce project uncertainty. In all cases we observed a range of activities to reduce project specific risks and revealed differences in the practice of innovation management in both the German and Japanese companies. We interviewed managers of 13 Japanese and 14 German enterprises concerning 14 Japanese and 14 German New Product Development projects. The focus of our research was the so called “fuzzy front end”, activities and typical deliverables in the innovation process which might be affected by front end management practice. Overall, in the case of the German as well as the Japanese projects, the uncertainties affected by the market or technology could successfully be reduced during the “fuzzy front end” and the majority of projects achieved their objectives and efficiency targets. Nevertheless, our study revealed differences in the way such uncertainties were reduced by the companies in Japan and Germany. Generally speaking, the 14 Japanese projects relied on a thorough planning, delegation of front end activities and strict controlling mechanisms to minimize deviations from front end specifications later in the innovation process and hence, achieved efficiency. In contrast, in the majority of the 14 German projects we could neither observe such a formal planning nor such an intensive controlling procedure supported by methods and tools as in the case of the Japanese projects. Instead, the companies in our German sample integrated relevant functions like R&D, marketing, sales, production or customer service from the beginning of the innovation process, usually already during the idea generation phase, to ensure that all critical information and perspectives were taken into consideration right from the beginning, to reduce uncertainties and later deviations as well as enhancing efficiency. Responsibilities were assigned during the fuzzy front end and rarely changed during the implementation of the project.