Facilitating Methodologies for Enhanced Product Innovation

In times of tight company resources and a continual need to improve company performance in all areas, including R&D, the use of effective and efficient tools and development methodologies for R&D is one avenue to follow. But is the price a company pays to learn, introduce and use a methodology worth the benefits it will share in various forms (e.g., product improvements, better work processes, etc.)? Sometimes new methodologies have hardly been introduced in a company before new tools are presented and advocated by academics, consultants or pioneering industry professionals. It is thus important not only to have a clear company strategy for the selection and implementation of methodologies and tools for innovation but also to secure organizational solutions to make company methodology use sustainable. There are certainly pros and cons for the use of development methodologies, but the frequent industrial use of different types of methodologies and the associated company resources they demand make assuring the productivity of development methodologies a growing company concern for R&D.