Organizing Customer Needs
Once customer needs are gathered, they then have to be organized. The mass of interview notes, requirements documents, market research, and customer data needs to be distilled into a handful of statements that express key customer needs. Affinity diagramming is a useful tool to assist with this effort. Brief statements which capture key customer needs are transcribed onto cards. A data dictionary which describes these statements of need are prepared to avoid any mis-interpretation. These cards are organized into logical groupings or related needs. This will make it easier to identify any redundancy and serves as a basis for organizing the customer needs.
In addition to "stated" or "spoken" customer needs, "unstated" or "unspoken" needs or opportunities should be identified. Needs that are assumed by customers and, therefore not verbalized, can be identified through preparation of a function tree. Excitement opportunities (new capabilities or unspoken needs that will cause customer excitement) are identified through the voice of the engineer, marketing, or customer support representative. These can also be identified by observing customers use or maintain products and recognizing opportunities for improvement.
Comprehensive Specification
These customers needs then have to be translated into a set of product requirements (more technical expressions of customer needs) that can be acted upon by Engineering. Quality function deployment (QFD) is an excellent methodology to support this objective while considering the competitive situation. QFD is a structured planning and decision-making methodology for capturing customer needs and translating those requirements into product requirements, part characteristics, process plans and quality/production plans through a series of matrices.
These product requirements are often expressed in the form of a product specification, functional specification, or marketing requirements specification. The degree of formality in expressing these requirements will vary depending on the complexity of the product, the size of the development project, and the organization structure and its communication requirements. With a less complex item, the QFD product planning matrix is usually sufficient. With a more complex item, a larger development project, and critical interfaces between multiple teams responsible for individual subsystems, the need for a formal specification increases. In addition to performance requirements and technical characteristics, a comprehensive specification would also address ease of use; ergonomics; styling and aesthetics; robustness, reliability and servicing; the product operating environment or conditions of use; life cycle costs; and packaging.
Several issues can arise with a product specification that can delay time-to-market: an incomplete, ambiguous, or conflicting specification and/or development proceeding prior to completion of a specification. In these situations, development often proceeds with assumptions made about requirements that may or may not be valid. If the assumptions are not valid, the product may be off-target or there may be further product definition and redesign iterations.
When specification ambiguity or conflicts are recognized before design proceeds, there are further product definition iterations that require additional time before development proceeds. This is the lesser of the two evils. It is more appropriate to take additional time than risk a product that misses the mark in meeting customer needs.
However, to the degree that all team members are involved with capturing the voice of the customer and with translating those needs into technical characteristics or requirements with QFD, it is less likely that the resulting specifications will be incomplete, ambiguous, or conflicting.
Team members will more readily recognize these situations and recognize the additional information that must be obtained or the issues that must be resolved much earlier. Further, if there is a well-defined development process with this team-based environment, it is less likely that development will proceed until specifications are completed.
Once requirements for a product are defined, they must be managed and kept stable. When requirements are a moving target, the redesign iterations severely impact time-to-market. To minimize the impact on time-to-market and more rigorously manage requirements or specifications, establish realistic requirements at the start and make needed trade-off's.
Avoid a tendency to proceed with the design before requirements are completely defined. Document requirements to communicate and develop a consistent understanding. Avoid creeping elegance and carefully consider the need to change requirements after development has started.
Evolutionary Development
The classic approach to product development involves significant effort defining requirements up front followed by customer evaluation and feedback of prototypes to refine the requirements and design. An alternative approach of "evolutionary product development" has emerged, largely based on the results of some Japanese companies.
This approach involves regular, on-going assessment of customer needs and customer feedback, shorter development cycles with a more limited set of new requirements or capabilities, and planned evolutionary upgrades or improvements based on customer feedback.
Once customer needs are gathered, they then have to be organized. The mass of interview notes, requirements documents, market research, and customer data needs to be distilled into a handful of statements that express key customer needs. Affinity diagramming is a useful tool to assist with this effort. Brief statements which capture key customer needs are transcribed onto cards. A data dictionary which describes these statements of need are prepared to avoid any mis-interpretation. These cards are organized into logical groupings or related needs. This will make it easier to identify any redundancy and serves as a basis for organizing the customer needs.
In addition to "stated" or "spoken" customer needs, "unstated" or "unspoken" needs or opportunities should be identified. Needs that are assumed by customers and, therefore not verbalized, can be identified through preparation of a function tree. Excitement opportunities (new capabilities or unspoken needs that will cause customer excitement) are identified through the voice of the engineer, marketing, or customer support representative. These can also be identified by observing customers use or maintain products and recognizing opportunities for improvement.
Comprehensive Specification
These customers needs then have to be translated into a set of product requirements (more technical expressions of customer needs) that can be acted upon by Engineering. Quality function deployment (QFD) is an excellent methodology to support this objective while considering the competitive situation. QFD is a structured planning and decision-making methodology for capturing customer needs and translating those requirements into product requirements, part characteristics, process plans and quality/production plans through a series of matrices.
These product requirements are often expressed in the form of a product specification, functional specification, or marketing requirements specification. The degree of formality in expressing these requirements will vary depending on the complexity of the product, the size of the development project, and the organization structure and its communication requirements. With a less complex item, the QFD product planning matrix is usually sufficient. With a more complex item, a larger development project, and critical interfaces between multiple teams responsible for individual subsystems, the need for a formal specification increases. In addition to performance requirements and technical characteristics, a comprehensive specification would also address ease of use; ergonomics; styling and aesthetics; robustness, reliability and servicing; the product operating environment or conditions of use; life cycle costs; and packaging.
Several issues can arise with a product specification that can delay time-to-market: an incomplete, ambiguous, or conflicting specification and/or development proceeding prior to completion of a specification. In these situations, development often proceeds with assumptions made about requirements that may or may not be valid. If the assumptions are not valid, the product may be off-target or there may be further product definition and redesign iterations.
When specification ambiguity or conflicts are recognized before design proceeds, there are further product definition iterations that require additional time before development proceeds. This is the lesser of the two evils. It is more appropriate to take additional time than risk a product that misses the mark in meeting customer needs.
However, to the degree that all team members are involved with capturing the voice of the customer and with translating those needs into technical characteristics or requirements with QFD, it is less likely that the resulting specifications will be incomplete, ambiguous, or conflicting.
Team members will more readily recognize these situations and recognize the additional information that must be obtained or the issues that must be resolved much earlier. Further, if there is a well-defined development process with this team-based environment, it is less likely that development will proceed until specifications are completed.
Once requirements for a product are defined, they must be managed and kept stable. When requirements are a moving target, the redesign iterations severely impact time-to-market. To minimize the impact on time-to-market and more rigorously manage requirements or specifications, establish realistic requirements at the start and make needed trade-off's.
Avoid a tendency to proceed with the design before requirements are completely defined. Document requirements to communicate and develop a consistent understanding. Avoid creeping elegance and carefully consider the need to change requirements after development has started.
Evolutionary Development
The classic approach to product development involves significant effort defining requirements up front followed by customer evaluation and feedback of prototypes to refine the requirements and design. An alternative approach of "evolutionary product development" has emerged, largely based on the results of some Japanese companies.
This approach involves regular, on-going assessment of customer needs and customer feedback, shorter development cycles with a more limited set of new requirements or capabilities, and planned evolutionary upgrades or improvements based on customer feedback.