CREATING NEW FOODS
THE PRODUCT DEVELOPER'S GUIDE
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Contents
About the book
About the authors
Preface
1. The product
development project
in the company
2. The organisation of
the product
development project
3. Product strategy
development: idea
generation and
screening
4. Product strategy
development: product
concepts and design
specifications
5. Product design and
process development
6. Product
commercialisation
7. Product launch and
evaluation
8. Summary: bringing
it together
8.10 Textbooks in
product development
Index of Examples &
Problems
Useful links
Feedback (email link)
CHAPTER 2
The organisation of the Product Development project


2.5 PROJECT PLANNING & TIMING

Because of the many activities occurring in a product development project, there is a need for overall coordination in a project plan. A comprehensive activity/time plan with regular reviews is an essential feature of the product development project. The complexity of this plan depends on the size of the project and on the background and skills of the personnel, and can vary from a one-page outline to a complex computer designed system with a major plan and a large number of sub-plans.

But the essential steps are:
      Identify the product development activities.
      Estimate the time required for each activity.
      Arrange activities in sequence, showing the interrelationships.
      Allocate resources - people, finance, equipment, materials.

Usually the overall activities are identified and then the people working in a specific area can identify the sub-activities in their own part of the project. Each activity has to be small enough to be carried out independently of other activities, but not so small as to be trivial. Activities less than one week are usually not considered as independent activities.

To the person coordinating a project, the management of the product development project plan can be assisted by use of formal planning aids such as bar charts (or job progress bar charts) and critical path networks and computer software packages for complex project planning. These techniques identify the start/finish time for each activity and determine the sequence of the activities and the activities that can run in parallel. With this information, logical flow diagrams and bar charts can be drawn and from these are identified the sequence of activities that are critical to the project timing.

If these activities are not completed at the correct time, then the whole project will run over time. It is essential that these critical activities are identified at the beginning of the project, and also that, during the project, any activities going critical are identified quickly. These critical activities may need more resources of people and finance, or just reorganisation.

The procedure starts by developing a plan which satisfies the project objectives given the essential constraints while ignoring time and resources, listing all the major activities and if necessary the sub-activities in a logical sequence; this is called project planning. The variables of time and expertise are then applied to the project plan and this is called project scheduling. Then as the project proceeds it is monitored and remedial actions identified; this is called project control.

It is important to have clearly identified the critical points where top management is to review the project and give go/no-go decisions.

Think Break 2.5
Project planning: development of a dried noodle product

The simple process for producing dried noodles is: mix the flour and water, extrude the dough through a plate to give the ribbon of noodle, and then dry.

In developing a new, high-protein noodle, the process was studied. There was no production line, so an extruder and a dryer had to be bought or built. The texture of the extruded dough and the noodles during drying were to be measured, and a tester to measure the texture had to be built.

The development of the noodle product involved the following activities in the process development section of the project:
      develop texture tester (design tester, make tester, standardise tester);
      obtain dough extruder (literature search, purchase and delivery of extruder, installation and
      commissioning);
      build dryer (drying cabinet converted, drying racks made, racks fixed in cabinet, cabinet wired);
      trial (experiments on conditions, testing products, optimise process).

Determine the sequence of the activities, what activity must be completed before others can start, and the activities that can run in parallel. Draw a sketch to show the activities.


PROJECT MANAGEMENT

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Creating New Foods. The Product Developer's Guide. Copyright © Chartered Inst. of Environmental Health.
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