One July 6th Greg Moores - Vice President of Engineering at DEWALT Construction Tools - presented “The DEWALT Product Development Machine” to a full auditorium. This was the first in a series of three case studies in the RMI Innovation series. It provided a view of the complete product development picture at DeWalt - from strategic product road planning to launching products into the marketplace. The presentations described how DeWalt strives to deliver products that enhance the end user's productivity through innovative solutions. Their approach blends available technology with end user desires by applying a ‘Milestone Process' underpinned by metrics for Quality, Delivery and Profitability. A proprietary Product Development Review Forum and Milestone Review gate meetings are deployed to monitor and manage an active project portfolio…

The DEWALT Product Development Machine

Innovation at DeWalt by Peter Wallace Innovating@comcast.net

“Stay close to your customers” is the motto for DeWalt when they think about innovation – and they know exactly where to go for their source of ideas…the work-site!

Underpinned by a passion for quality tools and a focus on solving work-site problems DeWalt knows that a series of projects to produce a stream of new, innovative power-tools is the key to their success.

Greg Moores - Vice President of Engineering at DEWALT Construction Tools notes that "The SECRET to successful Product Development at DEWALT is very simple. First you identify end-users needs and then you creatively satisfy their needs through practical solutions. Neccessity is, in fact, the mother of invention.

"The DeWalt answer? A “machine” for product development - An approach that uses a repeatable stage-gate process to identify, prioritize, assess and manage the multiple concurrently active projects. Just as important is a culture that applies very highly tuned project management disciplines to consistently produce results with each new tool.

This is anything but business as usual! Their innovation model recognizes risk and unpredictability and allows substantial lattitude for experimentation and failure in the developmental stages of each new product. In the latter stages, projects are tightly managed against rigorous performance metrics and expectations.

How does the DeWalt process relate to the RMI Innovation Framework model?

DeWalt are passing four major tests for successful innovation:

• QUANTIFICATION: Quantification of needs and a measured approach to investment in innovation
• FOCUS: Clearly defined primary areas of focus for innovation
• IDEA CREATION: An identified source of innovation
• VALUE CREATION: A predictable and repeatable process for innovation

To learn more about the RMI Innovation initiative, upcoming events or specilized innovation resources contact Mike Galiazzo: RMI@comcast.net