Lean Product Development Conference VII
“Knowledge Wins - Chief Engineer Leads”
October 7-8, 2009 Minneapolis

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Savvy Consortium© presents Lean Product Development Conference VII. This seventh Savvy Conference focuses on “knowledge based” product innovation, design and development systems and organizations. The conference knowledge content is provided by engineering people who are implementing lean systems and practices found in Toyota’s Product Design Engineering Organization.

New in 2009! Savvy Consortium© Lean Product Development Conference VII presents in-depth understanding of the Chief Engineer which Allen Ward called the “Entrepreneurial System Designer “(ESD). Toyota uses chief engineers to lead their development organizations. The CEs make their schedules, eliminate risk and rapidly apply engineering knowledge in product design decisions that satisfy customer expectations.

Five chief engineers and one technology development program leader from the Savvy Consortium will present their work practices to engage their development teams. They will describe: how they use technical knowledge for timely product design decisions that meet shorter schedules; how they build towering engineering competence/ productivity; and how they meet customer value expectations. The technical skills, product focus, leadership character, and work ethic of these chief engineer individuals truly engage their team colleagues and thereby transform into high performance teams.

2006 – 2009 Continuing Legacy In the tradition of previous Savvy conferences, a variety of engineering managers from firms large and small will present their implementation of the many fundamentals found in the Toyota Lean Product Development System.

Confirmed Speakers:

“Designing Knowledge Based Product Development and Implementing Chief Engineer Leader System”

Gary Kassen - Director of Engineering, Power Products Division - Eaton Corp.

Vince Duray - Chief Engineer- Motors, Gear & Vane Products - Eaton Corp.

Jaime LeClair - Chief Engineer, HLA Hybrids - Eaton Corp.

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“Implementing Knowledge Based Product Development and Chief Engineer in a Marketing Driven Organization”

Dave Klis - Director of Engineering Operations – The Toro Company

Todd P. Legault Chief Development Engineer – The Toro Company

Rich Guertin Chief Development Engineer – The Toro Company

Thomas F. Langworthy Chief Development Engineer – The Toro Company

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“Maintaining Momentum in Knowledge Based Product Development”

Bob Melvin - Director of Engineering - Teledyne Benthos

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“Implementing Knowledge Based Development System Elements in a Technology Development Program”

John Buettner - Manager, Advanced Element Design, Corporate R&D - Donaldson Company

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“Product Development is a Knowledge Factory: Lean Knowledge Flow Practices”

Todd Stute - Director of Business Excellence - Seagate Corporation

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“Hyper Short Development Cycle Transformation”

Wendell Short - Director of Product Development - Sauder Corporation

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“Transforming the ’Unplanned’ Engineering Request Practices to Achieve Level Process Flow”

Judd Clark - Principal Engineer- Altec Industries

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“Adapting Knowledge Based Design Methods in an Agile Organization”

Bill Belson - Director of Engineering - Bruno ILA Corp.

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“Knowledge Based Product Development Practices in Software Development”

Gene Kania - Director of Program Management - Computer Associates, Inc.

The Savvy Conference Difference

Savvy Consortium© Conference VII differentiates by offering superior knowledge value. The value stems from high performance engineering managers, more valuable content and timely practical information that has been building from multi--year implementation of knowledge based lean product development. Savvy’s mission is to offer content variety, knowledge quality and quantity in this expanded two day conference event.

1. The Savvy speakers are multi-task engineering managers: reducing time to market, reducing project risks, increasing team productivity and improving product quality that increasingly satisfies their customers.

2. The Savvy speakers are simultaneously transforming their organizations to “knowledge based” product development systems. They have compared their practices with Toyota’s design and development system, practices and foundations. They focus on improving customer knowledge, set based design concurrent engineering, technical knowledge pull/push flow, engineering knowledge worker excellence, rigorous problem solving and the chief engineer leadership model.

3. The Savvy speakers’ are reducing waste and eliminating non value-added practices that slow down harried knowledge workers struggling to perform their tasks and meet schedules.

4. Savvy Conference VII offers “current experience” knowledge from a greater number and variety of engineering managers-speakers compared to other conference.

5. The Savvy speaker content is better focused on valuable and practical knowledge you can implement. Savvy speakers present their practical experiences to generate discussion. They show documents and tools. They explain their step by step practices and the thinking behind them.

6. The Savvy Consortium speakers are convinced that their “knowledge based product development system” can be learned and integrated in existing organizations that use gated development processes and tools.

Conclusion Transforming to knowledge based product development is a must for USA companies to compete for 21st Century global markets.

Attending this Savvy Consortium conference will how you can accelerate your transformation or initiate it. Much learning and implementation effort is needed. The knowledge you get at this Savvy Conference generates energy to move forward and transform/improve product design, innovation and development results. You will have the confidence that you can do it by seeing and meeting individuals who are doing it successfully.

Who Should Attend this Event?
Development project leaders will profit from the chief engineers experiences. New product design engineering and new product leaders, managers, supervisors, development team members, test engineers, design engineers, new product marketing, product planning individuals, market researchers, heavyweight development project managers, continuous improvement experts, green belts, black belts, business excellence people, value stream managers and any individual with responsibility for product innovation, design and development will generate a list of action tasks that will start to payoff immediately.

The Savvy Consortium speakers invite you to register now for this unique conference. Plan to immerse yourself in the knowledge content materials. Plan to meet and interact with the speakers and many other product developers who are moving ahead in their initiatives to transform their product development people, processes, and practices.

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Event content, presentation materials and presenters may change without notice, but with intent to maintain or increase quality and relevance.