Lean Product Development Conference V

The Savvy Consortium presents “Lean Product Development Conference V” for North American product development organizations.

Lean Product Development Conference V features product development engineering leaders from a variety of industries, presenting their case study experiences as “early adopter” implementers of Lean Product Development System used at Toyota. A new feature is the “Chief Engineer Symposium” within this conference.

The Savvy Consortium describes Lean Product Development as a system of “towering competence” engineers, vendors, developers and production people using basic design knowledge generating processes and tools that launch customer pleasing new products which both win and sustain growth and market share. “Knowledge…… Wins.”

Keynote speaker Ron Marsiglio will describe his successes in learning the Toyota System and implementing it , generating new products successfully in a transformation with a short time line.

Speakers from a variety of products/markets manufacturers will highlight their initiatives to improve product development, their experiences and critical knowledge of what works and does not work in their respective cultures.

Speakers and topics:

KEYNOTE PRESENTATION

“Understanding the Principles of Knowledge Based Lean Product Development and a Leadership Guide for Implementation”.
Ron Marsiglio President, Teledyne Benthos, Inc.

“Knowledge Wins” is the Savvy Consortium’s Conference theme. Ron Marsiglio presents his organization’s highly successful “Knowledge Based Product Development” system. Ron will describe the implementation of this system and its impact on new product design recently launched successfully. He will lay out the learning and implementation timeline for this initiative which produced customer satisfying designs and quality that garnered market share at the launch in 08. Ron will describe the powerful impact on engineering competence and motivation. This keynote presentation is sure to help justify the learning and implementation of Lean Product Development Systems in PD organizations.

New Feature The Savvy “Chief Engineer Symposium”

Announcing the Savvy Chief Engineer Symposium: Thursday, October 9, 2008 at the Savvy Conference.

We are pleased to have Mr. Dave Klis, Director of Technical Operations, The Toro Company, Bloomington, MN, and Mr. Gary Kassen, Global Engineering Manager-Power Products Division, Eaton Hydraulics Corp., Eden Prairie, MN,  present their case study experiences learning and  implementing a  chief engineer type leadership in their product development organizations.  The symposium content will also feature content  from  Toyota’s Ken Kreafle presentation to  the  Savvy Conference IV in Chicago.  The discussion content will also reference the work of the late Allen Ward who described the “chief engineer” as the “systems designer/entrepreneur.” Toyota’s chief engineer leadership approach offers many elements of fundamentally competent leadership and decision making that is within the capabilities of most product development organizations.

The panelists will be joined by other Savvy Consortium members to address questions about the chief engineer entrepreneur as the system designer who leverages their enterprise’s capabilities with focus on: voice of the customer insights, the new product concept product design targets critical for customer value), reduced time to market goals, robust quality targets, and increased engineering competence.

A fully interactive discussion of  these topics will be allotted ample time at this symposium. Materials from this symposium will be distributed to all participants.

FEATURED Panel PRESENTATION

“The Chief Engineer: Leadership, Design Knowledge and decision making on the tight timeline”

The “chief engineer at Toyota” was described in the mid 1990s as the “systems designer/entrepreneur” by the late Allen Ward. Toyota’s Chief Engineer offers many elements of fundamentally competent leadership and decision making that is within the capabilities of most product development organizations.
Panelists will present their case study experiences learning and implementing the chief engineer method; they will contrast the knowledge from the management literature describing Toyota with the realities of their own organizations’ products and culture Panelists will describe the knowledge by the chief engineer entrepreneur/system designer to leverage their enterprise’s capabilities for developing the new product: voice of the customer insights, the product vision (comprised of design targets), reduced time to market goals, robust quality targets, and increased engineering competence.

Conference participants see a visual portrayal of a lean product development system focused on the new product project and driven by the chief engineer systems leader.

An in depth and interactive discussion of chief engineer practices in USA firms including “the effective chief engineer leader” will follow this presentation.

"A Comprehensive Implementation of the Toyota Practices - Year 2 of the Journey"
Joseph Klein Senior PMO Manager, Medtronic Corporation

Medtronic is the global leader in medical technology - alleviating pain, restoring health, and extending life for millions of people around the world with annual revenue in excess of $13 billion. Individuals within the Therapy Delivery Systems (TDS) division first became interested in the Toyota Product Development System Model in 2006. They started their journey by performing a comprehensive assessment of the TDS Division's New Product Development Process. Their assessment utilizing the 13 principles outlined in "The Toyota Product Development System" book authored by Morgan & Liker. They also studied the experiences of Savvy Consortium members on similar journeys. Joe Klein will provide an up to date overview of the journey the TDS Division has been on including the successes, critical lessons learned and practical recommendations for product developers responsible for improving their system, people and tools.

“Transforming the PD organization with A3 thinking/practice and chief engineer leadership”
Tom Platner , Vice President, HID Industries

HID’s Fargo designs and manufactures card identification systems. Tom Platner will describe Fargo’s lean product development organization’s steady progress building on their phase gate system while adopting the chief engineer leadership model. Tom will present A3 knowledge communication initiatives the leaders recently launched.

“Lean Product Innovation, Design and Development in Research and Development at Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company”
Sam Landers, Senior Research Fellow, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company

The opportunities for new product innovation are often embedded in knowledge of the interactions between physical properties of products. Sam Landers will present and discuss the use of tradeoff curves to identify these interactions which can “show” opportunities for innovation. Sam will discuss the scientific knowledge embedded and how the trade off curves “speak” to the scientist and engineer about innovation opportunities.

“Assessing Skills and Building the Fundamentals for Set Based Design and Lean Product Development competence”
Joe Herzog, Senior Vice President - Product Engineering/R&D Horton, Inc.

Horton Inc, is a Roseville MN based manufacturer of engine cooling system products. Joe Herzog initiated a vital effort to prepare his product engineering organization’s improvement to a high performance product development system modeled after Toyota’s. Joe will present his case study experiences during his assessment of current engineering skills and gaps leading to activities that prepares the Horton product engineering organization in advance of adoption of set-based design and Toyota lean product development methods.

Lean Product Development Savvy Consortium ® Conference V “Knowledge Wins - Chief Engineer Leads”
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Minneapolis, MN
Holiday Inn Bloomington Interstate 35W at 94th Street
7:30 a.m. – 5:15 p.m.
Cost: $900.00 Register here.

RELATED LEAN PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT SAVVY EVENTS
October 7- 10, 2008

Pre-Conference Workshop “The Chief Engineer”
Tuesday, October 7, 2008, full day.

The Savvy Consortium engineering managers will present the nine function methodology used in the chief engineer led product development project. The practices used by the chief engineer in organizations like Toyota to get the new product designed, developed and launched will be taught using visual materials. Workshop exercises will prepare the attendees to integrate the practices in their current tasks as product developers. Cost $800 per person.

Pre-conference Seminar: “Overview of the Lean Product Development System at Toyota”
Wednesday, October 8, 2008, morning.

This half day seminar is an overview for individuals who want a practical introduction to Toyota’s PD System. Presented by product development managers with years of experience, the seminar content is based on the experiences of Savvy Consortium members and other early adopters of Toyota’s Product Innovation, Design & Development System. Cost $500 per person.

Post conference Workshop: “Adopting Lean Product Development System: Getting Started”
Friday, October 10, 2008, morning.

This half day workshop is the only workshop that helps product development leaders plan their nine task transformation process from the current state to the ideal state, step by step, based on a dozen Savvy Consortium PD organizations’ experiences. Cost $500 per person.

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