With rising use of global outsourcing, offshoring, international distribution networks and internet channels, it is clear that low labour and factor costs and market access are no longer competitive differentiators. More and more companies are looking to innovation as a crucial source of competitive advantage. Designing and developing new products has become key to maintaining differentiation, growth and profitability.

Develop a Business Perspective on Product Innovation

The term R&D — Research and Development —traditionally refers to the engineering function. Our use of the term is much broader: Strategic R&D Management (SRDM) is about how organisations make product innovation happen. It helps senior managers engage in and support product innovation in a way that supports – rather than dissipates – the thrust of their business strategy. Excellent project management is undermined if the portfolio of innovations is not aligned with the business needs and strategy. Conversely, brilliant strategies achieve nothing if execution underperforms. In order for effective processes to have bottom-line impact, organisational units must pull together in the organisation, and this is even more of a challenge if the units are spread over the world. The challenges of executing product innovation concerns several groups, some of which have traditionally “owned” product innovation, including: engineering function managers (responsible for R&D in engineering-driven companies), marketing managers (responsible for product innovation in marketing-heavy companies) as well as manufacturing, finance, sales, and service managers involved in and responsible for important aspects of innovation.

Participants will learn how to manage product innovation as a strategic business process that cuts across and involves multiple functions. By gaining a framework for R&D, managers will be able to deliver more and better product innovation to their company. For over 15 years, the Strategic R&D Management programme has been constantly evolving, consistently remaining at the forefront of product development business concerns.

• Build tools to measure performance of uncertain and long-term innovation

• Build processes and structures that support innovation for different purposes and with different degrees of novelty

• Align functional contributions to innovation and better coordinate dispersed activities
• Build tools to translate business strategy into a portfolio of innovation initiatives

• International Project Management