Developing Products in Half the Time (Industrial Engineering) [Paperback]

Preston G. Smith (Author), Donald G. Reinertsen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1995 | Series: Industrial Engineering

Refreshingly practical answers to the question of how to get good products out faster are revealed in this book. With a holistic treatment of the development cycle, the authors--seasoned specialists in rapid product development--show what works, what doesn't, and why. Numerous examples are dissected to illustrate techniques that can increase development. 55 line drawings.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Developing Products in Half the Time is a classic on the art and science of competitive product development. This is a real manager's book, one that takes a sophisticated view of project dynamics, corporate structures, and the people who ultimately make projects succeed. Each of its 16 chapters is a self-contained examination of a single aspect or stage of the development process, and the whole adds up to a rational and well-considered approach transferable to real-world situations. Featured topics include the definition of rational product objectives, the creation of economic models for a new product, the management of a project's "fuzzy" early stages, staffing and motivational issues, organization and project management, the relationship between design and manufacturing, and risk management.

This volume is an expanded reprint of the 1991 hardcover edition, with an additional chapter that reviews the original 15 sections in light of the authors' experiences with clients. Although the authors writes primarily for managers in product manufacturing, much of their methodology is applicable to other fields, particularly software engineering.

Product Details

• Paperback: 316 pages
• Publisher: Van Nostrand Reinhold; Revised edition (September 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0442020643
• ISBN-13: 978-0442020644
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,747,277 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I have been a management consultant and trainer specializing in rapid and flexible product development since 1984. Prior to that, I earned a PhD in engineering from Stanford University and held several engineering and management positions in a broad variety of companies.

Here are short descriptions of my three books:

Developing Products in Half the Time has become a classic in the time-to-market literature--90,000 English copies in circulation plus six translations. It was published originally in 1991, with a paperback update in 1995 and a second edition in 1998.

Proactive Risk Management was written because I found that--even though Chapter 12 of Developing Products in Half the Time covers project risk management--companies were doing poorly at it. Specifically, companies with a phased-development process would typically identify and document project risks in an early phase. But then they would do nothing about these risks, and when the risks blossomed later in the project, it was embarrassing that to see that they had been predicted. This book won the David Cleland Project Literature Award from the Project Management Institute in 2003 as the best project management publication in 2002.

Flexible Product Development recognizes that, as the world has become more chaotic, it is unrealistic to presume, as we usually do in our plans, that the project will proceed to completion without changes. In fact, it is the nature of innovation that the project should change as we learn more about the customer and the product. So, instead of denying change, this book embraces change by reducing the cost of change and keeping options open. It aims to do for non-software products what agile software development has done for that field.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Some good concepts but falls short in bringing them together, November 4, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Developing Products in Half the Time (Industrial Engineering) (Paperback)

I found that this book had some excellent observations and perspectives on improving the product development process. Ch. 9 on Achieving Overlapping Activities was especially good. However, in Appendix B, the authors show their inexperience in the real world by arguing that World Class Manufacturing and Total Quality Management are impediments to rapid product development. In fact, the concepts practiced within these philosophies will, if properly implemented, work in concert with the other practices discussed in the book and result in faster and better product development. The authors missed this opportunity to fully explore the benefits of a truly integrated product development process. Nonetheless, this book is worth reading and owning.