Discussion Questions
December 4, 2012
POSTECH Strategic Management of Information and Technology Laboratory
(POSMIT: http://posmit.postech.ac.kr)
Dept. of Industrial & Management Engineering
POSTECH
Discussion Questions
■ Chapter 11. Managing the New Product Development Process
1. What are some of the advantages and disadvantages of a parallel development process?
What obstacles might a firm face in attempting to adopt a parallel process?
– Advantage: shorter, often more cost effective process
by avoiding costly and time-consuming iterations between development phases
– Disadvantage: risk that investments will have already been made in later stages
when the need to change the product design is recognized
by overlapping stages in the development process
– Possible obstacle: Risk that investments in later stages may have to be written off
 managers may be reluctant to admit the need for a design change
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Discussion Questions
■ Chapter 11. Managing the New Product Development Process
2. Consider a group project you have worked on at work or school. Did your group use mostly
sequential or parallel processes?
– Example
– “In developing a loan disbursement process in a post-conflict emerging market we used a
parallel process. While creating the means by which loans would be disbursed we identified
the need for additional products (letters of credit) that would be required to carry out the
disbursements. Similar to ensuring a product can be manufactured we had to determine the
likelihood that the additional products could be put in place in order to support the overall
disbursement process.”
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