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Customer Connected Product Definition

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Background
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 12 Key Benefits
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Featured Presentations
   (complete descriptions)
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Post-Conference Workshops
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Fees & Logistics
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) How to Register
arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Sponsorship Opportunities

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) Download Conference Brochure
    (606kb, Acrobat .pdf)

 

Featured Presentations
Complete descriptions for each
conference presentation

-  Monday, November 8 -

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Conference Welcome and Introduction - Graceanne Gatz, Conference Program Manager & Gregg Tong, Conference Moderator, Management Roundtable

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Keynote — The Value Compass: The Key To Effective Customer Connected Product Definition - Robert E. Wayland; co- author, Customer Connections: New Strategies for Growth (Harvard Business School Press); senior consultant, S4 Consulting

Many firms are struggling to implement a new customer-based product development approach, or to improve their existing practices. Although there is no one "right way" to approach customer value creation, it is possible to achieve a higher degree of empathy with customers by looking more broadly at the foundations of customer value. This stimulating and cutting edge keynote will help you to apply the principles of the Value Compass created by Robert Wayland and Paul Cole to your specific situation, as well as develop an understanding of the four critical dimensions of customer and shareholder value creation:

  • Customer Portfolio Management: Who are you trying to serve and how do you define and manage their involvement in defining new products?

  • Value-Proposition Design: What should you offer those customers; how do you extend your presence on their value chains?

  • Value-Added Role: What part should you play in creating and delivering the offer?

  • Risk and Reward Sharing: How are the risks and rewards of creating new products and services best shared by customers and stakeholders?

You’ll also receive some practical insights into eliminating internal functional barriers and proprietary notions, such as "customer ownership;" how to estimate and calculate your value to your customers; and how to calibrate and manage your customer information, knowledge building, and communication efforts to focus product development on customers.

- CASE STUDIES -
Creating The Environment for Customer-Connected
Product Definition

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Creating New Customer Solutions: Process vs. Cultural Change - Carole R. Katz, Voice of the Customer Director, Lucent Technologies, Business Communications Systems

What business would say it isn’t customer focused? After all, customers pay the bills and are the lifeblood of your company. Yet, all too often, businesses find themselves focused on developing products without clarity around customer requirements. Using the right process is certainly important...but first, you need to establish the right behaviors and culture across the organization to make customer centricity integral to product and service realization. This presentation will explore how Lucent is creating a customer-oriented product definition culture by:

  • Getting alignment and engagement across functional silos — who "owns" the customer?

  • Managing resource constraints —balancing time, quality and cost

  • Meeting the needs of the skeptics who say "prove it"

  • Identifying strategies and tactics to overcome the challenges

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 12:00p - 1:00p
Breaking Down Internal Barriers to Customer-Driven Product Definition - Steven R. Binder, Manager, Platform Development Business Unit, Bio-Rad Laboratories, Clinical Diagnostics Group

Customer-driven product definition is often viewed as an expensive, difficult and uncertain proposition; hence, it is very difficult to build internal alignment around it. This talk will describe how Bio-Rad’s customer-driven approach to product development satisfies senior management, as well as internal support groups. You will learn:

  • How a rigorous, cost-effective, results-oriented approach can lead to cross-functional buy-in and senior management support

  • How to use project management skills to complete the product definition phase on time in a rapidly changing market

  • The benefits of involving the entire development team in market research

  • How to select which customers to interview, and translate raw customer input into meaningful requirements

  • How to codify the approach and apply it to your next project

If you’d like to learn more about how to implement the techniques that worked for Lucent and Bio-Rad in your own company, sign up for the post-conference workshop: "Choice Model: Choosing the Right Product Definition Process for Your Customer and Your Company."

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 1:00p - 2:30p
Facilitated Topic Networking Luncheons
- Learn about what your colleagues are doing to meet the challenge of integrating customers into product definition. You’ll be asked for your input into topics prior to the conference, giving you the opportunity to shape the direction and focus of these expertly-moderated, interactive sessions.

- CASE STUDIES -
Getting Down To Business: Gathering Needs and Defining Requirements

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 2:30p - 3:30p
Product Design Criteria: Finding the Right "Knobs" to Turn - Teresa Prego, Director of New Products, Critical Care Worldwide Marketing, Bayer Diagnostics Corporation & Gerald M. Katz, Executive Vice President, Applied Marketing Science, Inc.

New product development usually requires literally dozens of design decisions, which can be thought of as the "knobs" that product developers can turn in designing the new product or service. Knowing which knobs to turn to achieve new product success depends upon how clearly the development team understands customer needs. This talk will focus on Bayer’s use of a practical methodology for capturing "The Voice of the Customer" that is also being used successfully by a large number of firms in industries which are characterized by rapidly changing customer needs. You will learn:

  • How to gather and prioritize a clear and comprehensive list of customer wants and needs

  • How to tie specific design decisions directly to those customer needs

  • How to determine and use appropriate metrics to track adherence to "The Voice of the Customer"

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 3:30p - 4:30p
Linking Customer Needs To Delivering Desired Customer Value - Robert Pennisi, Technical Staff, Motorola, Inc.

The process of gathering customer needs and integrating them into a well-organized product development plan that creates the desired customer outcome and gets it to market quickly is an activity that presents companies with unique challenges. This is especially true in high-tech, where competition is fierce and standards for time to market are shrinking every day. This case study will reveal the progress that Motorola has made in translating customer needs into product requirements, including:

  • Transforming the art of gathering and integrating the voice of the customer into a structured, metric-driven product development process

  • Translating raw customer data into product requirements

  • Linking the company’s activities to delivering desired customer value

  • Benchmarking, understanding, and predicting the evolving changes in customer needs

If you’d like to learn more about how to implement the techniques that worked for Motorola in your own company, sign up for the post-conference workshop: "Outcome-Based Logic: A Revolutionary Approach for Translating Customer Needs Into Customer Value."

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 8:45a - 10:15a
KEYNOTE: Defining New Technology Products at Hewlett-Packard: The Wave of the Future - Edith Wilson, Hewlett-Packard

As a product definition strategist for Hewlett-Packard, Ms. Wilson is well known for her work in the area of linking product definition to corporate strategy. She is now heading up a brand new research and development effort in the area of microwave and radio frequency testing equipment for the wireless technology industry. In this exciting new arena, the possibilities are endless—and so are the risks. The biggest challenge? Serving customers who are riding the crest of a technology wave so new that they can’t identify their own needs. You will learn:

  • How to involve customers in product definition when they don’t know what they want—or even what’s technologically possible

  • How to get customers to share the risks of R & D in uncharted territory

  • How to maximize the return on investment in the creation of breakthrough products

  • How to turn risk into reward by being first to market with newly-configured solutions

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 10:30a - 11:30a
Defining New Products on Internet Time through the use of Real Time Customer Feedback - Speaker TBA (Federal Express Online, 3Com invited)

The Internet has forced companies to rethink how they manage their customer’s involvement in product definition. While no one disputes that customer feedback is an important factor of product success, it is difficult to put this concept to practice without sacrificing speed to market. This case study will describe how a leading high-tech company has managed to strike a balance between speed and product perfection through the use of a real-time customer feedback process.

  • How to identify, qualify, and engage your optimal target customers

  • Key factors in maximizing the ROI of a real-time feedback program

  • The risks and rewards of this bold, new approach

If you’d like to learn how to implement this technique successfully within your own company, sign up for the post-conference workshop, "Executing Real-Time Customer Feedback Programs in High-Tech Environments: Common Traps and How to Avoid Them."

arrowbullet-purp.GIF (155 bytes) 11:30a - 12:15p
Rapid-Fire Question and Answer Panel
- This fast-paced session is designed to make sure you leave the conference with the information you came for. This is an opportunity to have your specific concerns addressed by our speakers so that you return to work with fresh ideas that can be implemented immediately.

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Conference Wrap-Up - Gregg Tong, Conference Moderator, Management Roundtable

A quick summary linking the information from each presentation into a comprehensive report you can use to share the conference's key points with your colleagues.

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