Lean Enterprise Institute Logo
  • Contact Us
  • Newsletter Signup
  • Cart (0)
  • Account
  • Search
Lean Enterprise Institute Logo
  • Explore Lean
        • What is Lean?
        • The Lean Transformation Framework
        • A Brief History of Lean
        • Lexicon Terms
        • Topics to explore
          • Operations
          • Lean Product & Process Development
          • Administration & Support
          • Problem-Solving
          • Coaching
          • Executive Leadership
          • Line Management
  • The Lean Post
        • Subscribe to see exclusive content
          • Subscribe
        • Featured posts
          Twi cards on a cork board

          Understanding the True Value of the TWI...

          office sign that says - Kaizen Promotion Office

          Ask Art: Why Do I Need a...

          • See all Posts
  • Events & Training
        • Leadership Coaching and Custom Training
        • What is a Co-Learning Partnership (CLP)?
        • Forms and Templates
        • Featured learning
          • Improvement Kata/Coaching Kata Remotely

            April 10, 2023 | Online Live Course

          • Developing Structured Problem-Solving and Leadership Skills using A3 Thinking: Managing to Learn Remotely

            April 17, 2023 | Online Live Course

          • Hoshin Kanri Remotely: Aligning and Executing on Your Organizational Objectives

            April 21, 2023 | Online Live Course

          • Designing the Future Remotely: A Lean Product Development Immersive Learning Experience

            April 24, 2023 | Online Live Course

          • See all Events
  • Store
        • Shopping Cart
        • Featured books
          Managing to Learn: Using the A3 management process

          Managing to Learn: Using the A3 management process

          Learning to See

          Learning to See

          • See all Books
  • About Us
        • Our people
          • Senior Advisors and Staff
          • Faculty
          • Board of Directors
        • Contact Us
        • Lean Global Network
        • Press Releases
        • In the News
        • Careers
        • About us

The Lean Post / Articles / Understand Before You Execute

Understand Before You Execute

Product & Process Development

Understand Before You Execute

By Jim Morgan, PhD

April 30, 2021

Leading practitioners share the benefits of understanding this principle of lean product and process development.

FacebookTweetLinkedInEmailPrintComment

Be among the first to get the latest insights from LEI’s Lean Product and Process Development (LPPD) thought leaders and practitioners. Subscribe to The Design Brief, LEI’s newsletter devoted to improving organizations’ innovation capability.

In the very early phases of designing the electrically powered Amazon delivery vehicles at Rivian, our designers and engineers spent countless hours closely observing Amazon drivers and other logistics stakeholders as they did their work. We debated observations based on first principles, formed hypotheses, rapidly built many different virtual and physical prototypes, tested them with users, got their feedback, rigorously tested them again, deselected, combined, and eventually converged on solutions. We did all this work before starting to do detailed design because we knew that was how we would create the best possible value.

This anecdote should come as no surprise to practitioners of Lean Product and Process Development. One of the critical findings from my product development research in the late ’90s was that Toyota put far more time and effort into understanding their customer and context at the very beginning of each program than their competitors did. They worked tirelessly to understand and solve the customer’s problem and deliver unique and targeted value with their products.

The other critical difference at Toyota was that a Chief Engineer and a small team of designers and engineers were directly involved in both understanding the customer and executing the program. Having the same people lead both phases of development ensured they would deeply understand what their customers need — and what their product needed to be.

Understand Before You Execute

Toyota leveraged the tools and methods of this upfront “kentou,” or study period, effectively. The company created many breakthrough, best-selling products, including the phenomenally successful Lexus brand — much to the chagrin of many “industry experts” who said Toyota could never design a luxury car. My co-author Jeff Liker and I shared many of these stories in the book The Toyota Product Development System. The subsequent rise in popularity of practices such as design and MVP (minimum viable product) thinking serves as testimony to their broad efficacy, ensuring design teams “understand before they execute.”

Closing Critical Knowledge Gaps

But there is much more to the study period than observing your customer. In parallel with deep customer understanding, the team needs to identify and close critical knowledge gaps that stand between their current know-how and what they need to learn to create new value. Whether in engineering, manufacturing, installation, logistics, or service, you must understand how you will deliver unique value.

Set-based experimentation continues to be a powerful tool as you add more workstreams to the process of understanding. Researching broadly, searching for patterns, debating, forming hypotheses, rigorously testing, deselecting and converging across workstreams. Fortunately, a host of digital design and simulation tools are available to enable a more wide-ranging, robust, and faster set-based approach to innovation than ever before.

Design Brief Understanding Before Executing PDF download

A final and often overlooked element of the study period is the concept paper, which should continually evolve as your understanding of your customer and your product takes shape. The concept paper is a powerful way to share the product vision, align around a plan to deliver, and enroll the team in the mission. John Drogosz has written more about the concept paper in this month’s “Coaches Corner.”

This month’s video features stories from a wide variety of organizations that have put the principle of “understand before you execute” into practice. Dave Pericak, director of Icons at Ford Motor Company, gives us an insider’s look into the early development stages of the all-new, path-breaking Bronco. Valerie Cole, software architecture manager at Schilling Robotics, a division of TechnipFMC, describes how her team applied this principle to software development on a game-changing, deep-sea remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV). And the clinical design and innovation team from Michigan Medicine describes how it used these practices to develop clinical processes that led to far better outcomes.

FacebookTweetLinkedInEmailPrintComment

Written by:

Jim Morgan, PhD

About Jim Morgan, PhD

Jim is recognized globally for his expertise in product and process development. His know-how comes from a unique combination of industry experience as a senior executive and rigorous scholarship. His most recent industry role was as the chief operating officer during a critical transition period for Rivian, an electric vehicle…

Read more about Jim Morgan, PhD

Leave a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related

Agile vs Lean Product and Process Development

Product & Process Development

How to Launch Better Products Faster

Article by Lean Leaper

hands at a table working together

Product & Process Development

Teaming Up to Overcome Common Business Challenges

Article by Katrina Appell, PhD and John Drogosz, PhD

Augment Book

Product & Process Development

Empowering Frontline Operators with Human-Centric Technology: a Conversation with Natan Linder

Podcast by Tom Ehrenfeld

Related books

The Power of Process – A Story of Innovative Lean Process Development

The Power of Process – A Story of Innovative Lean Process Development

by Eric Ethington and Matt Zayko

Welcome Problems, Find Success – Creating Toyota Cultures Around the World

Welcome Problems, Find Success – Creating Toyota Cultures Around the World

by Nate Furuta

Related events

April 24, 2023 | Online Live Course

Designing the Future Remotely: A Lean Product Development Immersive Learning Experience

Learn more

March 19, 2024 | Optional Post-Summit Workshops March 21-22
Carlsbad, California

Lean Summit 2024

Learn more

Explore topics

Product and Process Development graphic icon Product & Process Development

Join us on social

  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • Facebook

Join our #LeanCommunity

Join us on slack
  • Privacy Policy
  • Sitemap
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • Facebook

©Copyright 2000-2023 Lean Enterprise Institute, Inc. All rights reserved.
Lean Enterprise Institute, the leaper image, and stick figure are registered trademarks of Lean Enterprise Institute, Inc.

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Learn More. ACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT
Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!