d-beater just because marketing says it’s time to launch something new.

“Customer focus is essential to getting a new product developed and delivered,” says Simon Bragg, research director at ARC Advisory Group of Sandy, England. Bragg stresses that customer focus doesn’t just mean thinking generically about customers while drawing up designs; it means actively talking to customers, bouncing ideas off them and inviting them to critique work in progress.

That’s easier said than done. “Depending on the product, the duration of time required to develop the product, and whether the product is for single or multiple customers, customer involvement will need to be carefully structured in order to provide maximum benefits for the development team,” warn Law Ireland, a project management consultant from Clarksville, Tenn., USA. So getting a representative mix of customers and putting time into thinking about what you’re going to ask them – and why – are smart strategies. Be cautious about ceding too much control: “Don’t let the customer drive the business parameters of the project, but instead have him or her focus on the product’s progress,” he says.

Disappointing the Customer
Don’t get railroaded into a project deadline that is too tight. Experts agree that this is a tough call – but are just as unanimous that management is about making tough calls.

Connie Luna, senior program controls manager with defense contractor Sierra Nevada Corp., Sparks, Nev., USA, says that when dates look too tight, a good relationship with customers (and top management) can go a long way to sugaring the pill. “With a good relationship in place, it is possible to have a dialogue that says, we can’t make it in 12 months but we can in 13,” she says. Even so, she concedes, “changing th

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