طراحی تیم برای توسعه سریع محصول : اثر تعدیل پیچیدگی فن آوری

Findings from this study suggest that there is no one best team for speedy product development, especially not for projects of varying levels of technological complexity. Based on findings from 183 new product projects, this study indicates that managers tailor development teams to the degree of technological complexity of the project. Results show that technologically complex projects are sped up by development teams with individuals assigned full-time to the project, and working in close proximity. Alternatively, for technologically simple projects, findings suggest that managers assign part-time experienced members to projects, and maintain the same leader and members on the team throughout the development. Functional diversity has an inverted U-shaped relationship with innovation speed for both technologically complex and simple projects. Still, for the first part of the curve, functional diversity has a greater positive impact on the speed of technologically complex products.

Rapid development of new products is critical to the competitive advantage of most corporations. One factor to be associated with faster innovation speed is the use of cross-functional teams. Increasingly, organizations are using cross-functional teams to improve the speed of their new product development efforts (Griffin, 2002). Yet, despite their growing use, results of new product development teams’ endeavors have been mixed (McDonough, 2000). One of the key reasons is that managing product development teams is not easy. In implementing development teams, managers face many challenges and questions. A few researchers have begun to suggest that a universal approach to the design of new product development teams is not always effective (Clift and Vandenbosch, 1999 and Kessler and Chakrabarti, 1999). As observed by McDonough (1993), the type of technological work that is being undertaken on a project affects what team members' characteristics are important in order to speed up the development process. Because only very few studies have been conducted, there is still much to be learned about how to build teams so as to have a positive impact on the speed of projects of varying levels of technological complexity (McDonough, 2000). The study presented here attempts to fill this research gap. Specifically, the study investigates the moderating influence of the technological complexity on the effect of several team design factors on innovation speed. The relevance of this study comes from the fact that it focuses on understanding factors that affect an important underlying explanation for new product success and profitability (i.e. speed to market). Moreover, because the study considers variables that can be influenced by managers, its findings provide useful recommendations for enhancing innovation speed and, in turn, improving success and profitability.

The current study has offered new insights into the effect of several team design characteristics on the speed of projects of varying degrees of technological complexity. In accordance with our predictions, the study revealed an inverted U-shaped relationship between functional diversity and innovation speed. At a low level of functional diversity, an increase of functional diversity has a positive impact on innovation speed. However, when functional diversity becomes too high, increases of functional diversity diminish innovation speed. In addition, results show that functional diversity has a more positive effect on the speed of technologically complex products. The more complex and difficult the project, the greater the functional interdependence needed to speed up its execution. Functional diversity is less beneficial for simple projects requiring clear-cut solutions. Team experience is shown to speed up technologically simple projects. This supports previously discussed literature suggesting that, because of the greater familiarity with and understanding of the technologies embodied in technologically simple projects, teams can draw on their prior knowledge to identify the project's technological needs and challenges with adequate precision and focus and hence, get things done more quickly. For technologically complex projects, the results indicate no significant impact of team experience on innovation speed. This might be a result of the escalating need for experimentation, invention and trial-and-error associated with the development of technologically complex projects. Studies in the area of organizational learning have reported that high levels of memory inhibit any actions outside preexisting action patterns (Moorman and Miner, 1997). Consistent with our prediction, the findings show that team stability is positively correlated with the speed of technologically simple projects. For technologically complex projects, however, the results point to a lack of relationship between team stability and innovation speed. This finding might be explained by the association between team stability and team cohesiveness. The literature has suggested that the longer group members stay together, the more cohesive the group becomes. Highly cohesive teams tend to think and act so much alike that it is hard to introduce them to new and different ideas (Wagner et al., 1984). Perhaps with technologically complex projects, the downstream timesavings from team stability are overridden by its contribution to organizational inertia. Team dedication and team proximity appear to speed up technologically complex projects. This is in general consistent with the previously discussed literature. Surprisingly, the usage of full-time dedicated members is shown to slow down the speed of technologically simple projects. A plausible explanation lies in the very nature of these projects. Technologically simple projects often require little more than a cookie-cutter application of knowledge. In the absence of distractions from other commitments, individuals working full-time on these projects rarely feel they are making a notable contribution, and, to compensate, spend extra time on providing nice-to-have deliverables. This superfluous effort is usually out of scope and not pursued after presentation, yet it adds time to the delivery of the project. In summary, the evidence presented in this study indicates a contingency approach to speeding up innovation, which is consistent with the findings of Kessler and Chakrabarti (1999), Clift and Vandenbosch (1999) and McDonough (1993). Specifically, our results indicate that depending upon the degree of technological complexity of the project, there appear to be different sets of team-design factors affecting innovation speed. To speed up technologically complex projects, the study suggests that managers have teams made of full-time members working in close proximity. To accelerate technologically simple projects, managers should put together part-time, stable teams formed of people with experience in new product development. Evidence of an inverted U-shaped relationship between functional diversity and innovation speed brings up a need to carefully identify the critical functions that need to be represented on the team and to balance those functional representation needs with the inefficiencies associated with high group diversity.