DEVELOPING APPROPRIATE MEASURES OF NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT: A CONTINGENCY-BASED APPROACH

Abstract

While previous research studies describe a broad set of factors that discriminate between new product success and failure, much of the past and current research remains exploratory in nature (Cooper & Kleinschmidt, 1987; Montoya-Weiss & Calantone, 1994). The suggestion is that researchers, in looking to generalise, have actually been describing findings that are "averaging" over a number of areas, such as Dimensions of Success and Industry boundaries (Cooper & Kleinschmidt, 1993; Craig & Hart, 1992; Griffin & Page, 1993). This may well provide some explanation as to why, despite the very consistent findings of many past studies, failure rates are still high (Kleinschmidt & Cooper, 1995). This paper aims to provide more detailed insights into the development process activities within a single sector, the UK automotive components industry. This sector is particularly important as it is the main source of NPD activity for one of the world's largest industrial sectors, namely the automotive assembly market (Ford, GM, etc.). The paper addresses the "averaging" issue by using qualitative research to compare and contrast NPD processes in this sector with those suggested by extant (generalised) NPD literature to confirm that the measures used are valid for this particular industry context. The research identifies similarities but also significant differences. This suggests that the general measures used to assess NPD projects are not sufficiently detailed to analyse this chosen sector, which casts doubt over the applicability of these general NPD measures in other single industry settings. The findings confirm the need for this "intermediate" stage in the research process prior to undertaking quantitative research to evaluate the impact of the issues identified on performance, as described in the future research section.

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