The Shortest Distance Between You and Your New Product, 2nd Edition: How Innovators Use Rapid Learning Cycles to Get Their Best Ideas to Market Faster

I especially appreciate the effort that the author has taken to incorporate the best of "Agile" thinking while still acknowledging the waterfall-style development environments that many innovators operate in. I've seen new innovation methods written off by too many as idealistic, disorganized, or "only for the software world," but this book describes a framework that takes into account the diverse types of products/processes out there that, as the author has written, must "obey the laws of physics."This method offers an improvement over the Lean Startup in that it de-emphasizes the focus on "building something" (the passion/idol of many engineers) and focuses instead on finding the best way to "learn." This may be "building something," but it could also be: running a simulation, administering a survey, or something else that is less expensive or time-intensive.I found the "convergence method" noted in the book to be especially insightful. As I reflected back on my experiences in product development and R&D, I realized that I had frequently seen projects pick the strongest solution at the beginning and then "run with it," and sometimes not even consider more than one way to solve a complex/risky problem at all.The author's work history and other credentials show that she is not naive or idealistic. She has lived out the best and worst of product development.I hope this method can help re-establish credibility to corporate R&D in the midst of an ongoing fad to outsource new product development to "innovation hubs" and other external start-up-like environments.

Great insight. Gives a solid blueprint on how to plan and manage your development. While many books on product development are based on theory and rules which can't always be applied, this book has a practical approach which allows the reader to adapt the methodology to their reality. The author is using past experience and knowledge to show realistic ways that the methodology can be used and help your team with product development.

The book starts with a solid discussion on methods for product innovations. The basic idea of "Rapid Learning Cycles" then is described from a very practical point of view, giving detailed advice on how to start and manage such projects.When you purchase the book, you also get the opportunity to download document templates from their home page which makes work much easier.The book is easy to read, and therefore I can highly recommend it for every one who is responsible or interested in new product development.

I found there was a lot of material in this book that was directly related to our product development cycles. Some of it was highlighting the room for improvement on late challenges in projects. We will be using some of these techniques on our next major product development. I expect to see a nice improvement on knowledge capture and reduced late issues.