New product development (NPD), like any creative endeavour, engages the heart as well as the grey matter. But getting too emotionally involved with the contents of your firm's development pipeline can be a recipe for disaster, observes Colin Dudley, who has spent 30 years honing his NPD skills at consumer products giants, including Cadbury and United Biscuits.
Put it this way, he says: if you've spent months pouring blood, sweat and tears into a new product, you may not be sufficiently objective to see what is staring you in the face as to its commercial prospects: "We've all been there: sitting in on consumer research when the writing is clearly on the wall and, instead of facing facts, you spend the next hour doing everything in your power to convince everyone - including yourself - that the research isn't valid; the 'we've come this far' mentality kicks in. It takes a strong individual to come out and say: 'Let's call it a day.'"
In a pretty frank admission for someone who has spent three decades working in NPD, Dudley also admits that he can count the number of genuinely groundbreaking innovations over the last decade in confectionery - a key area of expertise - on the fingers of both hands. As for more work-a-day NPD, he is not much more complimentary: "Far too many retail products driven to the lowest cost and zero supplier profit flood the market with no real consumer benefit or long-term chance of success. This provides no growth, is a waste of resources and creates write-off stock for the manufacturer."
While the recession is hardly welcome, it has at least forced the food industry to prioritise resources on NPD concepts likely to deliver and re-evaluate those further down the pipeline or already on the market to ensure firms are getting maximum bang for their buck, observes Dudley.
But backing the right horses is only the beginning. The importance of having a rigorous NPD process that will help you execute chosen projects effectively cannot be underestimated, adds Dudley, citing Cadbury's abortive attempt to take on Wrigley in the gum market with the launch of 24-7 (pictured right) in 2003.
The product, which dispensed bean-shaped gum pellets from an innovative plastic container, was "fantastic", he insists, but the failure to spend sufficient time developing a convenient and practical way of displaying and selling it (it could not slot into retailers' standard gum merchandising units) ultimately killed the product. "It was a classic case of poor planning - we were so seduced by the individual pack concept that we failed to devote sufficient time and energy into how to merchandise it effectively.
"The feedback from retailers was that it was hard to sell. They had to get a dedicated merchandising unit that was also hard to replenish. We could have allocated more resource to getting this right but then we acquired Adams (and the Trident brand), and we had new priorities."
Another lesson Dudley has learned from bitter experience is the importance of evaluating products at every stage of development to ensure that you keep to the brief, he says. "You see it all the time, things get chipped and chipped away with compromise after compromise until you get to the stage where the final product bears no resemblance to the prototype that contained the key consumer benefits."
While good stagegate processes should reduce the likelihood of this happening, they are not foolproof, however. "Let's just say that if you know you need to make £10M in the first year in order to get a project going, you'll find a way to achieve that figure.
"What is almost never asked later when the project fails is how you actually came up with that £10M in the first place and why the figure wasn't challenged."
Logistics and co-ordination can also be a problem, especially in a large company with lots of concepts being progressed simultaneously, he notes. "There is often a lack of alignment between commercial teams and their technical/manufacturing colleagues.
"Conversely, commercial teams do not always appreciate the technical or manufacturing difficulties of the project that may prevent the overall concept being realised. This is a relatively straightforward thing to overcome by forming a collaborative team meeting on a regular basis supported by a senior manager."
== Open innovation ==
So a robust process (and accompanying IT system) are critical for successful NPD. But how do you generate hot ideas in the first place? And if you accept - as pretty much every major consumer goods company now has - that you need to embrace 'open innovation' and engage more with third parties - how do you build the infrastructure to facilitate this?
"If you want to do this seriously," says Dudley, "you need to have someone in the business to champion it. You also need focus. You can spend a lot of time surfing around and networking, but pretty quickly you need to limit yourself to two to three salient programmes or technologies with demonstrable commercial potential to keep senior management interested."
It is also imperative that a "win-win collaboration is cultivated - what's in it for them? It's a two-way street."
One of the best collaborations Cadbury set up was with ICI, which helped it come up with a more cost-efficient way to coat chewing gum pellets based on its experience in applying paints using electrostatic technology. Cadbury was, in turn, able to help ICI come up with more convenient packaging solutions for its products.
== Going solo ==
So how is he finding the interim market? It's not for the faint-hearted, but is actually quite liberating, says Dudley, who left Cadbury to become an interim manager/consultant in December 2007. "You've got to hit the ground running and you've got to be the kind of person that finds change enjoyable rather than stressful, but there is real satisfaction in going in with no baggage and just a job to do - unencumbered by politics.
"You get the job done, you leave and that's it. As an outsider, you also get to ask silly questions and people are more likely to give you an honest answer. But you've also got to be able to talk to people at all levels of an organisation, from the guy on the shopfloor to the boss, which means you have to be able to communicate quickly and effectively. I call it the 'lift moment'. You're in there with the chairman between floors three and eight and that's how much time you have to give him an update."
You probably need a couple of decades of experience to have credibility in the interim market, he says, but interim managers are getting younger. "It's no longer just something you do when you retire." FIHN
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=== The CV ===
2008-2009 Interim roles at Jordans Cereals, Cadbury, RSSL
2004-7 Research director, ingredients and taste, Cadbury Schweppes global science centre. Developed open innovation projects to solve existing technical problems or identify 7-10 high value novel technologies with IP/patent opportunities a year.
1999-2004 Global innovation manager, Bournville UK. Created an innovation team aiming to create high added value concepts at a global level.
1992-1999 NPD manager, Australia, Cadbury Schweppes. Developed Cadbury-branded ice creams and dairy desserts across Australia.
1990-1992 New business development manager, Bunge International, Australia. Developed cryogenically frozen yeasted products for the Japanese and Australian supermarket in-store bakery sector.
1973-1990 United Biscuits UK, NPD manager McVitie's. Developed Jaffa Cakes, Hobnobs and Boasters - the latter using a prototype technique of the rotary moulding of soft mass.