Introduction

Design Management Journal, 2002 by Hayes, Robert

This second edition of the Academic Review contains a number of interesting papers, whose topics range from the design process for "discontinuous" products (Veryzer) to the impact of design on different levels of corporate activities (Borja de Mozota) to the role of markets in stimulating innovation (Reinmoeller). To achieve publication these articles had to successfully pass through the careful screening of DMI's Research Advisory Committee. For those who are unaware of this committee and its activities, a few words about it and its mission might be appropriate.

Progress in any field takes place by building on the accomplishments of others. "I stood on the shoulders of giants" is how Isaac Newton modestly described his discovery of the laws of gravitation. Today's product designers and architects similarly build on the accumulated experience of their forebears and mentors, taking advantage of both their triumphs and their mistakes. So must those who attempt to conduct research about design management and organization.

In order for a body of knowledge to be a solid base for progress, however, great attention must be paid to the quality and coverage of the building blocks that go into constructing it. Most academic research takes place in environments that encourage and support the quality of the research process in a number of ways that are so ubiquitous that academics are often hardly aware of their existence (it has been said that the last thing a fish discovers is water!). We typically operate within well-defined academic disciplines, which-like a room of mirrors-continually direct our attention back on a restricted set of problems and issues, thus reinforcing the importance of building upon what is already known. In our doctoral training (which almost always takes place within the confines of a discipline) we are required to become familiar with the "foundations" of that discipline. Then we are required to explore some accepted problem area within it so deeply that we can create a new building block-a "thesis" that adds to existing knowledge.

After we join a university faculty, that process is further reinforced by the expectations and quality standards incorporated in the academic promotion process. One is expected to review the work of others, identify inconsistencies or gaps in their findings, and then collect new data or otherwise develop explanations for those inconsistencies, extend earlier findings, or contribute to the sum of knowledge in some other way. Policing this process are both our senior academic colleagues and the peer review process that our submissions to academic journals and conferences (as well as our requests for funding) must go through.

How does one duplicate this elaborate and self-reinforcing process in a new, and inter-disciplinary, field of inquiry, such as design management? Most of us have come to this emerging field from other disciplines that have different literatures, different methodologies, and different objectives. We generally find ourselves rather isolated in our institutions, working on problems that our immediate colleagues regard as tangential to their core interests. We have, as yet, almost no doctoral programs, academic departments, or accepted journals. We seldom have senior colleagues who can guide and support our work.

All we have are each other: a "virtual department" that spans institutions around the world. In place of an established journal we have occasional "academic reviews." And in place of the senior colleagues that guide progress in more established departments, we have our Research Advisory Council. This council has two roles. First, it acts something like a building inspector; checking the foundations of our emerging structure for bricks and beams that will not support the weight of follow-on research. It also looks for gaps in that foundation that need to be filled in order to strengthen and flesh out the structure. Second, it acts as a sort of general contractor; observing, as the structure takes shape, where additions to it might be appropriate and encouraging the appropriate specialists to take on that work.

As an example of this second role, let me propose some issues that managers of the design process (and this includes corporate managers who are not directly involved in design) face in today's world, but about which very little research has been done up to now. These issues concern how one should prepare both designers and design managers to operate effectively in what has come to be called the New Economy.

This New Economy is characterized first by increasing internationalization. Most organizations today routinely do business-including designing their products and services, as well as producing and marketing them-in several countries, often forming alliances with foreign-based companies. Second, advances in information technology (IT) are encouraging the development and growth of new types of "knowledge-based" products and services-even new types of companies (for example, the "dotcoms") and corporate organizations (for example, "virtual companies"). Third, the combination of IT and globalization has encouraged the growth of outsourcing, which has expanded rapidly from parts to modules (that is, from brakes to braking systems), to whole products-and increasingly to their design, as well. Now it is involving whole functional organizations, to the point where "contract manufacturing" has become the fastest growing industry in the US. In this New Economy, speed of response to customer requests, to market windows of opportunity, and to external crises is a key to success. Faster response requires both more autonomy/entrepreneurialism and closer integration-among functional groups, between companies and their customers, and among companies belonging to the same network.