Get Savvy about PLM

I attended an incredible meeting of some of the top minds in PLM at Purdue University’s PLM Center of Excellence last week and while there was far too much discussion to cover in detail, I found Dr. Grieve’s closing comments to be worth noting. With his permission, I am including just a few highlights - very paraphrased as he is an orator worth taking note of and I just can’t take notes that fast…

Some of the key points he raised were:
* The need to understand that PLM involves a paradigm shift - from atoms to bits - as our technology allows for more and more simulation of the real world - we can do more “virtually” to pre-build our designs and even our manufacturing plants - without physical prototypes - a savings of time, material, energy and more.
* People issues with PLM are bigger than the technical issues - to extract value from PLM means educating people about the possibilities that the PLM tool training alone does not provide (investing in the subject matter training is as important as the software training and perhaps more so).
* The absence of PLM related metrics is concerning but we should not allow the absence of metrics to paralize us.
* The CXO’s who are investing in PLM KNOW it is NOT optional and they KNOW that business survival depends upon their execution of PLM.
* Multicultural teams and virual teams pose new challenges to business. Isolated groups of people are not equal to globalized teams where literally everyone is working on the same development work around the world. Dealing with the time zones for globalized team communication is a problem we haven’t even begun to address.
* The vendors have been focused on PROCESS - yet innovation does not conform to processes. By definition process stifles innovation. PLM needs to enable PRACTICE - the creative side of product development. Innovation does not come from workflows and process maps.

I enjoyed meeting the folks at Purdue and the participants of their PLM Advisory Board. Keep your eyes open for good things in PLM from Purdue.

Copyright 2007, LHirr, All rights reserved.