Community Forum
Community Forum accepts member submitted questions and requests that members take a brief moment and reply with their viewpoint. All of the responses will be compiled and sent out in an email to all members within three business days. All questions and responses will be archived on this page for future reference for IRI members only. Community Forum is a members-only benefit of IRI Membership. Please login to view Community Forum discussions topics.
Have a question for the IRI Community?
Here are some guidelines to help you form your question:
- Provide context, as it will help your peers provide better answers
- Share your current approaches or ones you have considered
- Use simple language and explain terms that may be unfamiliar to your peers
- If you wish to remain anonymous in either your question or reply, please make a note of this in your email.
Recent Discussions
The innovation management tools market offers technologies that help organizations streamline operations for their innovation programs. Most products offer similar core capabilities around ideation, collaboration, stage-gate workflows and reporting. An IRI member is conducting market research around tools in this space and would like to know if IRI members are using COTS (commercially available off-the-shelf) products to capture the front end of innovation and your perception on the performance of the tools.
In the wake of the racial/social/civil protests and unrest that has occurred within the US, our organization has renewed efforts to improve the representation of under-represented minorities at all levels within the corporation as we believe diversity and inclusion to be a strategic imperative. Please take a minute and let us know how your organization is approaching this challenge.
Many companies review R&D projects at initiation for strategic fit and then review progress and continued relevance at ongoing stage gate and portfolio review meetings. Another dimension that is sometimes addressed is portfolio platform robustness. A project's impact on a portfolio platform’s robustness can be reviewed at initiation and at periodic portfolio reviews. Our organization is looking to begin a process of reviewing its platforms for robustness and would like insights from those that are have already implemented this type of review.
Fellow programs are one of many vehicles aimed to engage top R&D Talent. We are an organization looking to refresh our program and seeking insight on your organization's program. This includes how to engage fellows in a way that is beneficial to both them as top scientific talent but also the organization that values their contributions. While this is a specific ask about Fellow programs, any additional insight into engaging individual contributor R&D talent is welcome.
IRI and Babson College have teamed up to conduct a longitudinal study on the impact that the coronavirus pandemic is having on R&D and innovation management. In order to understand these impacts over time, we will be conducting a series of surveys over the next two years, tracking such key issues as productivity, morale, culture, collaboration, and communication.
Explore Community Topics
Below are samples of Community Forum resources. To see all of our historical data, please utilize the IRI Learning Center
Alliances & Collaborations
- What is your experience with open innovation firms?
- How do you handle IP when collaborating with universities?
Finance & Resources
- Can you help with Life Cycle Analyses?
- Can you recommend a consultant who can assess our overall R&D investment?
Innovation
Intellectual Asset Management
- How do you list inventors' names on patent applications?
- Are you concerned that your patent portfolio reveals your research strategy?
- How do you determine how long to hold on to IP?
- How does your company reward people who are granted patents?
- Who manages your IP?
Knowledge Management
Metrics
New Product Development
- What is your cost per project for early stage discovery?
- What is your Design Thinking methodology?
- How are new product sales calculated?
- How do you prioritize NPD?
- Let's Talk About NPD
- What is Your Vitality Index?
Project & Portfolio Management
- What program management tools do you use?
- What is your R&D resource allocation?
- What metrics are used for your innovation process?
- How do you track R&D project execution performance?
Strategic Planning
- Can you help with Life Cycle Analyses?
- Do you recommend ISO Certification?
- How many projects should R&D people have at a time?
- Are you concerned that your patent portfolio reveals your research strategy?
Organization & Culture
- What is your overall R&D structure?
- Do shared service centers work?
- How to establish a managerial career ladder and a technical career ladder
- Does your organization offer flex time?
- How does your company reward people who are granted patents?
Talent Management & Human Resources
- Can you share some examples of innovation job descriptions?
- What is your approach to STEM?
- How Do You Align Your Technical Ladder?
- Overal R&D Structure
- What is the career development structure of your R&D organization?
- How is your tech ladder structured for promotion opportunities?
- What is the span of control for managers?
- How do you align your technical ladder?
- How are you improving your team's technical capability?
Tools & Techniques
- What document management tool do you use?
- What new tools do your researchers use to do their jobs faster?
- Can you help with Life Cycle Analyses?
- Can you recommend a consultant who can assess our overall R&D investment?
- Do you have contact lens restrictions?
- What program management tools do you use?
Tuesday May 04, 2021 2:00pm – 3:30pm
Today there is almost no dispute that attention to issues of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is critical to an organization's success. There's also ample evidence that an inclusive and diverse...
Wednesday May 12, 2021 12:00pm
Effective innovation measurement includes choosing the right metrics for the context, yes, but can also involve educating the C-suite, navigating multiple software systems, and mitigating unintended...
Friday April 02, 2021 10:00am
The innovation management tools market offers technologies that help organizations streamline operations for their innovation programs. Most products offer similar core capabilities around ideation,...