Chief Architect and Change Agent
PLM is a tall order for CIOs, one that a few are just starting to address. Industries such as automotive, consumer-packaged goods and aerospace are taking the lead, but even there, most companies are in the early phases of deployment. The most common starting point is in engineering - creating collaborative design platforms and streamlining the engineering change order (ECO) process. The next steps usually deal with bringing efficiencies to supplier relationships. Still relatively unproven is integrating customer requirements information and post-sales data about products into the broader PLM picture.
"We're in the real early stages," says Michael Grieves, director of IT programs for the Centre for Professional Development at the University of Michigan's College of Engineering. "Most of this is still collaborative engineering. You don't yet see pieces of information from beyond the factory door being tied back in." To foster research and education on PLM best practices, Grieves has helped establish the university's PLM Development Consortium, which initially will explore use of the technology in the automotive sector. Industry heavyweights such as Ford Motor, Johnson Controls and Lear are among the charter sponsors, paying as much as $US25,000 annually to support the research.
Lear, a $US14.4 billion automotive supplier, is taking this kind of stake in PLM because vice president of IT and CIO John Crary views it as a way to more effectively manage Lear's product development efforts for its customers - the leading car manufacturers, which contract with Lear for interior systems such as seating, instrument panels and electronics. Crary says he wants to give Lear customers a "laser-like focus" about their projects throughout the development cycle, which can run anywhere from a few weeks to 18 months. In the past, project information was conveyed in an ad hoc manner via spreadsheets and e-mail, and it was often inconsistent, Crary says. Now, using tools from EDS PLM Solutions, Lear has built the underpinnings of a system that will give carmakers a constant flow of information about their projects - everything from engineering schedules to part changes to quality statistics - beginning with current vehicle models.
Crary's initial role with PLM was that of change agent, working with engineering to sell the business case to senior management. From there, Crary helped oversee a cross-functional PLM project team charged with mapping and defining common business processes. Hamilton Sundstrand's Charest took similar steps. With the engineering and operations groups as co-sponsors, he launched a campaign to sell the benefits of PLM to the company's different constituencies. The campaign included videotapes that talked up how PLM would improve the jobs of product developers, manufacturing personnel and post-sales support staff. "It was a trilateral sales job, and my most important role was to act as change agent," says Charest. Had he shied away from that task, PLM would never have taken root as an enterprise solution, he says. The first fruits of PLM at Hamilton Sundstrand are more interchangeable parts, flexibility in engineering job roles and a reduction in ECOs by as much as 15 per cent.
CIO Stuart Scott orchestrated a wholesale campaign to sell GE Industrial Systems on PLM. What started as a little-known engineering foray into product development management (termed PDM, which is a narrower, engineering-focused version of PLM) became the star attraction of Scott's biweekly communique highlighting IT successes. But Scott had more in mind than just giving accolades to the engineering department. He believed what was happening in that microcosm had ramifications for all business functions within the $US5 billion manufacturer of industrial, electrical, and security systems and services - even for its parent General Electric.
Instead of leaving engineering to its own devices, Scott took the project under his wing. That involved sending e-mails and even making a Webcast talking up the virtues of a broader vision of PDM - that is, PLM. Engineering became Scott's poster child for what was possible. "What I did is help engineering be successful with PDM, and that gave us the power to drive the technology across the business," he explains.
Join the CIO Australia group on LinkedIn. The group is open to CIOs, IT Directors, COOs, CTOs and senior IT managers.