Shannon McGarry
Elevate your design and manufacturing processes with Autodesk Fusion
Agile development processes are a requirement for consumer product companies. These processes allow them to deliver greater value to their customers and to remain competitive in today’s crowded, ever-changing market. Take a look at five commonly used agile product development tactics your team can implement to stay ahead of the game.
Agile Product Development Tactics
1. Using Kanban boards to monitor tasks and processes
“Kanban,” translated from Japanese, means “visual signal” and is one of the foundational pieces of agile product development. Kanban boards are a visual project management tool that allows all members of a team to see each step of the entire process, as well as each individual’s tasks within it.
The use of Kanban boards increases transparency and traceability, thus allowing all stakeholders to collaborate more effectively. The end result? Improved efficiency and increased speed of product creation.
2. Agile Product Development – Daily stand-up meetings
Daily stand-up meetings are a very popular tactic among agile consumer product companies. They aren’t just another meeting to fill up your already full calendar. These are strategic meetings that provide a platform to discuss progress, identify roadblocks, and determine next steps.
The full value of daily stand-ups comes to fruition when leaders run the meetings effectively. Meetings should focus on the critical tasks needed to advance the project and the stakeholders required to execute these tasks. Ultimately ensuring that continued progress is made and deadlines are met.
3. Use of sprints to assign and track tasks
Sprints are short, intense time periods to complete tasks. Typically managers assign tasks to the team with the expectation that they complete their work by the end of a one-to-two-week period. Tasks are very specific and tactical, always keeping in the mind the end goal of product development.
During sprint planning, team members and stakeholders share information, expectations, and estimated completion times. This helps define what tasks can be completed in each sprint.
4. Feedback from customers and stakeholders
Feedback is key for successful agile product development. Successful consumer product companies seek feedback from customers at every stage of development and then make design modifications based upon that feedback. Companies also seek feedback from other internal stakeholders that include engineers and quality assurance managers, as well as external stakeholders, such as consultants, contractors, and other subject-matter experts.
5. Arrive at the minimum viable product in the first iteration
Successful consumer product companies require clear definitions at the earliest stages of development that may include specific features, appearances, or important functionality. As a result, they attempt to create a minimum viable product (MVP) by the first iteration of a design. MVP products contain enough features to satisfy early-adopter customers. From there, teams can seek customer and stakeholder feedback to continue to iterate and improve the product.
Companies that quickly develop and iterate on an MVP are better positioned to meet customer expectations, create more competitive products and bring them to market more quickly.
Fusion 360 for agile product development
Are you ready to design and make better products? Start exploring the agile product development process with a free trial of Autodesk Fusion 360.
