Yesterday I spent most of the day populating the product development (solution design, systems engineering) decisions that are a big part of the Decision Driven® Strategy pattern. I added a branch of decisions that form the bridge between science (discovering and explaining what is true) and engineering (turning what is true into something useful).
The most interesting decision in this area is one that I’ve titled “Behaviors to Exploit” and framed as “What behaviors/properties (science) within the operating regime will be exploited to create value?”. Hang with me a second. Operating regime sounds scary and technical but it really just means that every product operates in the real world in a some range of environments. Your solar-powered calculator operates when there is light (photons that provide energy), not darkness. Your refrigerator operates at room temperatures, not at 2000 degrees F. Your cell phone, TV or satellite radio all operate within certain frequency bands.
Within those environments certain laws of science dominate and can be exploited to create value - the basis for every product. I was recently involved with the IEEE in creating a nanoelectronics standards roadmap. When materials are studied at nanometer scales (really, really, really small), they behave in strange ways. These strange behaviors can be exploited to create new products. Most of the breakthrough innovations of the past century or two are the result of one or two newly discovered properties of some material being exploited in a clever way.
Although I have a degree in Physics (and Electrical Engineering), most of the “new science” that I’ve discovered has revolved around human thinking, particularly decisions. In a previous posts, I’ve discussed one of those “true and useful” concepts: Decisions create and consume requirements. This statement is true because it explains the relationship between requirements and decisions for all time; and useful because it opens the door to a new capability to continuously align many decisions that are being made in parallel.
In upcoming posts, I’ll dive deeper into some of the other true and useful ideas that form the basis of Decision Driven® Strategy and Decision Driven® Life.
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Filed under: Decision Concepts, Decision Driven Strategy, Sample Decisions | Tagged: align, breakthrough, decision, decision science, design, engineering, innovation, pattern, product development, requirements, science, solution, systems engineering, thinking, true, useful
