Industrial practice in technology planning - implications for a useful tool catalogue for technology management

Summary form only given. Companies wishing to achieve superior financial results are advised to use a few tools well, concentrating on the mainstream tools for initiatives such as strategic planning and benchmarking. However, in a manufacturing company, both these initiatives need sound technological inputs to enable decisions to be taken about short and long term product and process investments. The field that deals with all aspects of integrating technological issues into business decision making is technology management, however practical technology management tools for managers do not appear to be accessible or widely used. Previous papers by the authors have aimed to develop a better conceptual understanding of tools themselves and how a tool catalogue would be best structured, for practical application using inputs from industrial workshops. However it was felt a wider view of industrial practice would give useful further input to the type of catalogue required and serve as a comprehensiveness check for a tool catalogue already under development. To this end a survey was conducted in 1999 to establish current practice in the area of technology planning, and this included questions about tools being used and where tools were still required. The survey revealed a rich and varied picture of how companies perceive technology planning and the approaches that are adopted. Technology planning tends not to be identified as a specific business process, but rather as embedded within other processes, such as general strategy and planning, innovation, new product introduction and R&D management.