Managing the Development of Complex Product Systems—What Managers Can Learn From the Research

Product development (PD) in the 21st century is becoming more complex due to fast paced technological advances and demanding customers. In this paper, I presents a preview of the various models and tools that can be used to manage the development of such complex product systems. These models and tools are organized around three PD domains: people, product, process, and the information that flows between them. The intention is not to identify all publications in any single domain, but instead to expose PD and engineering managers to a set of useful tools to manage the development complexity in each domain and more importantly at the intersection of the three domains.