Design briefs in design-driven new product development

Abstract

This study empirically examines the role of product design briefs as knowledge-based artefacts of cross-functional collaboration within design-driven new product development (NPD). Contemporary NPD is increasingly seen as a design-driven and knowledge-based activity where information sharing within team-based environments is critical to successful product design and development processes. However, the mere presence of inter-functional structures has not necessarily led to better outcomes for firms. By drawing on a proprietary sample of 80 product design briefs gathered from design-driven product-oriented firms, our results provide insight into how organizations create, codify and communicate knowledge from different functional areas and support flows of knowledge within NPD, specifically by: (1) providing an inventory of 51 information elements commonly present in product design briefs; (2) organizing these information elements into a parsimonious framework of strategic dimensions using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) alongside a widely-established taxonomy; (3) defining differences between information elements as rated by managerial ‘importance’ across three key functional areas of NPD: (a) design, (b) marketing and (c) engineering/ R&D/ development; and (4) providing a theoretic rationale for these differences and underlying strategic dimensions by integrating our findings with relevant literature.

Toward Sustainable Fashion Product Development: The use of 3D Virtual Prototyping Technologies in the Synchronous Remote Learning Classroom

“…A bill of materials (BOM) refers to the complete list of the raw materials and components that are required to build a product across industries (Bubonia, 2021; Parkman & Malkewitz, 2019).…”

“…To help students understand technical processes and details of product construction, different 3D virtual construction detail examples were prepared in simple 3D digital garment formats using CLO. Some of the construction details, such as sequinning or beading, are expensive to physically execute (Bubonia, 2021; Parkman & Malkewitz, 2019), thus, the use of 3D digital construction detail samples is a sustainable and cost-effective approach in product development (see Figure 7).…”

AI Assistance in Enterprise Workflows: Enhancing Design Brief Creation for Designers

“…Crossfunctional collaboration is imperative in the process of product design. Parkman and Malkewitz (2019) further emphasize the significance of the design brief, viewing it as a product of knowledge cross-functional collaboration [20]. The Design Brief has three core functions: 1) Assessment: It serves as an evaluation tool to reflect the needs of stakeholders at the beginning of a project.…”

Selection and framing of briefs for educational circular design projects

“…Design briefs are an integral part of design education, especially for project-based modules, outlining the purposes of the educational design projects, constituting a starting point for the educational tasks and hinting at the learning outcomes for novice designers (Paton and Dorst, 2011;Read and Bohemia, 2012). For a fruitful collaboration between industry partners and HEIs in the area of design for sustainability and CE, the development of the design briefs requires an integrated approach, considering the varying requirements of collaborating partners and the wide scope of sustainability and CE theories and challenges (Dewulf, 2013;Parkman and Malkewitz, 2019). While there are studies on integrating concerns of sustainability into design briefs (Dewulf et al, 2012;Petala et al, 2010), there are not many studies about educational design projects.…”