Project Value Improvement: What is it?
Project Value Improvement (PVI) is an initiative to accelerate and boost the outputs of a project while drastically reducing development costs. This is a strong methodology to rethink the way of working and to track down any non-value added to the project.
Project Value Improvement is an effective approach to meet the following challenges:
- Provide increased value to the outputs of the development / deployment project
- Optimize lead times & Accelerate Time-to-Market
- Drastically reduce your development costs & Boost your operating margins
Kusting has developed a unique methodology, customizable by type of project and industries, to get the most out of the PVI approach. This multi-business approach is based on the 4 following rules:
1. Master the objectives: which value for which effort?
The first step in any project is to define the objectives to be achieved. But how are these objectives defined: what are the requirements for what energy to be delivered?
This question is crucial given that an over-designed project can lead to unnecessary developments without real added value, a decreasing motivation of teams, a late launch… on the other hand, a under-designed project at the beginning can imply many iterations at the end of the project, a multiplication of uncontrollable risks, non-qualities… which generates in the end excessive additional costs.
This step is therefore a fundamental part of the PVI approach, which makes it possible to precisely define the right outputs of a project. This requires a 3-step evaluation: First, the same tools as for Design to Value (DTV) are applied to analyse the real value provided to the targets. Then, the required effort is defined according to many parameters: investments, costs, internal constraints, regulations, partners and suppliers… Each effort is finally directly compared to the generated value for customer / target to estimate the profitability of the developments.
The gains generated at this stage are often the most important as they impact all project cost items. Kusting has developed high-performance tools based on this PVI methodology for each of these 3 phases.
2. Unleash your Capabilities potential
Once the project is framed with valuable outputs, the second step is the way the project is executed. There are an infinite number of possible combinations but always based on 4 main pillars: Organisation, Processes, Skills and Tools/Means.
The PVI approach is based on generating ideas on each of these 4 themes to create multiple alternative scenarios. These scenarios allow to improve the quality of the project outputs and accelerate time-to-market while reducing investment and resources costs.
For example, not enough synergies are being created between the various internal projects, while the creation of multi-project “development blocks” is a strong lever for project improvement. There is also a high potential for optimization by initiating real partnerships with suppliers and other project players.
In addition to organizational ideas, the PVI also uses technical levers to develop in a more agile way. For example, product policy creation, modular design, standardization and platforming are methods traditionally used in the PVI approach for more efficient development projects.
Kusting offers a database and a panel of powerful creativity & analysis tools to generate multiple technical & organization scenarios for Project Value Improvement.
3. Be merciless with non-added value items
Once the project lines have been drawn, the 3rd step of the PVI consists in optimizing the selected scenario by tracking down any non-value added to the development processes. This allows, for a given model, to define the just necessary and “compress” all tasks in order to have a reduced lead time and resources to the just needed.
A PVI tool is particularly used for this purpose: value stream mapping (VSM) based on the Lean Management philosophy. This mapping tool allows all involved partners to share a common vision in order to identify concrete optimizations axes.
All the processes are screened: relationships between departments, not adapted tools / means, irritants or misunderstanding to the achievement of a task… Then the same creative tools are used not this time to generate scenarios but to remove these irritants.
To identify the optimization axes, generate relevant ideas and implement the related actions, Kusting offers an effective methodology based on the PVI approach.
4. Never let your guard down
After the best cases have been found and the ideas validated, the last phase is the execution. At this stage, the danger is to take the gains for granted, which may imply drift and therefore a risk to the profitability of the project. The challenge of this phase is therefore to manage rigorously and regularly in order to guarantee the implementation of ideas and therefore the gains generated.
The PVI approach is effective in this sense as it combines several project management tools. It manages the implementation of ideas, the sharing of the right level of information to all, the proper allocation and involvement of resources while securing the risks of drift.
It also enables a positive dynamic towards teams, with short but effective meetings, visual management tools that are understandable by everyone (such as digitised Obeya), which makes it possible to get the most out of the teams that are involved throughout the entire project.
Our intervention methods are based on this approach, which turns theoretical gains into actual financial conversion over time.