Comments on: Learning about PLM – Who Should We Listen To?

By: Prashant Dhonde

Prashant Dhonde — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 08:14:24 +0000

Hi Jim,

We also need to look at educatinal institues.Their are already some universities offering courses in PLM and lot more are coming up.
Also it also helps reading about how implementations work in other domains like ERP/CRM

Enjoy,
Prashant

By: Stan Przybylinski

Stan Przybylinski — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 13:10:15 +0000

There are some good links to his stuff on Wikipedia…

By: Jim Brown

Jim Brown — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 04:04:17 +0000

Oleg,
I was thinking more about how manufacturers and researchers can learn about PLM, but I certainly agree that vendors need to learn too! Customers are their best ally, but they have to make sure to have strategic conversations with business leaders and not get sucked into doing only minor usability enhancements and miss a big trend (like social computing).

Good conversations going on at PLM Twine / Daily PLM Think Tank, thanks.
Jim

By: Jim Brown

Jim Brown — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 04:00:41 +0000

Stan,
Thanks for your comments. I had a colleague (Olin Thompson) that I did some seminars with. He had what he called a “credibility matrix” that had two dimensions. If I recall it correctly, one dimension was the messenger, and the other the message medium. In his matrix, the most credible was a customer publishing their real-world experience in a formal setting (NY Times, for example). Very high on the list was a credible, 3rd party recounting customer experiences. This is one of the reasons why I focus my Tech-Clarity Perspectives on interviews with manufacturers. It is also why I think the most valuable thing the “big analysts” offer is their interactions with their manufacturing clients. I know you are wondering what the lowest credibility was on the matrix – it was a sales person communicating via spoken word. Sad but true.

Would love to hear more about Derek de Solla Price has to say. I will Google to see what I can find, or feel free to post back a relevant link if you have one.

Thanks,
Jim

By: Jim Brown

Jim Brown — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 03:51:27 +0000

Mark,
I love your analogy about learning from other domains. One of the things that I realize is that most of my analyst colleagues have engineering software / CAD backgrounds. I come at PLM from an enterprise systems / manufacturing systems perspective. I find my different background often gives me a different perspective than others. For example, I have worked with ERP and supply chain systems, so dealing with issues like product compliance/manufacturing execution/costing/supplier management/service management are all very closely aligned with my background. Of course, I can’t hold a candle to others when it comes to the details of CAD/CAE/etc. I have seen many trends from other enterprise systems enter PLM. Now, I think PLM has an opportunity to be on the forefront of things like social computing!

Of course you do a bit of blogging yourself, so we can learn from you as well.

Nice to hear from you Mark!

By: Stan Przybylinski

Stan Przybylinski — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:43:57 +0000

Hi Jim,

I’d like to add a couple things in a couple different directions. In my courses on competitive intelligence, they say that you should listen to people seen by the mainstream as being on the “fringe”. While sometimes they are indeed CRAZY, they often are saying things that threaten the status quo.

The other point has to do with research by analysts on who decision makers listen to. Sadly for analysts, they do not usually rate highly (although their rating improves as company size improves). Decision makers listen more to peers, through professional relationships and the like. AMR used to regularly ask the question but stopped a few years ago (maybe they saw their low rating – just a guess). Forrester did the most interesting work in this regard in the last year or so.

Burhops’ comment probably refers to, in part, Derek de Solla Price, who did some really good work in this area. Lots of great stuff that has implications for PLM.

Ciao for now…

Stan