4. The Need For A Product Champion

It is essential when starting a new product development project to have some individual carry out the role of product champion. The product champion carries out the role of central or prime decision maker with respect to product requirement decisions.

The Role Of Product Definition

The role of a product champion is to bring organisational resources to bear on both the definition and ongoing development of the product. During product definition these resources are likely to be decision making or decision assisting resources and quality control resources.

Without a proactive product champion, most product development projects splutter into life slowly as decisions get made by default, through poorly based assumptions and without a market reference point. A proactive product champion who has the backing of all parties involved in product development can achieve major project savings by ensuring that a high quality product definition is made available quickly.

An effective product champion can reduce the time to market for a new product by as much as 6 months. Most of these savings are achieved through time savings in the product definition phase and as a direct effect of providing high quality product definitions to product development project teams at an early stage in the product development life cycle.

Identifying A Product Champion

A product champion can come from any background. Most businesses recognise the need for a product champion but are left in a dilemma of wanting to institutionalise the product champion role whilst allowing innovative product ideas to surface more generally in the business.