Chapter 2
Product Lifecycle Management
“Reliable information is a must for successful planning”.
C. Columbus
2.1 Overview
Included within this chapter is a review of the commonality of attributes that form the necessary foundation of sound project management together with successful Product Lifecycle Management. There can be no reasonable expectation of excellence in Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) without an associated level of competence in project management. The basic principles of project management must, therefore, be properly understood and put into practice if PLM is to feature as a competitive core value within an organisation that aspires to the delivery of failure free products. The author makes no apology for suggesting that the basic principles of project management are worthy of discussion in the context of this chapter. It is not uncommon for engineering project reviews to amount to little more than a milestone box-ticking progress exercise, where uncompleted tasks are categorised as ‘ongoing’. In circumstances such as these, the project deliverable will not be reliable, will not be complete, will not be on time and will not be within budget. This much is guaranteed.
There is a wealth of literature devoted to the subject of Product Lifecycle Management in relation to products, services and business operations. Much of this literature has been generated over the last decade. Some of the pressures placed upon enterprises to subscribe to PLM software and consultancy ...
