Improving the Innovation Process at Eastman Chemical

OVERVIEW:As Eastman Chemical Company faced an increasingly competitive global environment, and stronger demands for new products from a market-oriented, business-centered organization, it was recognized that an improvement in the company's innovation process was necessary. Throughout the company, innovation was generally thought of as an R&D process with relatively poor linkage to marketing and business functions when innovating new growth products. On the other hand, the innovation process for incremental improvement of products worked very well. A systematic quality management process approach was used to redefine innovation as a company-wide system in which many functions, not just R&D, play a critical role. As a result of this effort, the identification of the right thing to work on (that is, the correct product or process needs for a business) was recognized as a major opportunity for improvement. Improvements in this area are being obtained by using multifunctional needs-identification teams and by clearly defining the role of the businesses as owners of innovation, with R&D a facilitator. In addition, opportunities for substantial improvements in efficiency (i.e., reduced cycle time) are being pursued by stronger focus on project management, including early use of informal multifunctional concept development teams.