Building an Integrated Engineering Organization

OVERVIEW:During the past 15 years, mature industries such as agricultural equipment have cut R&D expenditures to levels essential only for survival. Companies that survived did so by the now-standard interventions that increase emphasis on meeting customer expectations, reduce product cycle times, expand information technology, and eliminate non-value work. While these measures have made R&D within the system more efficient, they have not transformed the existing social system in a basic, fundamental way. If the resulting issues of an aging workforce and a lack of vitality in product creation are to be addressed successfully beyond the 1990s, a transformation is required. Since 1987, the John Deere Product Engineering Center has pursued a strategy for transformation. This strategy has three objectives: To shift responsibility out of the boss-subordinate dyad into teams; to encourage diversity and interaction across the boundaries of the traditional organization through the creation of communities; and to stimulate the flow of information and exchange of ideas within the context of global networks. In effect, a new social system for the organization is being implemented, based on relationships of integration rather than hierarchy.