Teaching new product development in universities: an action learning approach

This paper reviews the concepts of new product development (NPD) and discusses the change of traditional lectures into an action learning approach of teaching NPD in universities. It explains the design and delivery of an action learning NPD course, drawing upon the experience from an engineering department at the University of the West Indies, Trinidad. The course stresses student participation, teamwork, group decision-making and learning process evaluation. Despite classroom lectures and tutorials, it incorporates group learning activities and a competitive management workshop into a NPD curriculum for undergraduates. The workshop has been implemented with encouraging results in student learning and development.