The LEGO development process uses a stage gate system to ensure that new designs are regularly evaluated against their business criteria and the portfolio so that costly investments are not made in projects without firm financial and market justification, aligned with the original objectives.
The foundation overview is a poster-based tool used to visualise the LEGO development process. This helps the Product Market Development team to review the whole innovation process and manage stakeholder expectations.
The development process has four prototyping phases (P0 to P3) and five manufacturing phases (M1 to M5).
- In P0 (portfolio kick-off) the business objectives for the project are defined. At this stage, the key question asked is: What are the critical issues that should be solved for product groups/lines across the portfolio? This takes about two or three months
- In P1 (opportunity freeze) the team assesses what opportunities would solve the issues identified in P0 and should be taken forward for development into concepts. The marketing team becomes involved to build market and customer insights into the business case and begin to define product requirements.
Only when the project business criteria are in place, and the financial case for a new project has been proved, does the design team become involved.
- In P2 (concept freeze) the team establishes what the concepts are about in the context of overall business, product, communication and process requirements. The design team becomes involved, concepts are created and evaluated, some initial prototyping may be undertaken, the first full business case is prepared and detailed market analysis is used to identify the market opportunity for the new project
- In P3 (portfolio freeze) the team establishes which concepts are ready to be turned into projects. The full project requirements are established, including staff requirements, tooling and design costs and the full business case is put forward for approval. Some concepts that arise at this stage may not be LEGO-based and can be taken to other areas of the business for further exploration.
Overall, the journey from P0 to P3 can take up to six months.
Teams present their outputs from the P prototyping phases using standardised document templates. The foundation document is formed from a series of templates, and is used to create a foundation for each stage gate activity. It brings the core team activities together in an easy to understand document.
Tools such as the foundation document have made comparing different project options much more straightforward, and make decisions more objective says Smith-Meyer. 'Before, we had some people presenting 6 pages, some presenting 86 pages, some used CGI and interactive presentations. Now everyone presents in equal terms, focusing more on content than presentation, so we can compare apples with apples.'