Don’t take on too much.
For this phase and also for the subsequent phases, it is helpful to limit the number of project ideas worked on per phase.
This protects the staff and teams in each phase from being overloaded. After all, there is no point in leaving any number of project proposals in phases, which may then “lie around” there for a very long time and progress too late or never.
The limit for the number of projects allowed per phase is also called the “WIP limit” (WIP=Work In Progress).
Knowledge about problems instead of solutions.
In the first phase, the focus is on application analyses with customers, and in the search for problems that are solved with product ideas.
Main questions are answered:
Companies that have filled their cornucopia with systematically collected problems of their most important customers or product users can draw from the full.
Internally driven projects.
Internal projects are also integrated into the evaluation. After all, they also need capacity and can possibly surpass the innovation ideas in their importance. E.G:
Production cost optimisation
Technology projects
Quality improvements
Infrastructure projects
Such projects are also included in the consideration and evaluated relative to all others.