Concept selection

Carlos Andrés Miranda 1

Concept selection

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Concept selection
The concept development phase

Mission Development
Statement Plan
Identify Establish Generate Select Test Set Plan
Customer Target Product Product Product Final Downstream
Needs Specifications Concepts Concept(s) Concept(s) Specifications Development

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Concept selection
The concept development phase

Mission Development
Statement Identify Establish Generate Select Test Set Plan Plan
Customer Target Product Product Product Final Downstream
Needs Specifications Concepts Concept(s) Concept(s) Specifications Development

• Simple rating method helps identify the most promising concepts among many.

• Discussion, combination, and refinement of concepts can create even better ones.

• Structured process creates documentation and builds consensus.

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Concept selection
Concept selection is the process of evaluating concepts with respect to customer needs and other
criteria, comparing the relative strengths and weaknesses of the concepts, and selecting one or
more concepts for further investigation, testing, or development.

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Concept selection
After generating concepts, the next step that needs to be accomplished is evaluating them.

The term evaluate, as used in this text, implies comparison between alternative concepts relative to
the requirements they must meet.

The results of evaluation give the information necessary to make concept decisions.

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Concept selection
The goal is to expend the least amount of resources on deciding which concepts have the highest
potential for becoming a quality product.

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Concept selection
Many companies generate only one concept and then spend time developing it. Others develop
many concepts in parallel, eliminating the weaker ones along the way.

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Concept selection
Be ready during concept evaluation to abandon your favorite idea, if you cannot defend it in a
rational way.

Also, abandon if necessary “the way things have always been done around here.”

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Concept selection
Some concept selection methods

1. Open Multi-voting
2. Secret Ballot Voting
3. Pro/Con or Benefit/Effort List
4. Group Consensus
5. Leader’s Decision
6. Client’s Decision
7. Market Testing
8. Online Community Rating
9. Screening Matrix
10. Scoring Matrix

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Concept selection
Some concept selection methods
1. Open Multi-voting
very fast
2. Secret Ballot Voting
3. Pro/Con or Benefit/Effort List
common
4. Group Consensus

sometimes 5. Leader’s Decision

necessary 6. Client’s Decision
difficult 7. Market Testing
trendy 8. Online Community Rating
fast 9. Screening Matrix
balanced 10. Scoring Matrix
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Concept selection
Some concept selection methods
1. Open Multi-voting
very fast
2. Secret Ballot Voting
3. Pro/Con or Benefit/Effort List
common
4. Group Consensus

sometimes 5. Leader’s Decision

necessary 6. Client’s Decision
difficult 7. Market Testing
trendy 8. Online Community Rating
fast 9. Screening Matrix
balanced 10. Scoring Matrix
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Concept selection
Concept selection funnel

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Concept selection
Concept selection methods

• Screening is a quick, approximate evaluation aimed at producing a few viable alternatives.

• Scoring is a more careful analysis of these relatively few concepts to choose the single concept
most likely to lead to product success.

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Concept selection
Methodology

During concept screening, rough initial concepts are evaluated relative to a common reference
concept using the screening matrix.

At this preliminary stage, detailed quantitative comparisons are difficult to obtain and may be
misleading, so a coarse comparative rating system is used.

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Concept selection
Methodology

After some alternatives are eliminated, the team may choose to move on to concept scoring and
conduct more detailed analyses and finer quantitative evaluation of the remaining concepts using
the scoring matrix as a guide.

Throughout the screening and scoring process, several iterations may be performed, with new
alternatives arising from the combination of the features of several concepts.

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Concept selection
Methodology

Both screening and scoring use a matrix as the basis of a six-step selection process.

1. Prepare the selection matrix.

2. Rate the concepts.
3. Rank the concepts.
4. Combine and improve the concepts.
5. Select one or more concepts.
6. Reflect on the results and the process.

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Concept selection
Choosing the Criteria for Comparison

First, it is necessary to know the basis on which the alternatives are to be compared with each
other. Using the QFD method, an effort was made to develop a full set of customer requirements for
a design.

Usually the basis for comparing the design concepts is a mix of customer requirements and
engineering specifications, matched to the level of fidelity of the alternatives.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

Concept screening is based on a method developed by the late Stuart Pugh in the 1980s and is often
called Pugh concept selection (Pugh, 1990).

The purposes of this stage are to narrow the number of concepts quickly and to improve the
concepts.

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Concept screening

1. Prepare the selection matrix

Select the concept alternatives to be compared and choose the criteria for comparison.

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Concept screening

I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

2. Rate the concepts

A relative score of “better than” (+), “same as” (0), or “worse than” (-) is placed in each cell of the
matrix to represent how each concept rates in comparison to a reference concept relative to the
particular criterion.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

3. Rank the concepts

After rating all the concepts, the team sums the number of “better than,” “same as,” and “worse
than” scores and enters the sum for each category in the lower rows of the matrix.

Often at this point the team can identify one or two criteria that really seem to differentiate the
concepts.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

4. Combine and improve the concepts

Having rated and ranked the concepts, the team should verify that the results make sense and then
consider if there are ways to combine and improve certain concepts.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

4. Combine and improve the concepts

Two issues to consider are:

• Is there a generally good concept that is degraded by one bad feature? Can a minor modification
improve the overall concept and yet preserve a distinction from the other concepts?

• Are there two concepts that can be combined to preserve the “better than” qualities while
annulling the “worse than” qualities?

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Concept selection
Concept screening

4. Combine and improve the concepts

Combined and improved concepts are then added to the matrix, rated by the team, and ranked
along with the original concepts.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

5. Select one or more concepts

Once the team members are satisfied with their understanding of each concept and its relative
quality, they decide which concepts are to be selected for further refinement and analysis.

Based upon previous steps, the team will likely develop a clear sense of which are the most
promising concepts.

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Concept selection
Concept screening

6. Reflect on the results and the process

All of the team members should be comfortable with the outcome.

An explicit consideration of whether the results make sense to everyone reduces the likelihood of
making a mistake and increases the likelihood that the entire team will be solidly committed to the
subsequent development activities.

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Concept selection
Concept screening – A more refined one

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Concept selection
Concept screening – A more refined one

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

Concept scoring is used when increased resolution will better differentiate among competing
concepts.

In this stage, the team weighs the relative importance of the selection criteria and focuses on more
refined comparisons with respect to each criterion.

The concept scores are determined by the weighted sum of the ratings.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

1. Prepare the selection matrix

As in the screening stage, the team prepares a matrix and identifies a reference concept.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

1. Prepare the selection matrix

• Hierarchical decomposition of selection criteria:

In conjunction with more detailed concepts, the team may choose to break down criteria to the
level of detail necessary for meaningful comparison..

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

1. Prepare the selection matrix

After the criteria are entered, the team adds importance weights to the matrix.

Several different schemes can be used to weight the criteria, such as assigning an importance value
from 1 to 5, or allocating 100 percentage points among them.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring – 1. Prepare the selection matrix

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

2. Rating the concepts

As in the screening stage, the team prepares a matrix and identifies a reference concept.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring - 2. Rating the concepts

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Concept selection
Concept scoring - 2. Rating the concepts

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

3. Rank the concepts

Once the ratings are entered for each concept, weighted scores are calculated by multiplying the
raw scores by the criteria weights.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

3. Rank the concepts

The total score for each concept is the sum of the weighted scores:

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Concept selection
Concept scoring - 3. Rank the concepts

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

4. Combine and improve concepts

As in the screening stage, the team looks for changes or combinations that improve concepts.

Although the formal concept generation process is typically completed before concept selection
begins, some of the most creative refinements and improvements occur during the concept
selection process as the team realizes the inherent strengths and weaknesses of certain features of
the product concepts.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

5. Select one or more concepts

The final selection is not simply a question of choosing the concept that achieves the highest
ranking after the first pass through the process.

Rather, the team should explore this initial evaluation by conducting a sensitivity analysis.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

5. Select one or more concepts

The team may also create two or more scoring matrices with different weightings to yield the
concept ranking for various market segments with different customer preferences.

It may be that one concept is dominant for several segments.

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Concept selection
Concept scoring - 5. Select one or more concepts

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Concept selection
Concept scoring

6. Reflect on the results and the process

As a final step the team reflects on the selected concept(s) and on the concept selection process.

In some ways, this is the “point of no return” for the concept development process, so everyone on
the team should feel comfortable that all of the relevant issues have been discussed and that the
selected concept(s) have the greatest potential to satisfy customers and be economically successful.

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Concept scoring

6. Reflect on the results and the process

Two questions are useful in improving the process for subsequent concept selection activities:

• In what way did the concept selection method facilitate team decision making?

• How can the method be modified to improve team performance?

These questions focus the team on the strengths and weaknesses of the methodology in relation to the
needs and capabilities of the organization.

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Concept Selection Example:

Reusable Insulin Syringe

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Concept selection
A.
Example Master
Cylinder E.
Swash
Ring

B.
Rubber
Brake F.
Lever
Set

C.
Ratchet
G.
Dial
Screw

D.
Plunge
Stop 51
Concept selection
Screening
Matrix

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Concept selection
New concepts

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Concept selection
Scoring
Matrix

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