FIRE: How Fast, Inexpensive, Restrained, and Elegant Methods Ignite Innovation - Hardcover

Ward, Dan

3.94

180 ratings by Goodreads

9780062301901: FIRE: How Fast, Inexpensive, Restrained, and Elegant Methods Ignite Innovation

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 006230190X ISBN 13: 9780062301901

Publisher: HarperBus, 2014

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Noted military technology expert Dan Ward's manifesto for creating great products and projects using the methods of rapid innovation.

Why do some programs deliver their product under cost, while others bust their budget? Why do some deliver ahead of schedule, while others experience endless delays? Which products work better the quick and thrifty or the slow and expensive? Which situation leads to superior equipment?

With nearly two decades as an engineering officer in the U. S. Air Force, Dan Ward explored these questions during tours of duty at military research laboratories, the Air Force Institute of Technology, an intelligence agency, the Pentagon and Afghanistan. The pattern he noticed revealed that the most successful project leaders in both the public and private sectors delivered top-shelf products with a skeleton crew, a shoestring budget, and a cannonball schedule. Excessive investment of time, money, or complexity actually reduced innovation. He concluded the secret to innovation is to be fast, inexpensive, simple, and small.

FIRE presents an entertaining and practical framework for pursuing rapid, frugal innovation. A story-filled blend of pop culture and engineering insight, FIRE has something for everyone: strategic concepts leaders can use as they cast a vision, actionable principles for managers as they make business decisions, and practical tools for workers as they design, build, assess and test new products.

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Review:

“F.I.R.E. will appeal to project managers, space enthusiasts, military and tech buff s, and anyone who’s ever hired a plumber or general contractor.” (Success Magazine)

“This is no ordinary book about product development. Sure, it draws on the wisdom of great philosophers like John Cleese, Inigo Montoya, and Tom & Jerry. But it also makes a compelling case that none of us can design anything without revealing our values. ” (-Daniel H. Pink, author of TO SELL IS HUMAN, DRIVE, and A WHOLE NEW MIND)

“Dan’s refreshing philosophy promotes more effective defense acquisition and offers lessons for commercial products as well. His book helps to liberate good judgment...” (-Bernard Jenkin MP (Harwich and North Essex) Chairman, PASC (Public Administration Select Committee))

“Ward blends a maestro’s range of intriguing stories with intensely practical guidance. Don’t let the references to Mr. Bean, Quantum Leap, and Firefly fool you. FIRE is a deep and powerful contribution to the innovation literature.” (-Scott Anthony)

“Dan Ward’s FIRE is a minor miracle: a fast, fun, _funny_ read on running procurement and technical processes. It is packed with insight, cutting through common wisdom to deliver rules of thumb that should be a must read for any project manager.” (-Dr. Rachel Kleinfeld, Founder - Truman National Security Project)

“For decades we have paid more and more for defense technology and gotten less and less in return. Dan Ward’s FIRE approach establishes common sense principles with great promise-if we will only apply them.” (- MajGen Arnold Punaro, USMC (ret.), Chairman of the National Defense Industrial Association and member of the Defense Business Board,)

From the Back Cover:

Why do some projects deliver under budget and ahead of schedule, while others cost more and take longer than expected? More important, which products work better: the quick and thrifty or the slow and expensive?

In a story-filled blend of quirky pop culture and practical engineering insight, Dan Ward's F.I.R.E. answers those questions and more. Ward's extensive research and firsthand experience show how the world's top technologists consistently deliver best-in-class results on shoestring budgets and cannonball schedules, and using skeleton crews.

This remarkable book will make you laugh, make you think, and equip you to leverage the power of constraints. Discover the secrets of F.I.R.E. and learn how to:

Build strategies for speed that enhance accountability and ensure your products are well aligned with the market's needs.

Design your organizations, products, and processes with thrift in mind, solving problems with intellectual capital, not financial capital.

Unleash the power of small budgets and small teams, using short schedules, short meetings, and short documents.

Streamline your designs and cut through unnecessary, unproductive layers of bureaucracy.

But this is not just a book about how to win. With unflinching candor, Ward shows how the F.I.R.E. method, even when followed wisely and well, can result in a flop. Taking a deep look at several negative outcomes, he shows how to make failures optimal rather than epic.

F.I.R.E. provides strategic concepts for leaders, decision-making principles for managers, and practical tools for people working on anything from spacecraft and fighter jets to websites and children's toys. Technology professionals and curious amateurs alike will come away with a deeper understanding of effective product design. Plus, there's a funny story about a dishwasher that just may change the way you buy major appliances.

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