KNOWLEDGE SHARING (KS) DIFFICULTIES AND NPD

Dear respondent,

Developing new products is an integral part of any organization’s innovation strategy and is often considered as a key ingredient for growth and success. The core of the New Product Development (NPD) process centres on creation, sharing and management of knowledge. However, it has been observed that difficulties (or barriers) in knowledge sharing at each stage of the NPD process might result in the overall hindrance in the NPD process, which might lead to the organization losing its ground in the market. With this in mind, the current research have embarked upon the study of a set of critical Knowledge Sharing (KS) difficulties that might be associated with a NPD process and would greatly appreciate and value a few minutes of your time to respond to the enclosed questionnaire.

The results of this study will reveal a set of important KS difficulties associated with new product development. The findings of this research are expected to greatly aid the product development and management team of an organization to determine the possible difficulties in KS that retards the NPD process and design mitigation strategies accordingly. In this context, your input will serve as an invaluable contribution to our research. The questionnaire should only take 15-20 minutes to complete.

Please answer all the questions to reflect your perceptions on this issue. Your details will be kept strictly confidential at all stages of the research process and beyond and all information provided by you will be treated as strictly confidential. Needless to add, we will be happy to share with you the result and findings of the study, if you so desire.

We thank you in advance for completing the questionnaire and supporting our research in the process.

Yours sincerely,

Ms. Jasmine Hsu, Mr. Debdeep Chatterjee & Dr. Anirban Ganguly

(O. P. Jindal Global University & Schneider Electric)

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Important Definitions:
New Product Development: The overall process of strategy, organization, concept generation, product and marketing plan creation and evaluation, and commercialization of a new product.
Knowledge Sharing: Knowledge sharing is an activity through which knowledge (namely, information, skills, or expertise) is disseminated and exchanged among people, communities and organizations.
Knowledge Management: Process of capturing, developing, sharing, and effectively using organizational knowledge to achieve the overall objective of the organization
New Product Development (NPD) team: Functional teams that are involved in the NPD process, including R&D, Product Management, Product Marketing, Quality Assurance, among others.