Improving R&D Project Selection and Evaluation Methods of the Steel Company

Corporations are pursuing maximum returns from their R&D investment. They are also interested in sound measures to quantify returns. In fact, they use various measures and criteria for measuring returns from the R&D investment. But the fundamental problem is that there is no generic and widely acceptable measures and criteria. To make things more complicated, measures are very powerful and influential to the people in the corporations. Herbert Simon already indicated that people do many things but people usually do their best for the only tasks which are measured. Many researchers, like Chester(1995), are interested in R&D productivity measures and risks because what the company measures really influence R&D people and output. This article present design concepts of the R&D project selection and evaluation system in POSCO(Pohang Iron & Steel Company). This is an output extract from the 6-month joint activities with POSRI(POSCO Research Institute) researchers and POSCO R&D personnel. Process changes, new organizations and new selection and evaluation criteria are developed to improve R&D performance and to enhance technology management of the POSCO. This article covers new selection and evaluation criteria only. We would like to share our experience about how we redesign the selection and evaluation of R&D projects. We also bring insights how we seamlessly integrate 4 different project selection and evaluation steps as a whole. We hope that this case will give you a clue to improve your R&D management.