What's Next?: After Stage-Gate

As the creator of the Stage-Gate® process, I am often asked, “What's next after stage-gate?” For years, I've not had an answer. Now, we're seeing new approaches emerging from progressive companies that represent a new generation of idea-to-launch processes. In some cases, it's an evolution of Stage-Gate to a better, faster model; in other firms, its closer to a revolution, moving to a very different system. But there is anything but unanimity as to what the next generation idea-to-launch system should be. This article looks at what leading firms are doing to move beyond their current idea-to-launch methodology and tries to integrate these practices into a next-generation system.