Introduction

The Navy will continue to need a viable U.S. shipbuilding industry to meet its present and future needs.  With the reduced number of new combatant ships required this means that to remain viable U.S. shipbuilders will have to be more competitive in the global commercial shipbuilding market.  To be competitive in that market will require innovation in both design and organizational ability.

Background

The strategic mission of the Gulf Coast Region Maritime Technology Center (GCRMTC) is to assist the U.S. shipbuilding industry to become more competitive on an international scale.  One research project sponsored by GCRMTC was aimed at assessing the level of innovation deployment in the U.S. shipbuilding industry and to develop a method for improving it.  The assessment was accomplished through literature search, interviews and an industry survey.  The survey was developed to provide an understanding of how technology transfer/innovation was viewed by employees within multiple shipbuilding firms and to determine specific behaviors employees view as being critical to innovation.  The list of potential respondents was developed by random selection from a list of all shipbuilding firms obtained from the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers.  The results of the survey indicated that the U.S. shipbuilders are behind the best international shipbuilders and there appears to be little emphasis on rewarding innovation or technology transfer behaviors in the

Shipbuilding industry.  More importantly, the study suggested that many U.S. Shipbuilders did not even see the need to change.
A model was developed to measure the Innovation Quotient or IQ or an organization. The model was developed by a meta-analysis of existing literature on technology and innovation.  The model was used to determine specific areas that needed to be assessed to measure the innovative abilities of a shipbuilding organization.  The model is shown in Figure 1.

Objectives

As indicated in the background information, the study indicated that self-assessment of innovative capacity was a difficult task for the shipbuilding industry. This is not surprising since one of the most difficult tasks for any organization is an objective self-assessment, particularly in well established organizations.  Hence, one of the major objectives was to develop a simple and easy method to administer a self-assessment questionnaire which could measure the organization's basic ability to implement innovations.  The results of this test would then be used to develop a dialogue within the organization  to address the question on innovation improvement.

Application and Potential Uses

The questionnaire is administered through a software package and takes about twenty minutes to take the test.  The output is a measure of how the organization compares to a composite of a highly innovative company. These measures can be displayed in various graphical ways. The display of the results which seems to be most successful in developing a meaningful dialogue is the polar plot (see the example in Figure 2).

The discussions generally are centered around a comparision of scores with the composite company and the amount of convergence or divergence of the group on individual measures.

The method has been beta tested.  Two very different groups volunteered to participate in the beta tests.  One group was the research and development section for a very large shipbuilding company.  The second group was the executive group of a smaller firm which specializes in providing telecommunication to the oil and gas marine activities in the Gulf of Mexico.  In a facilitated environment, the results indicate that the method is very satisfactory in providing a  self analysis of the organizations strengths and weaknesses.  This dialogue leads to the expected next step for the organization, that of developing plans for improvement.

Some sample responses from the beta test groups best illustrate the usefulness of this model:
 

- "The software and questions point out trends that are in agreement with my perceptions of how the company works."

- "I was surprised to see the polar [radar] plot and it's close correlation to the actual perceptions of our somewhat diverse group."

- "The opportunity for individuals in the group to self-examine attitudes and perspectives and then compare to other group members' attitudes can benefit the product of the group's effort."

- "This system should be very effective in generating dialogue and cause people to think about how and why you feel and think certain things."

In addition to the success in developing dialogue about an organization's ability to innovate, the method has the potential to be used for other self assessment areas.  For example, it could be used for self-assessment of teamwork by simply changing the questions and the internal benchmark scoring  in the software .

Development Partner

Omni Technologies, Inc.

Deployment Partners

Ingalls Shipyard

PetroCom , Inc.

McDermott Shipbuilding

Project Status and Future Plans

The project to develop and test the model has been completed and is operational.  The software  has been copyrighted. A Final Report is available from GCRMTC.  While the project was successful and the program is presently useable, the software needs to be improved to be more user friendly.  This was suggested by the beta test participants.  Also, the facilitated discussion of the results is extremely important to the success of this methodology and a users manual needs to be developed to provide potential users with the capability to conduct the discussion of the results with their own facilitatiors.  Solicitation for funding for these improvements is presently underway.
 

For more information contact:

Associate Dean W.  Lannes
504-280-7122
E-Mail: WJLEE@UNO.EDU

Associate Professor Jim Logan
504-280-7140
E-Mail: JWLMN@UNO.EDU

GCRMTC TECHNICAL BRIEFS are published periodically by the Gulf Coast Region Maritime Technology Center, a U.S. Navy Center of Excellence in Advanced Marine Technology based at the University of New Orleans.  GCRMTC's Mission is to "enhance international competitiveness in the U.S. shipbuilding industry through sponsored research."   For additional information, contact:  GCRMTC, University of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA 70148, Tel: (504) 280-3871, Fax: (504) 280-3898, E-mail: jtsen@uno.edu

The contents of this publication reflect the views of the MERIC staff and are based on information obtained from the literature.  The contents do not necessarily reflect the official views or the policies of MERIC or the Gulf Coast Maritime Technology Center.  This publication does not constitute a standard, specification, or regulation.  MERIC does not endorse products, equipment or manufacturers.  Trademarks or manufacturer's names appear herein only because they are considered essential to the object of this publication.