LPPDE and the Volcano: The Power of the Last Responsible Moment

Event planning is a lot like product development in the sense that no matter how good the plan may be, the unexpected always happens.

Still no one could have guessed that the 2010 Lean Product & Process Development Exchange on Hilton Head Island would feel the effects of a volcanic eruption over 3,400 miles away!

Until Friday, I had felt great pleasure in knowing that over 20% of our attendees would come from outside the United States - 19 of them from Europe. That's when we learned that the volcanic eruption in Iceland had closed all European air space for the foreseeable future, leaving our European friends unable to get here for the conference.

This is one of those times when I appreciate the power of delaying decisions until the last responsible moment - and pushing that moment as late as possible.

Before I alerted my event planner, she had already taken steps to limit the impact on the conference. She negotiated with the hotel to eliminate cancellation fees, reduced catering counts and adjusted room set-ups. Friday was the last day we could lower our counts without penalty - three business days before the start of the event.

Some hotels ask for five business days, and some venues will not allow groups to lower numbers as long as thirty days out. When we negotiated our contract with the hotel, our event planner pushed hard to get these dates delayed to get as close to the day of the event as possible, conceding on other things to gain this flexibility. I'm grateful for that flexibility now - it frees up cash to explore alternatives for delivering as much value as we can to our colleagues who aren't here.

For example, that decision freed up money that we may invest in some equipment and a service to provide live audio and/or video streams.

Our last responsible moment to converge on that decision is about fifty hours away, when we finalize the A/V set up for the general sessions on Tuesday night. We have a set of alternatives and a convergence plan that gets us to a go-no go decision in time to execute it. If we've got a good solution in the set, I'm confident that we'll find it. Without the ability to adjust our other plans so quickly and easily, the event staff would not have had the resources to even consider this option now.

Not every product development program has to deal with a volcanic eruption, but we can all benefit from a little investment up front to preserve flexibility we'll need later to do the right thing for our customers.