Regardless of whether you already have a PLM system in your company that enables some processes or don’t have anything, whether you use PLM only in engineering or across multiple business functions, you need a sound PLM strategy. Especially if you only use PLM in engineering. Why?

Let’s start with the definition. What is a strategy? A strategy is the long-term direction and plan of an organization that enables it to obtain an advantage in a changing environment through the use of its resources and competencies, with the aim of achieving its objectives and fulfilling stakeholder expectations.

What does this mean with regard to the overall business strategy and PLM? First and foremost, in the context of the above definition, PLM is a resource for a company and can and should be part of the overall strategy to achieve its objectives and fulfill stakeholder expectations. 

The PLM strategy, which is part of the overall strategy, supports and enables a company to execute its business strategy and defines how specifically it will do so with PLM. Without a PLM strategy your company will not be able to properly use PLM as an important resource and enterprise-wide strategic solution and hence forfeit many related benefits. 

What does a PLM Strategy address?

First and foremost, a PLM strategy is not just about technology or tools. It has to address all elements of PLM, including business practices, processes, tools and technologies, people, and information that are involved and needed in all phases of the product lifecycle, starting from innovation to product management, sales and marketing, product definition, development, manufacturing, sourcing, quality assurance, compliance, maintenance and support, and recycling and disposal across the entire extended organization, i.e. including partners, customers and suppliers. 

What does the PLM Strategy include? 

The PLM Strategy should answer the following questions in sufficient detail to allow making sound decisions during the implementation of the strategy. For example, if the strategy requires certain resources and those resources are not or cannot be made available, or if the costs exceed the allocated capital, then the strategy will need to be reviewed, otherwise the entire implementation will not achieve the desired objectives. 

Elements of a Good PLM Strategy:

1. Objectives: 
   1. Which business objectives can PLM help to achieve?
   2. What specific objectives do we have with PLM?
2. Scope: 
   1. What functional areas of the business will be included? 
   2. Which value streams? 
   3. Which products? All products or only new ones?
   4. Which programs and projects? All programs and projects or only new ones?
   5. Which business practices and processes? 
   6. Which capability areas of PLM? 
   7. What tools and technologies? Integrated platform, federated architecture, or a hybrid approach? Which existing systems need to be integrated? What is the integration approach? Point to point or middleware? Which existing tools can and will be replaced? 
   8. Which employees, partners, customers and suppliers will need to be involved?
   9. What data and information will be affected and needs to be included?
3. Roadmap: 
   1. What is the sequence of addressing the entire scope? 
   2. In how many phases do we implement the entire scope?
   3. What exact scope is included in each phase? 
   4. What is the length of each phase? 
4. Resources: 
   1. What resources do we need to implement the entire scope and in each phase? 
   2. How much capital can and will need to be allocated in total and in each phase? This may require a PLM Value and ROI analysis.
   3. What internal and external human resources will be involved, ie employees, consultants, partners, customers, suppliers, etc and where and when, i.e. in what phase and for which scope element will we need them? 
5. Leadership:
   1. Given the scope, who will sponsor and have overall responsibility to lead the execution of the entire PLM strategy? With the enterprise-wide impact of PLM, this should be a member of the executive management team, such as the CDO, CIO or COO. 
   2. Who else will be involved in leading the initiative? Will there be a PLM Council with business owners from the different functional areas?