Have not heard anything yet
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After COVID we know have R&D people just sitting at home. How can you even think to do your job and deliver cutting edge breakthroughs via meetings in your basement
Thank you Sir for working so hard for the company and doing all the heavy lifting ( in all probability it means attending meetings all day and turning on the camera during Teams meeting to show your boss that you are present in your own private office!) and keeping the company running!
The company would like to express it' appreciation by giving you hundreds of stock options for your hard work.
Oops sorry they are all useless now !!
After COVID we know have R&D people just sitting at home. How can you even think to do your job and deliver cutting edge breakthroughs via meetings in your basement...
I've worked with different R&D teams through the years. They are not living in reality. They live in their own phantasy thinking like school kids. They have no respect to the engineers with real work experience. What they deliver do not fit the real world. At the same time, they are paid well, and they feel good about their "contribution". What a joke.
I have worked in R&D in 3M and also other places. Here is my perspective.
When someone files a patent, it is often difficult or impossible to know if the technology covered by the IP will ever be commercialized in the next 5 to 8 years. How does someone even know ? Stop filing IP and see how fast your products become commodities !
Also it seems R&D is getting a lot of flak. My question is what is the role of R&D management? During my time in 3M and I am sure even now, no one could work on a project that was not aligned to strategic plans. Every darn project was vetted by CRL top dogs. Also there is the alignment process, priority project process etc. Even with so much scrutiny a tiny fraction of research turns into a commercial product. Why is nobody talking about that.
It is not the R&D in 3M that is the problem it is the application and the disconnect that is the issue ....imho.
Because we think someone spending 8 + years getting a piece of paper is worth more then people who actually understand and make products...
3m made the same mistake that other big firms have made - promote the best PhDs who are good at research and then see them become PowerPoint experts and metrics gods and goddesses. A friend works at another big company in R&D. That company found the bachelor's degreed chemists and engineers made better managers of the labs than the PhDs. Plus these leaders also spent part of their career in manufacturing. Why doesn't 3m do the same
I 100% agree that R&D should be focused on salable and profitable products. I have spent roughly half my career in manufacturing and half in technical lab functions, so feel like my observations are informed by the realities of both worlds. I also don't believe that it is true across the board that all R&D is terrible at their jobs and incapable of scaling a profitable and great product up on time, as I have half a dozen examples that come to mind that contradict that sentiment. The way to get R&D to create more value is get rid of bad managers and metrics, not to summarily layoff technical people randomly. Good technical people can be taught. Good technical people can become productive when not bogged down by senseless reporting required by their managers. Good technical people can be shipped off to plants for 6 months so they learn the realities of manufacturing. Doing so will make them 10x better at their jobs, more empathetic to your concerns and questions, and somebody you actually look forward to scaling up that next product or technology with. Been there, done that.
Technology came be cutting edge and world class but that doesn't translate to sellable products... 3M needs sales, not patents that sit on the shelf... I am sure it is cool to work in the R&D labs but at the plants, the place that you know actually produces stuff, we are hamstrung and have constant stupid edicts from the lab. They roll out products or technology that do not work on the factory floor but are too incompetent to understand this. Instead they circlej--k how they are innovative for taking 5 years to launch a product with $50k sales a year at a negative GM.
I've worked in multiple technical roles across the company, including in CRL. The specific group I worked in was incredibly talented and hardworking, and the technologies being developed were truly world-class. The issues were not with the technical ranks, by and large - it was with the metrics and managers, pushing the technical folks to do things that were low value. Random layoffs that preferentially target technical people do nothing to improve the productivity and effectiveness of R&D, whereas targeting removal of ~50% of managers would result in an immense ROI. Cut the bloat, and realign the metrics to reflect the core charter of the company.
Corporate R&D labs are a complete waste. I’ve worked in division and business groups for 20 years and have realized exactly ZERO new product sales from products incubated in R&D. A bunch of PhD’s doing research work and creating IP that creates no value. Easiest place to save $ is to cut here.
Moni is that you ???? Welcome to the message board.Hope you have a pleasant reading experience here.
R&D got off track when the emphasis was how many patents 3m got approved each year and reporting this annually in annual reports. The place has become nothing more than a patent mill. Last good idea was thinsulate.
Corporate R&D labs are a complete waste. I’ve worked in division and business groups for 20 years and have realized exactly ZERO new product sales from products incubated in R&D. A bunch of PhD’s doing research work and creating IP that creates no value. Easiest place to save $ is to cut here.
Sounds like leveling 201 is not far off
R&D hasn't even come out with anything worthwhile for a decade. Optically clear adhesives was the last big break through. Instead it is constant playing with unmanufactureable NPIs that never see the light of day. Spending 5 years to launch a product with $200k/year sales. We will never see an ROI and almost anything our joke of an R&D team has anymore. Fix your existing products instead of constant launching new garbage and maybe COGS will actually look attractive again.
R&D at 3M has undelivered for years. Constant whining, cushy 8 to 5 jobs in air conditioned labs, never have to work evenings or weekends, and always horsing around on meaningless experiments.
Come down the road to Cottage Grove and see what it's like to work in 90 degree humid weather in the summer and fricking freezing weather from December to March. We make the pounds that pay your salary.
Not this time. It already underwent major layoffs early in the year. Also it has super high attrition, much higher than the rest of the company. You should also know that CRL is barely functional, because of the reasons outlined above and thus doing forward looking research is very challenging these days ! Much of CRL is going product development these days.
Just curious, are one one of those middle managers who have a grudge against R&D. Keep in mind that once R&D completely stops in Mother Mining, people like yourself, who contribute basically nothing to 3M ( keep in mind that attending meetings all day and doing horsework for upper management does not contribute to growth at all ) will not have a cushy seat to warm your ar-e all day long !
Not get back to your ppt slides, excel sheets, emails, updates , and mindmaps !
So far so good. Maybe the years of layoffs, dating back to GE Mcnerney, have left CRL barely able to function. At least it survived this round from reliable sources.