Brad Hedstrom, Sr. Director Portfolio & Program Management, Molecular Biology Division, Life Technologies
Speaker Bio
Brad Hedstrom is the director of portfolio and program management for the Molecular Biology Systems division (MBSD) of Life Technologies (formerly Applied Biosystems). Life Technologies (LIFE) is leading global biotechnology tools company. MBSD is the largest division of LIFE with nearly $1.5B annual revenue. Brad and his team of twelve program managers are responsible for both the selection of new product development (NPD) programs via our portfolio management process and the execution of NPD programs via our stage-gate product development process. Brad has been involved in NPD at Life Technologies for over ten years in a variety of R&D leadership roles spanning both functional management and program management. As Chief of Staff to the VP of R&D Brad has also been responsible for annual planning for an R&D organization in excess of 600 resources and an annual budget in excess of $150M. Prior to joining Life Technologies Brad was a principal consulting engineer for five years at Advanced Measurements, a small system integration consulting firm. Brad holds a doctorate in Electrical Engineering from the University of Victoria, Canada and a bachelors in electrical engineering from the University of Wyoming.
OMG, I Just RIF’ed Crucial Resources!
What you don’t know in Resource Planning can hurt you!
Brad Hedstrom, Director of Programs and Portfolio Management in the Molecular Biology Division of Life Technologies, was rated as the #1 Industry Speaker at the 2009 Resource Planning Summit. In 2009, he told the tale of how a poorly planned staff reduction created serious portfolio problems. The division didn’t have the information to distinguish resources crucial to future projects from those who were not because they could not forecast ahead. In addition, fiscal year planning was incredibly complex with 1000+ people, 150 different skills, spread across 230 projects, and housed in 5 business units and 145 cost centers. Prior to deployment of a new process and software solution, fiscal year planning took many weeks. Now it’s less than a week---and the division is able to forecast resource requirements six quarters out.
In 2010, he will revisit this story with new findings emphasizing the items that resonated so strongly with the 2009 attendees: The Bubble Chart, the Python who ate the Pig problem, and the centrality of Resource Management to a successful Portfolio Strategy.
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