Functional Thinking: Invest to Win and Stop Funding Losses

Functional Thinking: Invest to Win and Stop Funding Losses

Dr. Anatoly Agulyansky

Abstract:

How do we determine where to allocate our resources? How do we choose the direction that truly has potential? The common approach is to define a goal, launch a project, and work hard, investing time, materials, and money to achieve completion. But even when a project is successfully completed, how do we know if it is truly a win? History shows that even excellently executed projects, products, or processes can result in catastrophic failures.

The key challenge is ensuring that our efforts and investments are aligned with the right direction of development. To achieve this, strategy and tactics must be deliberately analyzed and clearly defined.

In my presentation, I will demonstrate how TRIZ methods, combined with the PRIZ Platform, can be used to create powerful strategies and effective tactics for product and process development. A successful strategy focuses on technologies that are relevant to the future, while avoiding wasteful investments in approaches that may soon be obsolete. Tactics, on the other hand, address current products, processes, and technologies. Yet even tactical improvements must be win-oriented, focused on enhancing the most functional and value-creating elements, rather than spending resources on what does not increase value.

The guiding principle here is Functional Thinking: think in terms of functions, not components. By shifting the focus from structure to purpose, we can simplify systems, maximize value, and avoid costly missteps.

During the presentation, I will share principles and real-world examples of building strategies and tactics using TRIZ tools such as 9 Windows, System Functional Modeling, and Process Functional Modeling. I will also explore how the PRIZ Platform enables organizations to design both strategy and tactics that consistently lead to winning outcomes.

Biography: Anatoly Agulyansky 2025 08 31 144501

Anatoly holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and has built his career at the intersection of academia and industry, specializing in materials processing for electronic applications and complex engineering problem-solving. In academia, he conducted research at the Institute of Chemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Bordeaux University, and the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. In the industry, he held senior positions at Vishay Intertechnology and Intel Corporation, and has provided worldwide consultancy on innovation and process development.

He is the author of more than 90 scientific papers and a book, “The Chemistry of Tantalum and Niobium Fluoride Compounds” (Elsevier, 2004, 406 pp.), with contributions that have advanced both materials science and innovation practices. As co-founder and Chief Scientist of PRIZ Guru Inc., Anatoly develops the PRIZ Innovation Platform and leads innovation management initiatives. He also lectures at Ben-Gurion University, where he created and teaches the course Engineering Thinking.

E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: +972-54-333-9825

Israel