Evaluating the organizational impact of product development projects

Purpose – Evaluation of product development projects is quite intuitive and subjective. The purpose of this paper is to analyze decision makers' value perceptions of organizational impact before and after a project to explain how post‐project value perceptions are formed. Design/methodology/approach – The research approach is hypothetic‐deductive and uses questionnaire data from 126 risky product development projects. Findings – Pre‐project value perceptions explain post‐project value perceptions at a significant level and in a different way for different value dimensions. The results reveal two moderating effects by using a product development control system, and different product types. Research limitations/implications – The study was limited to risky product development projects with external funding and their retrospective cross‐sectional survey. The findings imply a strong relation between the early‐stage value estimates and the latter‐stage value estimates, which may make change decisions difficult in risky projects. Practical implications – The initial value priorities of the managers have an important role in escalating commitment, and such value priorities can be reflected in the use of formal evaluation criteria. Originality/value – Many studies express the need to understand the organizational impacts of projects better and take them into account in decision making. This empirical study on the perceptions of managers offers evidence on the formation and evolution of the perceived organizational impact during the project.