The development team was able to 'stock' an inventory of knowledge about how to build a reliable modulator, with processing techniques, packaging, and reliable waveguide attachments before deciding on an actual design spec. The modulator team was able to use already proven CAD techniques to rapidly produce the needed modulator information and to demonstrate a prototype and production capability. This tendency stems from deep-rooted fear that all parts of a project may be high risk, so one should try to find as many problems as possible as early as possible. In addition, there is a fundamental belief that projects will get done faster and better if everyone is utilized to the maximum. Lead times and cycle times are longer because all of the resources and services build queues of work.
Intelligence is needed up-front to carefully analyze the real risks in the project.
Guts and discipline are required to assign most resources to mitigating these risks, almost ignoring the low-risk bits for the time being. Finally, a project manager must have faith that the low-risk parts really are that, or at least her lean design team can solve that unexpected problem rapidly. The design chain can be viewed as a collection of 'knowledge inventory' streams that are building in value and converging in time to form the final knowledge product. The timing and flow of these knowledge inventories is very important in minimizing the development time. The project manager can run a lean development chain by minimizing project work and scheduling knowledge inventory to arrive at the right time.