Best reasons to keep work in house

[KimBellingrath]

I have a pending meeting with a few managers that want to know why we can't just have outsiders do ProE work for us from time to time. I need to convince them to stay within the intranet, using existing global resources instead of checking work out and sending it off on dvd's and then checking it back in. Anyone have any feedback, horror stories, ideas?
The meeting is tomorrow morning (Wed).
Thanks,
Kim

 

[3dlogix]

There is nothing wrong with contracting work out. I have worked as a consultant in the past, where we either worked off-site or on-site with both Intralink and without. We never had any "major" problems with this setup, keeping in mind that problems often occured from lack of experience either from the contractor or comapny in how they set up the file transfer. Any problem we may have had was easily resolved. If people are structured in their ProE approach, then I dont see any issues.

Steve

http://www.sprdesign.com

http://www.3dlogix.com

 

[Guest0527211403]

Another problem with contracting work out is the time it takes to familiarize the contractors with your company's internal design/drawing practices. It really depends on the scope of what you want them to do, but in some cases, there is an adjustment period that a contractor requires in order to reach their maximum productivity (from my experiences as a contractor). For long term contracts this is not necessarily a bad thing, but if it's a short run of drawings, it may not be worth the money invested. Once you do have a contractor in for some time, however, it becomes more feasible to call them in for short term projects since they have already learned the ropes for your company.

My $.02..

 

[3dlogix]

I just went into a telecom company, and started and completed work on a semi-finished project in half the time they had estimated, and it only took me about 3 hrs to get familair with their work and habits.

So it goes both ways, unless the people at the company are very good Pro/E users, a contractor can save a lot of time and effort.

Steve

http://www.sprdesign.com

http://www.3dlogix.com

 

[KimBellingrath]

The people at this company are well-seasoned users with years of experience. We've had contractors (I used to be one before settling down) do work for us that brought our system to it's knees - circular references up the wazoooh!
I've seen some of the strangest feature creation over the years and I'm tired of checking parts for improper refs or overusage of intent manager...sometimes it's more trouble than it's worth. I hear you guys talking about good contractors and I understand because I did that work but there are a lot of 'operators' out there that get your work tangled up and make more work for you, so I don't want to start 'shipping' files around - period. Thanks for your input.

 

[Guest0527211403]

It might be worthwhile to have the contractor come in to your own company for a while. It will probably cost a but more but it will let you get a feel for their strengths/weaknesses. If you are happy with the way they are handling the work, and you do a dry run of the check in/out procedure while they are still there, it could be very worthwhile experience in the long run.

 

[Akesson]

As justkeepgiviner says:

"Another problem with contracting work out is the time it takes to familiarize the contractors with your company's internal design/drawing practices."

...this could be true but I think it's the same problem when you get a new employee.

I'm a contractor myself and we have some customers that we work with through internet connection and Intralink without more problem than if we should have been on site.

Then the skill of the contractor is of great importance.

In my opinion contractors often have a higher skill level in the CAD software then the employees. I think the reason of this is that most contractors have more "hours" in front of the software and atend to less meetings and do less other adminitrative tasks than employees.

 

[Guest0527211403]

While it's true contractors have more proficiency with Pro/E, they don't necessarily have any experience designing your company's products.

When I was working in that field our work varied from small electronic devices to large facilities. The design practices between the two vary greatly, and take some time for adjustment, especially if its something they haven't done before.

I'm confident that any good contractor could pick up the required skills, but the critical factor is how much time they have to do it. Often times (though it doesn't seem so in this case) a contractor is called in to help pull you out of a jam, so you need as much confidence in them as your own employees, if not more. Looking at your contractor's past clients would offer some good insight as to whether or not there may be a period of adjustment.

 

[KimBellingrath]

My situation is more like managers trying to keep projects under their wings by using old favorites that have since 'flown the coop'. Our goal is to use designers from other division who already have access to the intranet which has our Intralink parts. These managers don't understand how Intralink works and view it as simple files that can be burned on a disk and carried out the door for offsite work and then just returned to the database. You guys know that with Intralink, you get file change management that will not be the same if you keep checking out and checking in. In addition, there are people on site that need to work with these files at the same time. I don't want the headache and was looking for some anecdotal refs that I could use in this meeting. I don't question the value of contractors - I just don't want to get into that right now.

 

[Akesson]

One way to work with a contractor without them having Intralink is to ask the t install a client. Then you start ProE though this client ("light Intralink") all Intralink history is keept in the ProE files (revisons etc). By working like this you don't have to import/export (Intralink reads them as new files when import) the CAD files.

A also a KimBelligrath says have the experience that all managers don't understand the complexity of todays engieering work flow.

 

[davidinindy]

Sounds like you are just asking us to support your idea that contracting out is bad. You've made up your mind. I think most of us are contractors, so this would be the wrong crowd to ask. It would be short-changing your company to have such a closed mind about it. Bring up your concerns, and figure out ways to avoid them happening. There are many companies that have no permenent engineering employees. They contract out all of their design work. I've been on contract here for 6 months, and everything is gonig very smoothly. It didn't take me long to learn the network, inventory control, part number system, and general design guidelines. In fact, I've brought some improvements along with me. More than one person in the shop has mentioned the ease with which my drawings and designs go thru the shop compared to some in the past.
Anyway... Just another persons $.02

David

 

[natewebb]

When I think of the projects I've done over the past few years, there is a common theme. My customers were short on time, internal experience, internal manpower or some combination so they got outside help. The funny thing is they keep coming back for more rather than hiring internally.

If it wasnt a valuable service, people like us would not exist. Plus it saves you money really, how much does it cost to hire an engineer, pay 401k benefits, health insurance, hardware, buy another license of pro/e, pay to train him, then pay him severance when the company is "reorganized".

http://www.rmeng.com

 

[KimBellingrath]

I failed to include many details in my original request so I can see where you guys are coming from. I WAS just looking for reasons or stories, mainly because there are extenuating circumstances here that make things a little difficult to accomodate contractors. We have a huge company-wide network, replicated around the world and are sharing resources from one division to another. It's not easy but that's what the CEO wants us to do. One manager has a favorite outsider (used to work here but moved away) and he has tried everything to keep him doing work for us. This is disruptive in this environment because I am charged with supporting our 'The Sun Never Sets' motto and when others see him using this guy, they try doing the same and it causes problems within the group.
Does this explain my story a little better?

 

[bvanhiel]

I think you answered your own question. The only compelling reason not to use contractors is: "Because the CEO said so." Your best move is to make sure the next layer of management is going to back you up when you deliver the message.

-b