Improving mechanical design department 5

[dejan95]

Hello fellow engineers!

I'm looking at ways to improve our mechanical design department. We build different type of machines - automation lines.

We are a large firm, but this department is fairly new and I was hoping you may have any tips on how to improve productivity, communication, project leading...

Some problems which seems the most obvious to me are:
1.) The designers in the mechanical design department aren't motivated enough. They are good engineers, but they work at 50% productivity. How could we motivate them to do more work?

2.) Project leading is sometimes a problem. We use excel and confluence to manage projects. There are four main departments; mechanical design, assembly, programming and technology. What is the best way to connect this four departments for a specific projekt. Would it make sense to consider MS Project or some similar project managing tools?

3.) This one is specific to our mechanical design department. How could we improve productivity in a sense of automating tasks? We try to standardise designs, but are there any more useful tricks?

Or does anybody know any good books on this topics?

Thank you in advance!

 

[CWB1]

when the inputs are mainly judgement, then there's no real reason for "excessive" precision.

Depends on how you define judgement and precision. I agree with the quote but differ on its application. Given the project/product's performance requirements, every engineer should be able to create their own reasonably thorough task list (sans time) for project planning. They're obviously not going to get the exact number of bolted joint analyses correct and may forget a small task completely but overall the accuracy usually varies very consistently with project length/complexity and also between engineers of similar experience. The big variance in project planning is when folks are expected to estimate the time needed for each task, hence the use of median times for generic tasks based on historic projects. There's also "planning poker" and other group-average estimation methods but IMHO none as good as historic data. Combine a consistent, in/accurate list of tasks with a consistent time for each task and statistical methods yield a pretty accurate completion date. That said, planning projects does get faster and can be done more accurately with experience, so nobody should believe the consultants promising overnight magic. Several of my past employers successfully limit themselves to 2% variation (one week/year) from planned to actual completion, even in dedicated research groups, but they've been following consistent planning process for decades.

A senior manager with years of experience needs to be involved. mentoring young Engineers, and leading the way, now a seasoned well experience person, needs to be handled differently. Managers job is to report they are on schedule, and in budget. and quality of design.

Disagree. Companies have separate management and technical career tracks for good reason - bc management is its own role with its own set of tasks supporting, but not actually engineering. Efficient managers focus on being full-time managers, not part-time engineers. They exist to resolve the administrative/political/other fires that impede design teams, and also handle the plethora of high-level approvals and long-term business strategy tasks. Engineers should be working very independently and only see their manager a few times monthly - casually around the office, at weekly/bi-weekly/monthly 1-on-1 "personnel" check-ins, and in monthly design reviews. Juniors needing technical mentoring should be going to a senior engineer or tech steward/fellow/etc, not a manager who's been out of real engineering for years.

Most of my employers have been solidly in the camp that studies and understands every possible variance to pinch every penny and CYA against potential warranty/other losses. I honestly enjoy most of the extra effort as it can be very educational, and there's no real detriment to any one project as its company-wide. To each their own tho.

 

[geesaman.d]

Disagree. Companies have separate management and technical career tracks for good reason - bc management is its own role with its own set of tasks supporting, but not actually engineering. Efficient managers focus on being full-time managers, not part-time engineers. They exist to resolve the administrative/political/other fires that impede design teams, and also handle the plethora of high-level approvals and long-term business strategy tasks.

Some companies do this, some don't. I've worked for both. Either one has major built-in risks.

Having true Engineers as managers is dicey stuff - first, if you promote people into management because they are good engineers you will almost certainly have terrible management. The skill sets / instincts / training are almost completely unrelated. Excellent engineers who are naturally excellent managers are unicorns. You need to train those engineers to manage and appreciate the business needs of the company.
Second, if you promote good management candidates from within Engineering, there can be resentment when the sophomoric 'new kid' becomes the boss. But I get it, when the new kid has real management potential and the other engineers just stand around complaining about management instead of engaging and contributing. I've also seen the types who will always say what management wants to hear rise rapidly through the ranks because (from a leadership point of view) there are so few management candidates coming up through Engineering.

Having Engineers on a seniority track parallel to management makes a lot of sense. I, for one, took a turn at management and left for a senior engineering position. While the toxic management team that caused that has now left, having a senior engineering opportunity kept me here. It takes plenty of energy and brain power to make physics work for us - so there are many engineers who want to keep engineering and apply their experience to higher level planning and projects. If management was the only path up, they'd leave, become neglectful managers, or simply stall and not realize their potential.

The trouble with having Senior Engineering positions that are not in management is because they completely lose influence to the management. I've said before, and get reminded regularly, that physics does not give a f&cx about you or your financial success. So if management or sales really wants a thing to happen, the senior engineers need to 1) be allowed to assess the new 'opportunity' for risk and 2) be in a position to build an appropriate risk management (damage control) plan into its execution. Many management teams get desperate and cut out the technical minds from the up-front work and aren't held accountable for their unmitigated risk taking. Then those valuable technical minds become fully consumed by those bad projects, which makes them leave or at least, less available to plan new projects, which feeds a vicious cycle.

Maybe I digress. But as always, good leadership respects nature's wrath and that Engineering plays a crucial role in defending the companies profitability from it.