Proximity in Operations

The time to work together is sooner rather than later
(Courtesy of www.engineeringdaily.net)

The strongest operations will purposely locate the engineering as close as possible to the manufacturing operations.  It has been proven over and again that this encourages dialogue between he two groups which benefits the operation.  But what about  within an engineering organization?  Are there good ways to set up an organization to maximize the engineering talent?

One of my earlier posts relayed my positive experience with Integrated Product Teams (IPTs).  This involved having members from different functional groups together in one group to successfully design and support a product.  However it is not enough to have these members in one group.  They must sit together or near each other to make it work.

At Boeing I was a structural design engineer.  My closest associate I worked with was the stress analyst.  It was our job to work together to develop a statically and dynamically robust design that would be eventually manufactured.  So he and I sat next to each other , even sharing a common table between us.  This allowed us to lay out drawings and sketches to discuss design details immediately rather than travelling across an office to work together.  Other functional members sat close by so even though I interacted with them less frequently, they were close by to discuss details.

Better designs evolve when everyone resides near each other
(Courtesy www.astrocenter.tamu.edu)

Many companies still embrace they idea of  the same functions (i.e. stress, design, manufacturing, etc) sitting together in an engineering operation.  But this idea allows groups to become an "us" versus "them" philosophy that stagnates production.  It is better to sit together and then "we" can use engineering skills to a better advantage.

Integrated Product Teams

Historically functional groups such as design, tooling, quality assurance, manufacturing, and others have tended to operate with their own circle.  For instance as a  design entered the functional group for evaluation, it was reviewed and then comments were passed back to the originating group (usually design).  The process iterates until everyone is pleased and then the design is moved to the next functional group and the process continues.  An extremely time-consuming process.

My best experience in avoiding this was working in an Integrated Product Team (IPT) as an engineer on the F-22 fighter program for Boeing.  In an IPT the structure is focused on a product rather than a function.  The IPT I worked in (Internal Spars) had members from design, stress, tooling, quality assurance, and manufacturing sit together to develop a superior design concurrently.  

As a design was developing, each functional member could provide immediate input to ensure the design was optimized while it was being designed rather than after the first iteration was completed.  It was a refreshing way to design a product and highlighted several benefits:

• Decreased design time as all functional members were able to contribute while the design was being developed.  Feedback was incorporated immediately and  design was able to progress more rapidly to completion. It was immediately evident that operations would be improved by working together from the beginning.
• Working together with other functional group members allowed me to understand what was important to them.  I had previously thought of other functional members as "them" but working in an IPT made me think of "us".
• In an IPT I was able to understand the entire design build process as I was involved in all phases of it, not just the design process.  I have used this experience in subsequent design activities to make me a better engineer.

(Typical IPT example)