eProcurement and digital hardware development for mechanical engineers. A perspective from Germany.

A few words on: Speed and efficiency in design and product development

Sure, everything must go faster: The customer is waiting, the boss is demanding, the colleagues look angry, the competitor has already conquered half the world. Shouldn’t the construction have been completed last week? Or was there the targeted delivery date, so that assembly could start as quickly as possible? Damn it, where are my parts?

But now take a deep breath. How could it be faster with 100 perceived changes per day in the project? Of course we always want everything to be faster and preferably have everything done immediately. But is it even worth it? Doesn’t the hectic pace of our projects destroy more than we lose in value through speed? In short: no.

What’s after methodology in mechanical engineering?

Even if our university-time design professor doesn’t want to hear it: Methodical design was a heaven-sent gift of scientific development (where would we all be without our morphological box?), but it is also a remnant of the 1950s. Basically a mistaken belief that theory and models can always create a “perfect product” by pure mental power.

But now we have left the 20th century a few years behind us. Even our mature engineers know: Making mistakes with innovative products is the norm and only those who do not learn from their mistakes are the stupid ones. Actually, one cannot even speak of mistakes but of many technical assumptions in a system of unknowns. And if we move away from all the theories and put them into practice, it becomes clear to every designer in a live test what works and what doesn’t (often unfortunately still). The whole thing is not a break in the leg, but part of a practice-oriented, application-oriented and iterative/agile product development.

Sounds expensive? But it isn’t: Expensive is the hourly rate of the men/ladies designers. For the time the designer spends on theoretical models, many parts can be manufactured and tested. Brain-off is still not the order of the day: even in modern engineering, planning as a pillar is considered a success. But the right amount of preparation and experimental testing must be right. So let’s face reality faster in experiments and give our managers what they understand: Hardware and results.

Agility is the buzzword of the hour here: many iterations, many lessons learned to get from zero to 1 quickly. For series developers who have to squeeze the last tenth of a percent of efficiency and optimization out of their components, this is certainly not the right approach. But for those who want to investigate (or realize) feasibility in the first place, this is the right approach. In other words, this is the right approach for pre-developers, researchers and other bright minds involved in innovation.

And what does this mean for the digitalization of product development?

The biggest lever is probably to learn quickly and to incorporate what has been learned into the latest iteration. But product development is also a team sport. I have identified a number of trends in recent years that are directly related to digitization:

1. TOOLS: More digital tools from software development

Even the Swabian mechanical engineer can no longer avoid the tools of the software industry. Whether AgileDev, Scrum or MVP: The terms are also anchored in the hardware world and are even used by automotive OEMs, whose previous forms of organization were still based on Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg. But when working with several teams, maybe even internationally, the organization of communication and project coordination is a new challenge. Welcome to Online-Kooperation und Co.

2. COOPERATIONS: More cross-organizational cooperation: International, interdisciplinary, innovative

Another novelty for the Swabian region: tinkering all alone in the closet is probably no longer up to date at the current speed. Although the private-public partnership models between various research institutions and industry are now firmly anchored in organizational thinking, a new wind is blowing in the air: For decades, money was pumped into various institutes through huge subsidies to produce patents for the drawer (except .mp3). But the Americanization of innovation development is imminent. The wheel is turning faster and it is time to find new forms of cooperation: More and more people are working with young, agile companies and usually without public over-subsidy. The focus is clearly on business model-oriented innovation development and no longer on pure research for the sake of research. The following applies here: Preference for the best over the closest (International > Local), preference for implementation over talking and higher investment in takeovers and cooperations instead of long-term, internal resource building, which can never keep up with external development.

3. PURPOSE: A new focus on “deep work

Let’s talk about our daily work routine: How much time of the day do we actually spend on our expertise? With 2 hours of professional work you would already belong to the top, because most of the time is spent on meetings, customer pampering, supplier management, meetings, e-mails, organizational and communication. But liberation is in sight: the return to our professional work as engineers: developing, testing, optimizing. No wonder that secondary operations such as procurement take a back seat. But in the end, we are not paid for self-organisation, but for solving technical problems. I very much hope that an AI / Automation / Outsourcing solution will emerge for everything else.

Conclusions: Less organizing, more experimentation

Now I have pictured machine builders as the old-fashioned, arch-conservative, slow couch potatoes over a comb. But in fact, the above description results in an interesting cycle and a certain back-rudder.

In every market the wheels turn faster. No matter where you are in product development, whether you are active in B2B or B2C. International competition is getting stronger, competitors are catching up — the pressure to innovate is increasing. We are all standing somewhere in this system and have to present our customers with better and faster solutions. But at the same time, we are constantly being provided with new methods, tools and food for thought. On the one hand, we can always try to follow one trend or another in this press of customer requirements and market offers. On the other hand, you can also reflect on your strengths. Whether it is the development of machines, software or new mobility concepts. Maybe we all simply don’t have to try to do everything anymore (Blockchain, Big Data, AI, lightweight design, …), but to do what we do better and faster. Because there is rarely criticism of the quality of work in this country, but there is always criticism of the remedial action and the costs.

And this is exactly where the chance of “New Work” lies: If we work with better partners, if we work internationally, if we work concentrated on what we have mastered excellently and if we let everything else do that is exactly where our strength lies, we work in a modern, proud and courageous way — and also tomorrow we will be part of the future.

To be able to say no once in a while is a strength. But a conscious yes to that which brings us forward productively: Yes, please!

This article has been taken from my German blog. Alos please excuse my Genglisch (German English). We are not so good at language, but we love building great machines and cars here.

#hardware #machinebuilding #procurement #engineering