When you start planning a project – regardless of whether it’s a building, a bridge, or in this case a design proposal for the next pneumatic and geared drive marvel – try and start with a clear picture of how it will look.
Read that again – How will it look?
|
Think about what a customer would want their product to look like. In this case, SEW Eurodrive, Festo, as well as a potential customer who may consider buying your design. The more you think about and involve your customers, the better chance you have of designing a product with fewer constraints and that that may meet expectations.
It often happens that very little time is spent on thinking about, or designing the look and feel of a product and key features and benefits often go missing.
When planning your project, it can be very helpful to to clearly define the scope of the project during its design stage.
|
|
Think about the following:
* What is the business scope of the project? What business processes and functions need to be considered?
* Where will the project be implemented? Will the design work in a specific location or could it fit into many regional areas?
* Who will the product influence? Individuals, departments within companies or entire socio-economic regions?
To summarise:
* Think about how you can adequately involve your customer early in the design process.
* Set clear completion milestones for each design element.
* If you have solid and effective design ideas, make sure that nothing is lost between the requirements of the project and the design of the potential product.
* Carefully consider how you will manage changes to the design and business objectives of the project.
* When all else fails, slow the project down and find ways to ensure that the design is going to meet business needs.