Shipulski On Design

Archive for the ‘Imagination’ Category

We’ve all done Voice of the Customer (VOC) work, where we jump on a plane, visit our largest customers, and ask leading questions. Under the guise of learning it’s mostly a mechanism to justify what we already want to do, to justify the products we know want to launch. (VOC should stand for Validate Our Choices.)

It’s a waste of time to ask customers for the next big thing or get their thoughts on a radical technology. First off, it’s not their job to know the next big thing, it’s ours. The next big thing is bigger than their imagination, never mind what they do today. (That’s why it’s called the next big thing.) And if we wait for customers tell us the next big thing, we’re hosed. (Their time horizon is too short and ours is shorter.) In this case it’s best to declare failure; our competitors figured it out a long time ago (they didn’t wait for the customer) and are weeks from commercialization. We should get busy on the next, next big thing because we’ve already missed this next generation. Next time we’ll silence the voice of the customer (VOC) and listen to the voice of the technology (VOT).

As far as radical technology, if we wait for customers to understand the technology, it’s not radical. Radical means radical, it means game-changing, a change so radical it obsoletes business models and creates unrecognizable, ultra-profitable, new ones. That’s radical. If we don’t start technical work until our customers understand the new technology, it’s no longer radical, and our competitors have already cornered the market. Again, we’ve missed an entire generation. Next time we’ll silence the voice of the customer (VOC) and listen to the voice of the technology (VOT).

Technology has a life force; it has a direction; it knows what it wants to be when it grows up. It has a voice. Independent of customer, it knows where it wants to go and how it will get there. At the highest level it has character traits and preferred paths, a kind of evolutionary inevitability; this is the voice of technology (VOT).

Technology will evolve to complete itself; it will move toward natural periodicity among its elements; it will harmonize itself; it will become more controllable; it will shorten its neural flow paths;  it will do yoga to improve its flexibility; its feet will grow too fast and create adolescent imbalance; it will replicate into multiples selves; it will shrink itself;  it will improve its own DNA. This is VOT.

Technology cannot tell us its lower-level embodiments (we control that), but it does sing hymns of its high-level wants and desires, and we must listen. No need to wait for VOC, it’s time to listen to VOT.

Like a dog whistle, technologists can hear VOT while others cannot. We understand the genetics of technology and we understand its desires (because we understand its physics.) We can look back to its ancestors, see its trajectory of natural evolution, and predict attributes of its offspring. Before everyone else, we see what will be.

Next time, instead of VOC, ask your technologists what the voice of technology is saying, and listen.

Innovation has two parts: ideation and commercialization. Ideation, the first part, is all about ideas, and this the part of innovation that comes to mind when we think of innovation. Commercialization, the second part, is all about products. This is the part we don’t think of, and this is the part we’ve got to do better.

Ideation happens readily, and it happens at the whiteboard, that mystical device that can focus the universe’s creativity onto a 3 foot buy 4 foot sheet. In front of the whiteboard it’s exciting, fast, frenzied; ideas jump directly from ether to whiteboard, and we are only the unconscious conduits. With a dry erase marker in each hand and several other colors at the ready, markers fly about as if guided by a spiritual force; flow charts magically appear with all the blocks and all the right arrows; shirt sleeves are used as erasers to keep up with the flow of ideas. This is what comes to mind when we think about innovation. But this is the easy part. Fact is, we already have enough good ideas, and what we need is better execution, better commercialization.

Commercialization is a different game altogether. Once ideas are created and documented in and understandable way, the real work, the difficult work, begins.  The biggest fundamental challenge is how to choose between a recently invented whiteboard idea (with no revenue stream) and a modification of something that sells today (with an existing revenue stream). Traditional net present value techniques aren’t the right answer because they always favor improvements of the existing stuff, and any ranking process must guess at future sales for the whiteboard idea, and guesses are not sufficient to carry the day. It’s a tough road, and a detour may be in order.

As advocate for the whiteboard ideas, choose the path less traveled, take the detour. Figure out where the company wants to go, understand the destination. Then, review all the non-whiteboard ideas, the improvements to existing stuff, and see if those ideas, on their own, can get the company to its new destination. It’s my bet they cannot, that there will be gaps. (But if they can, the whiteboard ideas are dead in the water.) With gaps defined, there is now a rationale, now a reason, to believe in the whiteboard ideas. Finally, some leverage.

Staring with the gap analysis, sprinkle in the best whiteboard ideas, and see what it looks like, see where the ideas could take the company. My bet is the picture looks better with the whiteboard ideas in the mix; my bet is there will now be plausible scenarios where the company can achieve its desired future state. (Plausible scenarios may not sound like much, but they’re a whole lot better than knowing you won’t make it). And once company leaders see how the whiteboard ideas improve the situation, some may get sufficiently jazzed to swap out a few more of the improve-the-old-stuff ideas for more whiteboard ideas.

It’s extremely difficult to challenge the status quo, to go head-to-head with existing revenue streams, but that’s exactly what whiteboard ideas must do. To carry the day, company leaders must say yes to whiteboard ideas at the expense of improve-the-old-stuff ideas. That’s a particularly difficult hurdle since business unit leaders are judged on hitting their numbers (thankfully). The upside of moving the company closer to its desired future state must outweigh the downside of saying no to investments in predictable revenue streams. Let’s be clear, this can only be an emotional decision.

With allocation of resources, the whiteboard idea is off and running, though not home free. It will be continually challenged by the established business units, who, at every turn, will ask to judge the whiteboard idea using improve-the-old-stuff criteria.  Talk about the gap analysis where possible.

I’ve found ideation far more fun than commercialization, and commercialization far more difficult than ideation. But like peanut butter and jelly or Oreos and milk, neither has meaning without the other. We’ve got the ideation stuff down, but our execution/commercialization stuff needs serious work.

Though not glamorous, we’ve got to improve the commercialization element of innovation if we are to realize more of its benefits.

It’s high tide for innovation – innovate, innovate, innovate. Do it now; bring together the experts; hold an off-site brainstorm session; generate 10⁶ ideas. Fast and easy; anyone can do that. Now the hard part: choose the projects to work on. Say no to most and yes to a few. Choose and execute.

To choose we use processes to rank and prioritize; we assign scores 1-5 on multiple dimensions and multiply. Highest is best, pull the trigger, and go. Right? (Only if it was that easy.) Not how it goes.

After the first round of scoring we hold a never-ending series of debates over the rankings; we replace 5s with 3s and re-run the numbers; we replace 1s with 5s and re-re-run. We crank on Excel like the numbers are real, like 5 is really 5. Face it – the scores are arbitrary, dimensionless numbers, quasi-variables data based on judgment. Face it – we manipulate the numbers until the prioritization fits our judgment.

Clearly this is a game of judgment. There’s no data for new products, new technologies, and new markets (because they don’t exist), and the data you have doesn’t fit. (That’s why they call it new.) No market – the objective is to create it; no technology – same objective, yet we cloak our judgment in self-invented, quasi-variables data, and the masquerade doesn’t feel good. It would be a whole lot better if we openly acknowledged it’s judgment-based – smoother, faster, and more fun.

Instead of the 1-3-5 shuffle, try a story-based approach. Place the idea in the context of past, present, and future; tell a tale of evolution: the market used to be like this with a fundamental of that; it moved this way because of the other, I think. By natural extension (or better yet, unnatural), my judgment is the new market could be like this… (If you say will, that’s closeted 1-3-5 behavior.) While it’s the most probable market in my judgment, there is range of possible markets…

Tell a story through analogy: a similar technology started this way, which was based on a fundamental of that, and evolved to something like the other. By natural evolution (use TRIZ) my technical judgment is the technology could follow a similar line of evolution like this…. However, there are a range of possible evolutionary directions that it could follow, kind of like this or that.

And what’s the market size? As you know, we don’t sell any now. (No kidding we don’t sell any, we haven’t created the technology and the market does not exist. That’s what the project is about.) Some better questions: what could the market be? Judgment required. What could the technology be? Judgment. If the technology works, is the market sitting there under the dirt just waiting to be discovered? Judgment.

Like the archeologist, we must translate the hieroglyphs, analyze the old maps, and interpret the dead scrolls. We must use our instinct, experience, and judgment to choose where to dig.

Like it or not, it’s a judgment game, so make your best judgment, and dig like hell.

We are responsible for our actions, for what we do, for our work, and others are responsible for their response to it. (That’s why they call it responsibility.) Though we know we can’t control others, we still snare ourselves in worry trap: What will they think? Will they like it? What will they say?

Worse than the worry trap, however, is when we actually change our work based on what others will think. A big no-no. We’re asked to do the work because we’re talented, we’re uniquely qualified, we’re the experts. Why do we let opinions of others wield so much power? Who cares what they say. We will let our work speak for itself.

There’s not much in life we have control over, but work is one of them. We control most everything about it: the what and how, the caliber, the tenor. We choose to do marginal work, average work, great work, or magical work.  It’s our choice.  We choose. When we chose to do magical work, its voice powerful enough to drown out the less capable, the politically motivated, and the CEO.

So go do magical work. Do work so good you don’t remember how you did it, so good you don’t think you could do it again, so good it scares you. But be ready – magical work, by definition, is misunderstood.

What will they say about your magic?  It doesn’t matter, magic’s voice will drown them out.

Technology has strong character traits; it has wants and desires; it plans for the future. It’s alive.

Technology continually tries to reinvent itself. And like rust, it never sleeps – it continually thinks, schemes, and plans how to do more with less (or less with far less).  That’s Technology’s life dream, its prime directive – more with less. All day, every day it strives, reaches, and writhes toward more with less.

Technology needs our help along its journey. To do this we must understand its life experiences, understand its emotional state, and listen when it talks of the future. Like with a good friend, listening is important.

Technology has several important character traits which govern how it goes about its life’s work. Habitually, it likes to focus its energy on one a single subsystem and reinvents it, where the reinvented subsystem then puts strain on the others.  It is this mismatch in capability among the subsystems that Technology uses to fuel innovation on the next subsystem. Its work day goes like this: innovate on a subsystem, create strife among the others, and repeat.

Technology likes to continually increase its flexibility.  It feels better when it can stretch, bend, twist, and contort. It likes to develop pivot points, hinges, and rubbery algorithms that adjust to unexpected inputs and create novel outputs.  Ultimately Technology wants to self-design and self-configure, but that’s down the road.

Technology likes to get into the details – the deeper the better.  To do this it gets small.  Here’s its rationale: small changes at the molecular or atomic levels roll up to big changes at the system level. A small change multiplied by Avogadro’s number makes for a big lever. Technology understands this.

Technology is frugal, not wasteful in any way, especially when it comes to energy. Its best party trick is to shorten energy flow paths. The logic: shorter energy paths result in less loss and a simpler product. You’ll see this in its next round of work in energy efficiency where it will move subsystems closer to each other to radically improve efficiency and radically reduce product complexity.

Technology knows where it wants to go, and has its favorite ways to get there. Our innovation engines will be more productive if they’re informed by its character.

(Special thanks to Victor Fey for teaching me about Technology’s character traits, which he calls lines of evolution.)

What’s the risk?

What’s to lose?

What’s in the way?

What are you afraid of?

a

Try it.

I think we can turn around the US economy, one company at a time.  Here’s how:

To start, we must make a couple commitments to ourselves.  1. We will do what it takes to manufacture products in the US because it’s right for the country. 2. We will be more profitable because of it.

Next, we will set up a meeting with our engineering community, and we will tell them about the two commitments. (We will wear earplugs because the cheering will be overwhelming.) Then, we will throw down the gauntlet; we will tell them that, going forward, it’s no longer acceptable to design products as before, that going forward the mantra is: half the cost, half the parts, half the time. Then we will describe the plan.

On the next new product we will define cost, part count, and assembly time goals 50% less that the existing product; we will train the team on DFMA; we will tear apart the existing product and use the toolset; we will learn where the cost is (so we can design it out); we will learn where the parts are (so we can design them out); we will learn where the assembly time is (so we can design it out).

On the next new product we will front load the engineering work; we will spend the needed time to do the up-front thinking; we will analyze; we will examine; we will weigh options; we will understand our designs. This time we will not just talk about the right work, this time we will do it.

On the next new product we will use our design reviews to hold ourselves accountable to the 50% reductions, to the investment in DFMA tools, to the training plan, to the front-loaded engineering work, to our commitment to our profitability and our country.

On the next new product we will celebrate the success of improved product functionality, improved product robustness, a tighter, more predictable supply chain, increased sales, increased profits, and increased US manufacturing jobs.

On the next new product we will do what it takes to manufacture products in the US because it’s the right thing for the country, and we will be more profitable because of it.

If you’d like some help improving the US economy one company at a time, send me an email (mike@shipulski.com), and I’ll help you put a plan together.

a

p.s. I’m holding a half-day workshop on how to implement systematic cost savings through product design on June 13 in Providence RI as part of the International Forum on DFMA — here’s the link. I hope to see you there.

Mental walls are more powerful than physical ones.

With physical walls you know where they start and end and know if you can bust them down. With mental walls, you’re not sure.

With physical walls you know they exist – that they’re real. With mental walls, you’re not sure.

With physical walls you can blame someone for bad workmanship. With mental walls, you’re the workman.

The only way to tell a real wall from a mental one is to to take a run at it, but even then, you’re never really sure.

Your product costs are twice what they should be. That’s right. Twice.

You don’t believe me. But why? Here’s why:

If 50% cost reduction is possible, that would mean you’ve left a whole shitpot of money on the table year-on-year and that would be embarrassing. But for that kind of money don’t you think you could work through it?

If 50% cost reduction is possible, a successful company like yours would have already done it. No. In fact, it’s your success that’s in the way. It’s your success that’s kept you from looking critically at your product costs. It’s your success that’s allowed you to avoid the hard work of helping the design engineering community change its thinking. But for that kind of money don’t you think you could work through it?

Even if you don’t believe 50% cost reduction is possible, for that kind of money don’t you think it’s worth a try?

Engineers make magic.  We are the only ones who create things from nothing: cars, televisions, bridges, buildings, machine tools, molecules, software… (You get the idea.)  Politicians can’t do it, lawyers can’t do it, MBAs can’t do it. Only engineers.

And the stuff we create is the foundation of sustainable economies.  We create things, our companies sell them for a profit, and that profit creates wealth and fuels our economies – a tight causal chain.  Said another way: no engineers, no products, no profits, no wealth, no economy.  The end.

Engineers used to be valued for our magic.  In medieval times we were given high status for our art, for making stuff that mattered: swords, trebuchets, armor, castles… (You get the idea.)  And the best of us were given a special title (wizard) and special consideration (if not reverence) for our work. These folks were given a wide berth, and for good reason.  Piss them off and they’d turn someone into a toad, or worse yet, stop making the stuff that mattered.

In the industrial revolution we were valued for our magic, for making stuff that mattered. This time it was the machines that made machines and weapons: water powered factories, gun drills, lathes, grinding machines, honing machines… (You get the idea.)  Politicians used our magic to advance their causes and industrialists got rich on our magic, and our status was diminished.

Since then we’ve made more magic than ever: cars, televisions, bridges, buildings, machine tools, molecules, software… (You get the idea.)  We still make magic yet have little influence over our how our companies do things. How did we let this happen? We forgot that we make magic.

We forgot our magic is valuable and powerful (and scary). We forgot that without our magic the wheels fall off.  No magic, no profit, no economy.

Engineers – A call to arms!  It’s time recognize our magic is still as powerful as Merlin’s and it’s time to behave that way again. Watch out politicians, lawyers, and MBAs or we’ll turn you into toads.

The chase for low cost labor is still alive and well. And it’s still a mistake. Low cost labor is fleeting. Open a plant in a low cost country and capitalism takes immediate hold. Workers see others getting rich off their hard work and demand to be compensated. It’s an inevitable death spiral to a living wage. Time to find the next low cost country.

The truth is labor costs are an extremely small portion of product cost. (The major cost, by far, is the material and the associated costs of moving it around the planet and managing its movement.) And when design engineers actively design out labor costs (50% reductions are commonplace) it becomes so small it should be ignored altogether. That’s right – ignored. No labor costs. Free labor. What would you do if labor was free?

Eliminate labor costs from the equation and it’s clear what to do. Make it where you can achieve the highest product quality, make it where you can run the smallest batches, and make it where you sell it. Design out labor and you’re on your way.

Design engineers are the key. Only they can design out labor. Management can’t do it without engineers, but engineers can do it without management.

A call to arms for design engineers: organize yourselves, design out labor, and force your company to do the right thing. Your kids and your economy will thank you.