Quality during Design: Recent Episodes
Dianna Deeney
Hosted by Dianna Deeney, Quality during Design is the place for product design engineers to use quality thinking throughout the design process to create products others love, for less. Join the conversation at QualityDuringDesign.com.
In this milestone episode, Dianna reflects on how the thinking evolved from quality methods to product development processes, to team dynamics, and ultimately to one central idea:
Quality during Design happens when teams align early and think together intentionally.
In this episode
- The question that has guided all 200 episodes
- Why good engineering teams still build products that miss the mark
- The evolution from tools → process → people → systems
- The "Design Fog" and why the earliest product decisions matter most
- What a backyard orchard taught Dianna about product development
- How brainwriting led to the ADEPT Framework
- Why the future of quality starts before engineering design begins
Featured ideas
- Design Fog
- ADEPT Framework
- Concept Space Model
- Brainwriting
- Early concept development
- Cross-functional alignment
- Building the right product before building the product right
Thank you
Whether this is your first episode or you've been listening since 2021, thank you for being part of the Quality During Design community. Your questions, conversations, and willingness to rethink product development have shaped this podcast as much as the ideas shared.
Here's to the next 200 episodes.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Why do product teams stay misaligned? Jenny Wanger explains the structural problems: efficiency-focused handoff workflows, unclear strategy, and people left cleaning up decisions they didn't help make. She shares tested practices for influencing upstream decisions without formal authority: clarifying strategy through curiosity, bringing the right people in early (pre-mortems work), and publicly recognizing collaborators.
Key Takeaways
- Fire drills and half-finished features often stem from lost customer context in handoff-driven workflows
- Use curiosity, not criticism, to surface strategy gaps - Interview leaders and highlight missing pieces
- Run cross-functional pre-mortems early; rank risks by likelihood × impact, not opinion
- Make others look good publicly (CC their boss); build a reputation as someone worth inviting
Timestamps
- 02:42 The Misalignment Before Picture
- 05:05 The Handoff Trap
- 17:00 Strategy Gaps & Curiosity
- 23:00 Pre-Mortems & Early Involvement
- 32:00 First Steps
Resources
- Jenny Wanger: jennywanger.com | LinkedIn
Your Challenge
Pick one: Share a kudos with someone's manager, approach a colleague about a past bottleneck, or volunteer to run a pre-mortem.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
The episode features Chad Schneider, CEO and founder of Root3 Labs, discussing prototyping as a discipline focused on answering specific questions to reduce technical, schedule, and market risk.
He explains that prototypes need not resemble the final product, citing examples like using a cardboard mockup to verify hand access for connectors and 3D-printed sizing models to understand surgical constraints.
Chad describes managing complex, time-constrained projects by rigorously evaluating requirements as needs versus wants. He uses quick calculations and low-fidelity prototypes to resolve unknowns early — when changes are cheap — rather than waiting for expensive tooling decisions to reveal them.
He also shares a hospital device concept that was canceled after observing nurses (who immediately removed the cable-concealing covers the team had designed) framing 'killing' the project as a win.
Key takeaway: before you build, write down the question you're trying to answer, then find the lowest-resolution way to answer it. For more highlights, visit the blog post.
00:00 Start With The Question
01:22 Meet Chad Schneider
02:25 What Root Three Builds
04:46 Prototype Means Question
06:25 Why Skipping Costs More
07:17 Cardboard Box Prototype
09:27 Managing Deadlines And Needs
13:47 Risk Based Prototyping Culture
21:48 User Feedback Can Kill Projects
30:47 Final Takeaways And Challenge
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Engineering rework often comes from unasked questions or using the wrong tool at the wrong fidelity.
Dianna outlines three common prototyping traps:
- the “ta-da” trap, where teams build polished prototypes to impress stakeholders before the concept is stable, anchoring the team to an early solution
- the “I’m smarter than cardboard” trap, where engineers skip low-fidelity physical models in favor of analysis even when the real question is usability
- the “validation theater” trap, where teams default to expensive, validation-level rigs before confirming they’re asking the highest-risk, right question.
All three share a root cause: jumping from idea to build without defining what must be learned and the appropriate fidelity.
She invites listeners to subscribe for a future episode on prototyping done well.
02:08 Trap 1: The 'ta-da' trap
04:19 Trap 2: The "I'm smarter than cardboard" trap
05:43 Trap 3: The "validation theater" trap
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Most of the social conversation around AI is aimed at business owners and programmers, but if you’re an engineer or quality professional, you might be wondering how to actually use these tools to help with your own work processes or information pools. While many people are waiting for their company to provide an AI strategy, there is a way to start building your own private "AI intern" today without being a coder or a programmer.
In this episode, I’m joined by technologist Vincent Deeney to discuss the practical side of running Large Language Models (LLMs) locally on your own hardware. We move past the hype to talk about how "playing" with these models is actually a high-level form of learning that can help you bridge technical gaps and soar in your productivity.
Vincent introduces a mental model for your personal development: the "Senior Engineer vs. Intern" workflow. You’ll learn how to use elite frontier models to help you architect complex concepts, then hand that plan over to a local model to execute the repetitive, data-heavy tasks.
Whether you want to automate your morning research or just understand the "why" behind AI behavior, this episode is your guide to becoming a more capable, AI-literate professional. We don't just talk about AI - we give you a roadmap to start executing on your own.
Listen in and visit the podcast blog for extra resources: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/s3e20
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Late-breaking insights in product development aren’t caused by negligence but by a lack of structure that pulls existing team knowledge into concept discussions early, when changes are cheaper.
Dianna describes an experiment running three product briefs (solar post-installation support, a portable oxygen concentrator, and a field lettuce harvester module) through traditional versus structured concept development.
Both produced credible outputs, but the structured method added context: linking each design input to a specific use-process failure or targeted benefit, its severity or importance, and a clear acceptance condition. Engineering inherits clarity rather than having to guess intent.
Dianna proposes a three-question filter (who fails, how severe/important, what “done” means) and challenges listeners to apply it to one current design input.
Visit the YouTube series showing side-by-side results: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTtGpfRyyNcZ9qMVL2HmWA7heE3Idyfbt
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
The episode features Cassie Leonard—former aerospace technical leader, executive coach, and author of STEM Moms and Beyond the Pipeline—explaining why the traditional linear “pipeline” model of engineering careers is constricting and mislabels non-linear moves as failure.
Drawing on expectancy-value theory, she presents an ROI-style equation for decisions: attainment, intrinsic, and utility value divided by effort, loss of valued alternatives, and cost of failure, illustrating it with her choice to leave a Fortune 100 role and start her coaching business.
This conversation applies the framework to individual confidence and authenticity, leader strategies for retention and recognition (including “rock stars” vs. “superstars”), and cross-functional empathy when trade-offs arise.
See more about Cassie at ELMMcoaching.com.
Visit the blog post for more: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/s3e19/
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Your team keeps solving the exact same problems project after project. What if the issue isn't careless execution, but a reactive system designed to hide failures rather than learn from them?
In this episode:
• Discover how protective, reactive systems create "quiet" organizations where vital failure data gets buried instead of shared.
• Learn the three essential shifts high-performing organizations use to turn lessons learned into strategic, upstream inputs.
• Understand why the pendulum swing toward over-constrained, paperwork-heavy processes is just another system design failure.
Ready to stop the cycle of repeating mistakes? Download the strategic quality integration checklist via the Quality During Design newsletter, or book a free 20-minute clarity call at qualityduringdesign.com/talk to map out your next best move.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Your team keeps building the wrong thing, despite great effort. What if the problem isn’t execution. It’s the fog you’re navigating in?
We speak with Shannon Cummings, a seasoned product and marketing strategist who’s spent his career bridging the gap between Marketing, Product, and Engineering. He’s launched life-changing medical devices, cut development time in half, and done it all by bringing marketing into the room before the first prototype.
In this episode:
• Why product development fails when marketing is an afterthought
• How early customer insight—not prototypes—should drive design
• The real power of cross-functional alignment (and how to make it happen)
• A proven process to keep teams united, focused, and customer-obsessed from day one
Show notes and links: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/s3e18/
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Have you ever walked into a meeting (design review, planning session, phase gate) only to realize the decision was already made? That the discussion was just theater, not dialogue? You weren’t there to shape the outcome. You were there to witness it. If that’s happened to you, you’re not alone.
In this episode, Dianna explores why this happens, why it feels so frustrating, and most importantly how to fix it.
In this episode:
• Design reviews are often theater because of the system: decisions are made before the meeting, not during
• Real influence happens upstream, not in the formal meeting
• Three practical steps to shape decisions before they’re locked in
Stop waiting for your moment to shine. Start shaping the moment before it happens. Share this with someone who’s been a witness too many times.
Visit the blog post for additional notes and transcript: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/stop-being-a-witness
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
In this episode of 'Quality during Design', we delve into how engineers can avoid mistakes and oversights by managing stress and enhancing performance.
Host Dianna Deeney interviews Karli Auble, an engineering leader at a global firm in the defense industry. She has unique expertise in systems engineering and positive psychology, with a master's degree in both disciplines.
Karli shares insights on her THRIVE framework, focusing on thoughts, habits, relationships, instincts, values, and environments. She emphasizes the importance of recognizing 'error codes' in our bodies, applying practical tools, and fostering better communication within teams. All with an eye of better engineering outcomes.
Listeners will learn actionable strategies to improve their work.
Visit the podcast blog for more info, including how to contact Karli.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Your team keeps brainstorming into a void, producing “meh” ideas that never stick. What if the problem isn’t a lack of creativity but the absence of the right constraints?
In this episode:
• The Goldilocks principle of team creativity – why no guardrails and too‑many guardrails both kill innovation.
• Frameworks unlock, don’t limit, creativity – using the drummers‑without‑drums analogy to show how structured constraints spark breakthrough ideas.
• Timing and the Concept Space Model – the sweet spot after business approval but before detailed design, and how to map inputs, process, and outputs to generate high‑quality concepts.
Visit the blog post.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Early concept development often fails because teams lack clarity and alignment, leading to wasted time and resources. Discover the structured approach needed to cut through the "design fog" and ensure your team is building the right product from the start.
In this episode:
• The Concept Space Model defines the fundamental questions teams must align on before diving into technical details.
• The ADEPT Team Framework provides a five-part method for effective co-creation and structured ideation.
• Learn how brainwriting and ensuring common understanding lead to actionable design inputs.
Do you want next steps? Are you ready to pierce your design fog? Here is how to get started:
- Listen to the free podcast series. Get the list at PierceTheDesignFog.com
- Read the book, Pierce the Design Fog. It contains detailed templates, facilitation guides, and case studies.
- Work with me. I help teams implement these frameworks. Visit DeeneyEnterprises.com
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Your team spent six weeks on a feature that got rejected in the demo. Your engineers built a prototype that totally missed the mark. This misalignment is the design fog, and it’s where most product failures are born in the uncomfortable space of the fuzzy front end.
In this episode:
• Learn why jumping to prototypes introduces fixedness, robbing your team of the chance to define true user requirements.
• Understand the symptoms of the design fog, including the silent assumptions problem and the premature precision trap.
• Discover how the Concept Space Model and the ADEPT Team Framework act as the rope and torches you need to pierce the design fog and align your team in a matter of hours, not weeks.
Subscribe at qualityduringdesign.substack.com so you don’t miss the framework that stops the cycle.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Ever face a late-stage design decision where your gut says “maybe,” finance says “no,” and the schedule says “hurry”?
We unpack a simple way to make those calls with more clarity: using expected value to connect confidence, upside, and downside into one sober view of net benefit. No jargon, no spreadsheets required—just a clear framework that helps you see when a $50,000 test buys real certainty, and when the right move is to ship.
Still, numbers don’t get the final say. The goal isn’t to pick the biggest EV; it’s to choose the most balanced, actionable, project-aligned option.
If this approach helps you navigate the gray areas between risk and reward, follow the show, share it with a teammate, and leave a quick review so others can find it. Got a decision you’re wrestling with? Send it our way—we’ll feature it in a future breakdown.
This blogpost: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/expected-value-makes-uncertainty-manageable/
Facing a really complicated and nuanced decision? Try this Method to Help with Complex Decisions (DMRCS)
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
When pursuing aggressive benchmarks, engineers must employ portfolio thinking, running multiple design projects simultaneously. But choosing winners requires a decisive way to eliminate projects that are not feasible to continue innovating, often referred to as a "project killer".
In this episode, we analyze Tesla's battery development as a case study. We delve into their use of five clear-cut constraint categories that define failure conditions upfront: the Economic filter, Performance filter, Scalability filter, Resource filter, and System filter.
We discuss the challenges engineers face in letting go of projects due to the sunk cost fallacy, where prior investments irrationally influence future choices, leading to the creation of "zombie projects".
Learn why defining explicit kill criteria before development begins is a vital, often overlooked exercise that saves resources and ensures rational decision-making.
Blog for this episode: https://deeneyenterprises.com/qdd/podcast/define-kill-criteria-to-avoid-zombie-projects/
Episode with Dianna's review of Annie Duke's "Quit": Exploring Product Development and AI Through Literature: Insights from 'Loonshots', 'AI 2041', 'Quit', and "How Big Things Get Done' (QDD Book Cast) - Deeney Enterprises
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
We turn late-stage design surprises into a strategic plan by assigning explicit confidence levels, stacking evidence, and using the three-dial model of time, cost, and confidence boost. We show how to work backward from a system test to cheaper steps that drive faster, clearer decisions.
• applying the three dials of time, cost, confidence
• sequencing with the work-backwards strategy
• avoiding overtesting, undertesting, wrong testing
• turning confidence into a team communication tool
• practical next steps to build the confidence muscle
Subscribe to the Substack for monthly guides, templates, and Q&A where I help you apply these to your specific projects.
Visit qualityduringdesign.substack.com, or you can get the transcript of this episode and many other podcast episodes at deeneyenterprises.com
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
Late-stage design just hit a snag—now comes the moment that separates guesswork from great engineering. We walk through a clear, repeatable method to investigate unexpected failures and make high-impact decisions with confidence. Instead of hunting for a perfect test, we set a confidence target and stack multiple forms of imperfect evidence until we close the gap.
If you’re navigating late-stage product development and want a calm, methodical way to move from 40% to 90% confidence, this framework will help you choose the next best step, allocate limited time and budget, and know when to stop.
Join the Substack for monthly guides, templates, and QA where I help you apply these to your specific projects. Visit qualityduringdesign.substack.com.
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Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
We break down why risk analyses often become checkbox theater and replace them with a simple, practical impact vs likelihood matrix that guides action. From quick wins to high-stakes unknowns, we show how to calibrate effort, buy the right learning, and move with confidence.
Join the Substack for monthly guides, templates, and QA where I help you apply these to your specific projects.
Send us a message
Work with Dianna I help product development teams build quality into the front end when it's cheap and easy, not late when it's expensive and painful.
Book a 20-minute discovery call with Dianna's calendar. Whether you're navigating the "fuzzy front end" of product development and want to explore a workshop or advisory partnership, or you'd like to be a guest on this podcast. You'll leave with a summary, relevant resources, and a clear path for next steps within 24 hours.
Pierce the Design Fog (piercethedesignfog.com): my book on aligning cross-functional teams, defining clear design inputs, and accelerating product success. NIEA Finalist Award, reviewed by PDMA.
Connect with me: I'm most active on LinkedIn.
Free Resources for Subscribers Subscribe to the Quality during Design digest — https://newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com — for monthly actionable highlights, plus access to the Strategic Quality Integration Checklist (a free self-assessment download) and my Swipe File Vault.
If you reach for the nearest “risk” template, it might cause more problems.
There are two very different jobs we ask risk tools to do. In this episode, we talk about how to pick the one that actually moves your project forward.
- identification tools for unknown unknowns (like FMEA and preliminary hazard analysis) that systematically surface risks to users, systems, and environments
- decision tools for known unknowns that clarify impact, likelihood, and uncertainty so teams can choose a path with confidence.
Along the way, we call out organizational risks—supplier failure, regulation shifts, competitor timing—that belong in resilience planning, not product FMEAs.
Are your teams struggling with poor communication and rushed timelines? Is your product vision clouded by a lack of clarity? It's time to find your way through the confusion and build products that truly resonate with users.
Introducing "Pierce the Design Fog" by Dianna Deeney, the essential guide to turning abstract ideas into high-quality products. This book offers a proven playbook with practical frameworks and tools to help you foster team synergy, lead with vision, and ma
*JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK* Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
**PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.**
Big changes, clearer focus, and more ways to learn together. We’re tightening our cadence to two episodes a month and building monthly themes that travel across the podcast, blog, and a new Substack home—so you can go beyond ideas and into practice with tools, Q&A, and live community sessions.
Here’s what’s new and why it matters. The podcast keeps its familiar format, but now each month has a focused theme that carries into Substack deep dives. Subscribers get comprehensive guides, open Q&A weeks where we answer your specific questions in the comments, and a one-hour live chat each month to pressure-test methods on real scenarios. It’s a smarter learning loop: listen, explore, apply—then come back with better questions. You’ll also get access to the strategy vault filled with templates, worksheets, and facilitation guides.
We’re also thrilled to announce the launch of Pierce the Design Fog, a practical playbook for product, engineering, and UX teams who need structure without losing speed or humanity. With models like the concept space and ADEPT framework, you’ll align cross-functional teams, turn insights into actionable design inputs, and make confident calls under uncertainty. There’s a companion card deck—Concept Quest: Design Discovery—that acts like a portable facilitator, with prompts and instructions to guide workshops. Pre-order before October 14, 2025, to enter the card deck giveaway and bring these methods straight into your team’s next session.
Subscribe to the show, check out the Substack at qualityduringdesign.substack.com, and leave a review to help more builders find us.
Are your teams struggling with poor communication and rushed timelines? Is your product vision clouded by a lack of clarity? It's time to find your way through the confusion and build products that truly resonate with users.
Introducing "Pierce the Design Fog" by Dianna Deeney, the essential guide to turning abstract ideas into high-quality products. This book offers a proven playbook with practical frameworks and tools to help you foster team synergy, lead with vision, and ma
*JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK* Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
**PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.**
How do you balance customer wants with project constraints? If your customer-facing teammates are saying our customers want this, that and the other thing, which ones do we prioritize over others?
Not all features are equal in the eyes of our customers. And not all features are value-added, either.
In this episode, we delve into how to prioritize customer wants using the powerful Kano Model, a tool that maps customer satisfaction against the implementation of product features.
You'll learn how to differentiate between essential and non-essential features, ensuring that your design truly resonates with your customers. This episode walks through the intricacies of the Kano Model's two-by-two matrix and the different satisfaction levels represented by various lines and curves.
Too complex? We break it down. Prioritize your features based on their impact to the customer using their voice. Then, consider how well you want to implement that in your design using the Kano Model.
Get ready for practical tips and proven strategies to enhance your product’s value while managing cost, time, and design trade-offs. This episode is an introduction to the Kano Model for design.
Visit the podcast blog for a Kano Model and examples to help you put it into practice.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Every product designer knows that critical moment when you must shift from understanding customer needs to actually engineering solutions. It's where the magic happens—and where many projects stumble.
After a week of concept development with your team (customer evaluations, benefit analysis, symptom ID, and process mapping), you've gathered valuable insights. But how do you transform this mountain of information into concrete technical requirements?
Quality tools transform the concept-to-design transition from a jarring handoff to a smooth, continuous conversation with your cross-functional team. In translating concept development ideas into design inputs, you'll create products that truly solve problems and delight users—with less rework and fewer costly changes later in development.
Ready to bridge the gap in your next design project? Visit the podcast blog and links to other episodes.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
This episode explores the critical importance of evaluating the customer's use process during concept development.
Rather than focusing solely on what your product does, understanding how users will interact with it creates opportunities to design more intuitive, enjoyable experiences. By mapping out the steps users take from beginning to end using process flowcharts, development teams gain clarity on inputs, outputs, and the journey between them.
Quality engineers have long used flowchart analysis tools to improve manufacturing processes, and these same techniques provide tremendous value in product design.
Whether you need to simplify complex steps, compare competitor approaches, or identify critical-to-quality elements, these analytical methods help prioritize design decisions based on what truly matters to users.
The goal is creating products that feel intuitive and natural, preventing those awkward validation testing moments when engineers want to shout, "You're doing it wrong!" When we evaluate the use process early, we develop products others love while minimizing costly redesigns and user frustration.
Subscribe to Quality During Design and sign up for our newsletter at newsletter.deeneyenterprises.com to learn more about applying quality thinking to your product development process. Your users will thank you for it!
View the podcast blog.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
What happens when cutting-edge AI meets manufacturing quality control? The results are nothing short of revolutionary.
Keven Wang, co-founder and CEO of UnitX, takes us through the world of AI-powered visual inspection, where it is transforming how factories detect defects and improve product quality. Drawing from his experience with over 160 manufacturers worldwide, Keven reveals how these systems consistently outperform both human inspectors and traditional rule-based vision systems, reducing escape rates by up to 10x while cutting scrap rates by approximately 50%.
We talk beyond basic implementation to explore Kevin's four-step roadmap for AI-powered manufacturing. Starting with end-of-line inspection, manufacturers progress to upstream checkpoints, then leverage collected data for powerful insights, ultimately working toward the "self-driving factory" where AI automatically implements process corrections. Keven shares a compelling success story of a motor manufacturer that reduced customer complaints by 90% and improved yield from 85% to 90% after adopting this technology across 90 production lines.
Perhaps most surprising is Keven's observation that the greatest challenge in AI adoption isn't technical but human: aligning teams, establishing shared goals, and helping personnel become comfortable with the technology. This insight underscores that successful implementation requires thoughtful change management alongside technical expertise.
Whether you're a design engineer, manufacturing engineer, quality professional, or technology leader, this episode provides both practical guidance for getting started with AI inspection and an inspiring vision of where these technologies are heading. Ready to explore how AI could transform quality in your production environment? This conversation is your perfect starting point.
Visit the UnitX website.
Visit the podcast blog for more.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Ever stood in that devastating moment when customers finally interact with your nearly-finished product only to hear them say, "I don't like that" or "This doesn't work for me"? After months of development and what you thought was adequate customer engagement, these late-stage revelations can send you spiraling back to the drawing board, costing time, money, and team morale.
This episode dives deep into why this painful scenario happens even to the most diligent product development teams and offers three powerful strategies to prevent it.
- First, we explore the concept of the "problem space" - that crucial period between identifying a customer problem and jumping to design solutions.
- The power of cross-functional collaboration forms our second focus. These varied viewpoints collectively create a comprehensive understanding that helps identify potential issues much earlier.
- Our third strategy introduces the concept of "symptoms" - what customers experience when there's an unintended output or event with your product. By intentionally exploring these possible negative experiences during concept development, teams can make informed design decisions that prevent or mitigate problems before they materialize in the final product.
Ready to transform your product development approach? Start with these strategies on your next project and watch how they reduce those heartbreaking late-stage discoveries. Your customers—and your future self—will thank you.
Visit this podcast blog.
Other podcast episodes you may like:
Uncovering Customer Desires: Understanding Benefits in Concept Development
The Hidden Costs of Poor Concept Development in Product Design
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
What does it really mean to design relationships with artificial intelligence? Jake McKee, a community strategist with over two decades of experience working with companies like Lego and Apple, brings clarity to this complex question by introducing us to AI Experience Design (AIX).
In this eye-opening conversation, Jake draws a powerful parallel between today's AI transformation and the digital transformation of the early 2000s. The key difference? Scale and speed. While the early web had natural boundaries, AI presents an almost limitless frontier advancing at breathtaking pace. This creates unique challenges for product teams caught between executive demands for AI innovation and the practical realities of implementation. Jake explains how this pressure often leads to a predictable cycle of over-reliance followed by algorithm aversion before teams eventually find balance.
Rather than viewing AI as a replacement for human capabilities, Jake advocates for seeing it as a "creative and critical partner" that enhances our thinking and processes. He shares practical examples of how product teams can thoughtfully integrate AI – from using it to test early concepts against customer data to employing it as a collaborative ideation tool. Throughout our discussion, Jake emphasizes that successful AI integration depends on maintaining human relationships at the center of product development, not pushing customers further away behind technological barriers.
Perhaps Jake's most counterintuitive yet valuable advice is simple: slow down. "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast," he quotes from fighter pilot wisdom. By taking time to consider the deeper implications of AI implementation – from social contracts to ethical considerations to long-term impacts – teams can actually achieve better, more sustainable results than those rushing to implement AI for quarterly gains.
Ready to transform how you think about AI in your product development process? Connect with Jake through his AIX Sessions, a unique monthly event series designed for candid, senior-level conversations about community, product, and AI strategy at jakemckee.com.
Visit the blog post for additional information and links.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
What truly matters in product design – the features you create or the benefits users experience? In this exploration of a cornerstone concept, we dive into the critical distinction between benefits and features that can make or break your product development efforts.
Benefits describe your users' experience – the positive outcomes and emotional connections that result from using your product. Features, meanwhile, are the tangible, measurable components that make your product work. Understanding this distinction isn't just academic – it transforms how you approach design challenges and communicate value to customers.
Through practical examples from my own website redesign journey, I demonstrate how focusing on benefits first guided the development of features. The episode also explores how needs differ from both benefits and features, representing the gap between what users currently have and what they want to achieve.
By starting with targeted customer benefits and working backward to determine which features and offerings will deliver them, you create products that don't just work – they deeply resonate with users.
Ready to transform your approach to product development? Visit DeeneyEnterprises.com, take the product development archetype quiz, and discover resources tailored to your specific technical, teamwork, or leadership challenges. Share your feedback and be part of validating whether the site's features truly deliver on their promised benefits!
Visit the podcast blog for this episode.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
That "fuzzy front end" of product development, where ideas should flourish, often becomes a frustrating quagmire of unfocused brainstorming sessions and competing perspectives. The truth is, traditional brainstorming doesn't work nearly as well as we've been led to believe.
Drawing from research and decades of experience, this episode reveals why teams facing blank flipcharts produce fewer and lower-quality ideas than those using structured approaches. The solution? Visual models and templates—powerful frameworks that channel creativity rather than stifling it. These tools have transformed quality improvement efforts for nearly a century, and they can revolutionize your concept development process too.
You'll discover how a telecommunications company implemented a simple template change that generated 300% more high-quality ideas in a fraction of the time. We explore why activity theory explains the effectiveness of these approaches, and how proper template design aligns team thinking toward customer-focused solutions. Visual models provide the structure teams need to collaborate effectively, maintain focus, and prevent confusion—turning abstract conversations into concrete design inputs.
Whether you're struggling with cross-functional alignment or searching for ways to improve your team's innovative output, this episode offers practical insights to transform your concept development process. The fuzzy front end doesn't have to be chaotic. With the right visual frameworks, you can guide your team toward designing products customers will love.
Ready to elevate your development process? Listen now, then visit qualityduringdesign.com for more resources to implement these approaches on your next project.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Have you ever watched a promising product idea slowly die in the fuzzy space between "great concept" and "actual development"? You're not alone.
The journey from product idea to market-ready solution contains a critical yet often overlooked phase: concept development. This is where cross-functional teams must align their diverse perspectives to create a solid foundation for design. But as many product developers discover, this is precisely where communication frequently breaks down.
In this episode, we dive deep into why cross-functional teams struggle to communicate effectively during early concept development and how to fix it.
By creating collaborative moments, you'll transform how your team approaches concept development. You'll uncover insights that might otherwise remain buried in individual reports, align on priorities more effectively, and build stronger foundations for subsequent development phases.
Join the conversation and share your experiences on the blog. Or send us a text at the link above.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
The hidden costs of poor product development can devastate your project timeline, budget, and ultimate market success. Drawing from Dr. Robert Cooper's research, this episode reveals how skipping proper concept development—the critical "fuzzy front end" of product design—leads many teams into a costly "ready-fire-aim" approach.
Most development teams dedicate a mere 16% of project time to concept work, despite evidence showing successful products allocate 75% more resources to these early activities. The consequences? Designs repeatedly scrapped or substantially modified mid-development, wasted engineering hours, multiple unnecessary prototypes, and products that fail to meet customer expectations.
Through practical scenarios and comparative timelines, I demonstrate how proper concept development using Quality During Design methodology can reduce engineering time by 35% and design iterations by 60%. By engaging cross-functional teams early and using visual frameworks instead of multiple physical prototypes, you'll not only save time but develop products with significantly higher chances of market success—up to three times more likely, with 38% higher market share and better customer ratings.
This approach doesn't mean endless planning without action. Rather, it's about focused teamwork that addresses customer needs, use environments, and potential risks before diving into detailed design. The result? More efficient development, stronger team alignment, and products that genuinely solve customer problems. Visit the blog for additional resources to transform your product development process and start creating products others love for less.
Visit the podcast blog.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Ever hit that wall where your creative tank feels bone dry? That moment when you've been grinding away at your projects, head down for so long that when someone asks for innovation, you come up empty? You're not alone.
Creative slumps happen when we get too immersed in our specialized domains. As engineers and designers, we develop expertise through consistent application of familiar tools and techniques. But that same specialization creates mental echo chambers where we recycle the same ideas and follow habitual thought patterns. The result? When innovation is needed most, we feel frustratingly blocked.
The solution lies in cross-pollination – deliberately exposing ourselves to diverse inputs that spark unexpected connections.
This episode explores three strategies to reignite your creative spark:
- scheduling dedicated exploration time through activities
- practicing analogy thinking by mapping structures from unrelated domains to your challenges
- maintaining a cross-pollination journal to capture insights for future reference.
Ready to break through your creative block? Join us for practical techniques to expand your innovative thinking and approach design challenges with fresh perspective. Your next great breakthrough might be waiting in the most unexpected places – you just need to train yourself to look for the connections.
Schedule 90 minutes this week for intentional exploration outside your field, and watch what happens when you allow your mind to wander beyond the boundaries of your expertise.
Visit the podcast blog for more information and links.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Ever wondered if you're wasting resources by setting unnecessarily high confidence levels for your reliability requirements? You're not alone. Many engineering teams default to 95% or 99% confidence without considering the downstream impact on testing timelines and resources.
This episode tackles a question that's been coming up frequently from listeners: how to choose appropriate confidence levels for reliability requirements and test methods. Rather than making arbitrary decisions, I share a practical approach using your existing Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) as a guide. This risk-based method helps you match your confidence levels to the actual risks associated with potential failures.
When you connect your testing strategy to your risk analysis, you create a logical framework for deciding where to invest more testing resources and where you might reasonably accept lower confidence levels. I walk through exactly how to do this by examining the severity of potential failures, the number of possible effects, and what other controls might already be in place. The beauty of this approach is that it leverages work your cross-functional team has already done during FMEA development, providing an objective foundation for your test planning decisions.
For those new to the Quality During Design podcast, this episode exemplifies our philosophy that emphasizes using quality tools early in the development process to make better decisions. Whether you're struggling with reliability testing or just looking to optimize your design process, you'll find practical insights to help you create better products with fewer resources. Subscribe to the podcast, visit qualityduringdesign.com for additional resources, or sign up for our monthly newsletter to stay informed about the latest quality design methodologies.
Visit the podcast blog.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
As a Generation X engineer, I've watched design processes evolve from manual drafting kits and hand-derived equations to sophisticated CAD systems powered by artificial intelligence. What fascinates me most isn't the replacement of skills but their enhancement. The engineering fundamentals I learned decades ago haven't become obsolete. They've become more powerful when paired with AI and machine learning tools.
Today's design engineers have unprecedented autonomy. Tasks that once required specialized computing power and expertise are now accessible through AI-enhanced software. This democratization of advanced capabilities doesn't diminish the value of engineering judgment; it amplifies it. Understanding the underlying principles remains crucial for effectively leveraging these powerful tools.
If you're feeling overwhelmed by the pace of technological change in engineering design, start with foundational machine learning and AI prompts. Take a course that is an overview of how it works (I doubt you'll need to learn to code). From there, focus on applications most relevant to your work. Start with the software tools you already use for engineering. Is there an option to enhance it? Critically think about the assumptions and models it's using and always evaluate the result.
Text me about how you're incorporating AI into your design processes or what concerns you have about adopting these new tools.
Visit the podcast blog for a graphic about AI hierarchy, ideas of how to use AI in different steps of product development, and my extra thoughts about this topic.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Good reliability requirements are going to drive our design decisions relating to the concept, the components, the materials, and other stuff. So, the moment to start defining reliability requirements is early in the design process. But, what makes a well-defined reliability requirement? There are five aspects it should cover: do you know what they are?
We'll describe what makes a good reliability requirement and examples of common (but not good) requirements.
Visit the podcast blog for links to reliability engineering articles and sites about "No MTBF".
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ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
We dive deep into the intricate relationship between supplier agreements and product quality, highlighting the essential aspects to consider when partnering with suppliers. Quality in design is not just a checkbox; it requires clear communication and collaboration.
• Exploring the challenges of designing custom components
• Discussing the different types of supplier agreements
• The importance of defining and measuring quality expectations
• Navigating multiple vendors in the supply chain
• Developing a quality plan for effective collaboration
If you like these topics, please visit qualityduringdesign.com and sign up for the newsletter.
Visit this podcast blog.
You might like this episode, too: Supply Chain Management during Design, with Kevin Bailey (A Chat with Cross-Functional Experts) - Quality During Design
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Does the phrase "Subjective Probability Estimation" make you feel uncomfortable? If you're a data-driven professional, you're likely wary of each of those terms on their own, let alone combining them into one thing.
But we sometimes need to do it. And we can practice to get better at it.
In this episode, we emphasize the importance of subjective probability estimations in decision-making, especially in situations where concrete data may be unavailable or impractical.
We talk about:
• Exploring the discomfort of subjective probability estimations
• Utilizing Monte Carlo simulations for complex systems analysis
• Addressing bias and improving estimation accuracy
Inspired by Douglas W. Hubbard's "The Failure of Risk Management," we uncover strategies to sharpen our estimation skills. Consistent practice leads to improvements. Whether it's by imagining you're betting money, breaking down complex estimations, or engaging in true-false trivia, this episode emphasizes regular practice in refining these skills.
I invite you to participate in a collaborative endeavor tailored for engineers—creating a shared database of estimation questions—to foster a community of learning and improvement.
- Choose a true/false question (with answer).
- Or ask for a value (e.g. distance in air travel from LAX to PHL) (with answer).
Share it with Dianna to add to a database for sharing. Either leave a message through the link at the top of these show notes or respond in email to Dianna's newsletter.
Visiting the podcast blog? Leave a comment.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
How are quality tools Legos of development?
We talk about two philosophies of brick building and our use of the family of quality tools.
We also talk about seven uses of quality tools in product development.
Visit the podcast blog for fun graphics.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Choosing Quality Tools (Mind Map vs. Flowchart vs. Spaghetti Diagram)
Quality as a Strategic Asset vs. Quality as a Control
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Tradespeople bring expertise, innovation, high quality, and leadership to product development. If we're lucky enough to be able to work with them, they're an invaluable part of the engineering team.
What about when we're working without them? How can we create a culture of craftsmanship in a company that uses a quality system?
In this episode, we talk about the crafts' and trades' relationship with quality systems, and steps toward creating a culture of craftsmanship.
Visit the podcast blog for this episode.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
When you perform analysis and share it with others to make a decision, do you sometimes just send the file with a blurb in an email? Only to not quite remember what you did later, when you need it most.
There's a simple, relatively fast thing to do: a Mini Report. And it provides so much more than just jogging a memory.
Mini reports are a valuable tool for communication in engineering. By using them, engineers can enhance team collaboration, streamline decision-making, and provide mentorship opportunities to junior colleagues.
We talk about:
• Importance of maintaining records for future reference
• How mini reports improve team communication
• Elements every mini report should contain
• Benefits of organized documentation for teams
• Role of mini reports in mentoring junior engineers
• Potential for using mini reports in professional presentations
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Celebrating a year of insights and community growth, this episode reflects on key moments, popular episodes, and the future direction of the Quality During Design podcast. 2024 included episodes focused on actionable insights, deep-dive series, expert interviews, and insightful book reviews. With gratitude for listeners and a commitment to quality, we look ahead to new topics and collaborations for 2025.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Dianna Deeney interviews Yakira Mirabito about social dynamics within engineering and how it affects decision making. The episode focuses on improving design reviews and making them more inclusive.
Yakira explains how things like personalities and power dynamics can really affect decisions made by design teams. She gives advice to engineers on how to prepare for these reviews, such as how to give presentations effectively and encourage helpful feedback from team members. She also highlights useful tools, like the “Identity Wheel,” to help people understand each other's backgrounds and avoid biases when making decisions. The episode is a great resource for anyone who wants to improve teamwork and create better products!
Yakira Mirabito is a postdoctoral researcher at MIT whose work falls within design theory and engineering management. Her research examines how sociotechnical factors influence design decisions using quantitative and qualitative research methods. Her research interests include design behavior, cognitive biases, and social dynamics within engineering contexts. Yakira's work enhances current design methods and tools, empowering engineers to build more innovative and equitable systems.
Visit the Quality during Design podcast blog for more.
And visit www.yakiramirabito.com for Yakira's resources and ways to contact her about collaborating.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Have you ever stopped to consider the engineering marvels that make festive meals like Thanksgiving possible? Engineering has played a crucial role in ensuring we can enjoy fresh-tasting vegetables and perfectly preserved foods all year round.
Beyond the realm of food preservation, this episode serves as a tribute to the unsung heroes of our holiday tables: engineers. These individuals are responsible for the seamless functioning of everyday items that enhance our lives. By shedding light on these engineering feats, we hope to inspire a greater appreciation for the engineering community's contributions to making life safer, easier, and more enjoyable.
As a fellow engineer, I am proud to be part of a profession that has such a profound impact on the world. By sharing stories of innovation and success, we can foster a deeper understanding of the vital role engineers play in shaping our daily experiences. Whether it's through the development of new technologies or the improvement of existing processes, engineers continue to push the boundaries of what is possible, ensuring that our holiday feasts are as delicious, healthy, and convenient as ever.
Visit the podcast blog.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Discover how predictive analytics, machine learning, AI, and virtual reality reshape some of the ways we approach design. In this episode, we journey from the origins of predictive analytics to the convergence of big data, IoT, digital twins and more, paving the way for innovative product development. We'll also discuss the potential of virtual reality to enhance collaboration and communication within design processes.
This episode isn't just about embracing the latest tech trends; it's about knowing when simpler solutions will suffice and the critical role of data stewardship. This overview will help you to understand the big picture of where these tools fit into your design process. Listen-in so you can better choose when to use them to optimize your design engineering endeavors, or not.
Join the conversation by sharing your thoughts on our blog or newsletter.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Communication challenges in engineering? Dianna Deeney interviews Dr. Meagan Pollock about improving communication and the workplace. They explore how improving communication within cross-functional teams involves active listening, continuous learning, and adapting communication styles to create a more inclusive and productive environment.
Meagan and Dianna talk about:
- Diversity Drives Better Outcomes
- High-Performing Teams Prioritize Communication
- Communication Styles are Shaped by Diverse Factors
- The Role of AI in Communication
- Continuous Growth and Expansion
What can you do today?
- Visit Dr. Pollock's website (EngineerInclusion.com) to access free resources on communication and inclusive leadership.
- Actively engage in continuous learning by seeking out diverse viewpoints and perspectives through various channels (conferences, podcasts, social media, etc.).
- Implement the LISTEN framework to enhance personal communication skills and contribute to more inclusive workplaces. LISTEN framework
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Take it to the next level with Meagan in her workshops. "How to Communicate Effectively Across Cultures and Styles" is happening November 14, 2024. Meagan offered QDD listeners $20 off enrollment with code: DESIGN.
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Visit the podcast blog for more detailed show notes, information, and extra links.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
In this Part 2, we continue to challenge product development ideas by reviewing the final three myths identified by Stefan Thomke and Donald Reinersten in their article, "6 Myths of Product Development". You'll leave with a better understanding of why smaller development 'batches, embracing mistakes, and focusing on the quality of features are what's needed for innovative products.
Discover how quality thinking and systems approaches not only enhances collaboration but also improves user experience from the ground up. By integrating insights from the concept phase, teams can make more informed and strategic decisions throughout the development lifecycle.
Use this episode as an opportunity to change-up your development toolkit with practical guidance and resources.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links and resources.
JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.
PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.
ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.
GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.
VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.
ABOUT DIANNADianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.
Send us a text
How do we integrate quality with product development? Using quality tools and techniques early in the design phase can lead to more successful outcomes. But we cannot do it by treating the product development process like a manufacturing process.
Listen to this Part 1 as we unpack Harvard Business Review’s "The Six Myths of Product Development" by Stefan Thomke and Donald Reinersten. We review three of the six myths in the article, revealing the misconceptions around resource allocation, batch processing, and rigid development plans.
Join us as we review why treating a product development process like a manufacturing process is riddled with pitfalls. The reasons why it doesn't work provides us understanding to what we CAN use quality tools and techniques to do to improve product development.
Visit the podcast blog for additional links!
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FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
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Engineering is a field that constantly evolves, and staying ahead requires not only technical skills but also the ability to communicate effectively and work collaboratively.
Join Steven Giako and Dianna Deeney in a panel discussion of central themes in the books Brilliant! Shuji Nakamura And the Revolution in Lighting Technology and How to Win Friends and Influence People.
How do these two books relate with one another, and what lessons can be learned by combining and contrasting their messages? How can the story in Brilliant! relate to the advice given in How to Win Friends and Influence People? What are potential lessons learned for engineers today who are leading in the edges of innovation?
Steven and Dianna explore these two books together by combining common themes for discussion points and add their own experiences from their engineering careers.
Discussion Topics
- Writing technical papers (9:12)
- Presentations - Adding Flair (16:05)
- Collaboration (23:31)
- Recognition of Others (31:37)
- Getting Buy-In on an Idea (39:00)
Steven and Dianna's Overall Rating and Reviews
How to Win Friends and Influence People (45:47)
Brilliant! (50:54)
Participant Comment
"I didn't realize, until you pointed it out, the need for dramatization in presentations or the need to recognize the politics of publication. I never before went for politics or personal relationships. It was always the technology. And what you've talked about tonight points me in a slightly different direction: [the] need to recognize the politics and the personality, the drama that goes with presentations or publication. I never before recognized the need for recognizing the personal relationships." - R
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a text
Can the way you present technical information drastically impact decision-making? Absolutely. In our latest episode, discover how the assertion evidence model can revolutionize your presentations. Rather than relying on lifeless bullet points, this method encourages you to make clear recommendations at the top of each slide, coupled with compelling graphical evidence. We delve into the six P's—Perspective, Problem, Principle, Proposal, Proof, and Process—that serve as the backbone for structuring your presentation. These elements not only enhance learning but also facilitate more informed and productive discussions within your team.
If the thought of presenting to your team makes you anxious, we've got you covered. We'll share practical advice to boost your confidence and help you deliver your findings more effectively. By focusing on the value of your insights and using the six P's framework, you'll be well-equipped to engage your audience and convey crucial information. As we approach a busy season of deadlines and presentations, challenge yourself to adopt these methods for the benefit of your team. For more learning techniques, don't forget to check out qualityduringdesign.com.
Visit the podcast blog for helpful summaries and graphics.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
How do you balance customer wants with project constraints? If your customer-facing teammates are saying our customers want this, that and the other thing, which ones do we prioritize over others?
Not all features are equal in the eyes of our customers. And not all features are value-added, either.
In this episode, we delve into how to prioritize customer wants using the powerful Kano Model, a tool that maps customer satisfaction against the implementation of product features.
You'll learn how to differentiate between essential and non-essential features, ensuring that your design truly resonates with your customers. This episode walks through the intricacies of the Kano Model's two-by-two matrix and the different satisfaction levels represented by various lines and curves.
Too complex? We break it down. Prioritize your features based on their impact to the customer using their voice. Then, consider how well you want to implement that in your design using the Kano Model.
Get ready for practical tips and proven strategies to enhance your product’s value while managing cost, time, and design trade-offs. This episode is an introduction to the Kano Model for design.
Visit the podcast blog for a Kano Model and examples to help you put it into practice.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
Our team is saying "No" to our co-work session.
We want to have a working meeting with them to get important information and make decisions. Since they declined, now we are missing an important viewpoint and source of design inputs! Plus, it could prove disastrous, later, when we have a pass/go decision on our concept designs.
In this week's episode we talk about ways to overcome this challenge, beyond typical schedule availability. Tune in as we uncover practical strategies that make co-working sessions truly valuable, which will help us in maximizing meeting value and participation.
Visit the podcast blog.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
Can visualizing your data be the game-changer you've been missing?
Discover why plotting isn't just a step in data analysis, but a crucial practice that can reveal uniformity, natural variations, and even potential flaws in your test methods. Learn about the importance of recognizing multiple failure modes and how to avoid common pitfalls such as mishandling outliers and making incorrect assumptions. This episode is packed with actionable advice to enhance your decision-making process.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links.
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
Ready to transform your team meetings from chaotic to cohesive? Discover a method used by Six Sigma practitioners, continuous improvement teams, and design sprints to make your meetings more effective and efficient.
We’ll guide you through the phases of discovery, examination, and prioritization to streamline idea generation and ensure that every team member’s input is valued. You’ll learn techniques for individual brainstorming, anonymous idea sharing, and collective refinement, making your meetings not just productive but a crucial part of your design process.
But that's not all. We dive into the utilization of quality tools for superior team decision-making during design Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA). Explore how to categorize and evaluate potential failures, assign severity ratings, and use tools like tree diagrams and fishbone diagrams to organize complex discussions. By focusing on collaboration and consensus, you’ll be setting your team up for effective failure analysis. Join us to elevate your team meetings and turn them into a powerhouse of creativity and efficiency.
Visit the podcast blog for this episode.
Other episodes you might like:
Brainstorming within Design Sprints
Ways to Gather Ideas with a Team
Product Design with Brainstorming, with Emily Haidemenos (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
Quality control, quality assurance, quality assistance, and Quality 4.0. We unravel these quality concepts and their impact on design.
Listen in to be guided through the historical context and evolution of these terms, offering insights into how they shape design decisions and team communications. You'll learn the roles of quality assurance and quality control, discover the origins and meaning of "quality assistance", and grasp the implications of Quality 4.0.
We’ll dig into official definitions and explore how these quality methodologies have transformed over time. Through practical examples, we’ll show you how to integrate these quality methods into your design processes, fostering collaboration within cross-functional teams.
Tune in to enhance your understanding of quality thinking and quality during design.
Visit the podcast blog for resources we reference.
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About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
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Ever find yourself stuck trying to gauge the likelihood of an event?
What if you could transform your approach to probability assignments with just one simple trick?
On this episode of Quality During Design, we talk about simplifying probabilities for better decision making. We uncover a method to assign probabilities and occurrence ratings during preliminary assessments.
We share a technique that involves breaking down an event into smaller, more manageable parts, helping you understand and analyze it better. This method makes it easier to assign likelihoods because it provides better understanding of the event, clearer context, and consideration of what may drive things to happen.
Then, we relate these parts to conditional probabilities. We offer example explanations and practical applications to help you grasp conditional probabilities.
Plus, for those looking for additional resources, we have a cheat sheet that can further simplify these concepts for you. Not a subscriber yet? Visit qualityduringdesign.com to sign up and start receiving valuable insights directly in your inbox.
Join us to learn how these techniques can simplify probabilities, improve your assessments, and boost your team's decision-making.
Visit the podcast blog for more.
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FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Send us a Text Message.
What could Shuji Nakamura, the Nobel Prize-winning engineer behind the blue LED, teach you about teamwork and career growth? Discover how transitioning from an independent researcher to a collaborative leader can elevate your professional journey.
Join me, Dianna Deeney, as I share insights from a recent event co-hosted for the IEEE Philadelphia Professional Communication Society. We'll uncover valuable lessons from the books "Brilliant!" by Bob Johnstone and Dale Carnegie's classic "How to Win Friends and Influence People," both of which spotlight the transformative power of teamwork and communication.
Learn about Shuji Nakamura's career evolution and find out how his story parallels many of our own professional paths. I'll also dive into my personal shift from solitary work to embracing collaboration in quality engineering. By leveraging quality tools for better communication and idea sharing within cross-functional teams, you too can drive more successful engineering and design projects. This episode is packed with actionable advice and inspiring anecdotes to help you thrive in your professional life. Don’t miss out on knowing the baseline approach that can lead to collaboration success!
Visit the podcast blog for more links.
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FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Anne Meixner, Dr. Vaneeta Kaur Grover, and Dianna Deeney join in a panel discussion about engineering and STEM. They met for an engineering book review to discuss the ideas that came from the books themselves and to link literature about engineering to current-day challenges.
Uncover the intricacies of engineering's past and present as we dissect To Engineer is Human and The Wright Brothers. Our collective expertise spans the gamut from semiconductor testing to biotechnology statistics, offering a rich tapestry of perspectives on these seminal works. This episode promises a journey through the shared trials and triumphs that shape our engineering landscape and a candid examination of the setbacks we seldom speak about.
The episode isn't complete without their review of the books that sparked this enriching dialogue. You'll hear why "The Wright Brothers" and "To Engineer is Human" scored high on our recommendation list for anyone keen on understanding the essence of engineering, from the glory of breakthroughs to the wisdom found in failures. Join us for this episode, where we bridge the divide between historical achievement and contemporary challenges in the ever-evolving world of STEM.
Topics Discussed
Visit the podcast blog to follow along with the discussion topics, prompts, and questions. Also access a bonus topic to consider for yourself or for your own book review/discussion.
Next Discussion
Want to participate in the next discussion? Join Dianna and others on May 28th. See this link for more info.
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FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
We explore the history, philosophy, and methodology of Design for Six Sigma (DFSS). We dissect the acronyms DMAIC and DMADV, revealing how these methodologies are blueprints for achieving excellence. From statistics to Motorola's legendary quality standards and other history of six sigma, you'll begin to see how DFSS may relate with your organization's current design development processes.
Quality during Design is not DFSS. It can be part of DFSS or any other product development process. Quality during Design is a philosophy that emphasizes the benefits of cross-functional team involvement and a methodology that uses quality tools to refine design concepts early on. Quality tools bridge the gap between team communication and innovative concept development. We review why skipping the crucial steps of questioning and investigating can lead to missed opportunities.
As we navigate through the essential stages of product development, we invite you to join us on this enlightening path to creating impactful and high-quality solutions that stand the test of time—and the marketplace.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Unveil the hidden flaws of FMEA and risk matrices that could be skewing your analysis and decision-making.
In the realm of risk assessment and management, traditional tools like Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) and risk matrices have been widely accepted as the norm. However, beneath the surface of these established methods lie hidden flaws that can significantly impact the effectiveness of risk analysis and decision-making processes. The latest podcast episode takes a deep dive into these issues, offering listeners an exploration of the challenges posed by conventional risk assessment techniques.
We take our conversation a step further, emphasizing not just the identification of such critiques but the vital role understanding them plays in fortifying our decision-making frameworks.
The episode emphasizes the importance of staying informed and adapting to new methods in the ever-evolving landscape of risk management. By doing so, professionals can ensure that they are not only equipped to handle current challenges but also prepared to meet the demands of the future.
And for those of you eager to translate this newfound knowledge into practice, we spotlight an exceptional resource: "FMEA in Practice from plan to risk-based decision making," an Udemy course that promises to elevate your risk-based decision-making abilities.
Visit the podcast blog for a list of resources and more links.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Fred Schenkelberg about getting information for product design, focusing on reliability engineering in new products.
This episode is part 2 of 2.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Fred
Fred is a Reliability Engineering and Management Consultant and founder of Accendo Reliability. Fred’s expertise is program development, accelerated life test design & analysis, reliability statistics, risk assessment, test planning, and training. He is a graduate course lecturer with the University of Maryland, the initial Producer of the ASQ Reliability Division Webinar program, and a regular speaker at the Reliability and Maintainability Symposium (RAMS®). He also founded and maintains accendoreliability.com, a reliability engineering professional development hub.
Fred and Dianna talk about
- the realities of internal team dynamics and the delicate dance between innovation and issue resolution
- advantages of initiating reliability conversations early in the design process
- practical advice on how design teams can triage problems by applying the right tools, thus ensuring a more robust product design process
Fred's tales from the trenches offer a unique lens into the challenges and triumphs of creating products that not only work but last.
Visit the podcast blog for links to Fred's recommendations.
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Fred Schenkelberg about getting information for product design, focusing on reliability engineering in new products.
This episode is part 1 of 2.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Fred
Fred is a Reliability Engineering and Management Consultant and founder of Accendo Reliability. Fred’s expertise is program development, accelerated life test design & analysis, reliability statistics, risk assessment, test planning, and training. He is a graduate course lecturer with the University of Maryland, the initial Producer of the ASQ Reliability Division Webinar program, and a regular speaker at the Reliability and Maintainability Symposium (RAMS®). He also founded and maintains accendoreliability.com, a reliability engineering professional development hub.
Fred and Dianna talk about
- the realities of internal team dynamics and the delicate dance between innovation and issue resolution
- advantages of initiating reliability conversations early in the design process
- practical advice on how design teams can triage problems by applying the right tools, thus ensuring a more robust product design process
Fred's tales from the trenches offer a unique lens into the challenges and triumphs of creating products that not only work but last.
Visit the podcast blog for links to Fred's recommendations.
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Navigating the common roadblocks of team consensus on severity ratings during FMEA or hazard analysis can be challenging. But with the right strategies, your team can capture uncertainty and avoid the pitfall of too many conservative estimates that skew prioritization. Learn how a probability mass function can revolutionize your risk assessment, ensuring a smoother, more accurate process for all stakeholders involved.
Your voice matters to us, and it's your feedback that fuels the journey of 'Quality During Design'. Share your thoughts on PodChaser or your podcast player of choice. Your reviews do more than just support us—they help others discover the insights we offer and contribute to our collective success. Tune in, engage, and be a part of something bigger with Quality during Design, where every listener's perspective is valued and every episode is a step towards mastering the art of using quality during product design.
Other episodes you might like:
Use FMEA to Choose Critical Design Features
Reliability Engineering during Design, with Adam Bahret (A Chat with Cross-Functional Experts)
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ever find yourself at the tail end of a project, swamped with unfinished tasks, and wondering where things went awry? Are there important recommended actions that the team was excited about that just didn't get done? These are the conundrums we tackle in this episode of Quality During Design, with a special nod to Arnold Schwarzenegger's "Be Useful" for his proactive approach to work.
We dissect the all-too-familiar scenario of projects saddled with incomplete actions, despite our best-laid plans. We don't just commiserate—we arm you with a strategy to ensure that things are seen through to the end.
We pull lessons from Schwarzenegger's tenure as California's governor and his hands-on approach during crises. We dissect the significance of staying involved and the vital role of follow-up and follow-through in implementing recommended actions from customer studies to FMEAs. Join us as we cast a critical eye on why management systems sometimes fail in practice and what to do to help ensure success. This isn't just about weathering audits or ticking boxes; it's about a commitment to excellence in product and service design.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Quality during Design isn't just an add-on; it's a fundamental aspect that drives innovation, efficiency, and customer satisfaction!
Welcome back from our brief hiatus!
One of the highlights of this episode is the introduction of an upcoming FMEA course on Udemy, with The Manufacturing Academy. FMEA, or Failure Modes and Effects Analysis, is a systematic method for evaluating our offerings to identify where and how they might fail and to assess the relative impact of different failures. Dianna's approach to FMEA is not only about adhering to traditional methods but also about addressing the criticisms and limitations often associated with them. This course promises to be a fresh take on risk-based decision-making. You'll hear more about it when it is released!
Moreover, the episode touches upon the 'Quality During Design Fast Track' program, which is currently in the works and open to listener feedback. The initiative aims to harness quality tools in novel ways, even before a design concept is fully fleshed out. It emphasizes the importance of early input from cross-functional teams to gather requirements and user needs, thereby making the design process more effective and efficient. This program is system-based and affects how products and services are developed, leading to more thoughtful, user-centric designs.
Listeners are invited: please take brief survey to help Dianna with aspects of these upcoming courses and more. www.qualityduringdesign.com/survey
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Blink and you'll miss it, Quality During Design is taking a short, well-deserved break. We’ve journeyed together through a whopping 136 episodes over the last two years and eight months, and now it's time for us to recharge, refocus, and return with a bang in a few weeks. While we are not releasing new episodes during this period, we're excited to stay connected with you through our weekly email newsletters, loaded with the same quality content, professional wisdom, and valuable tips that you've come to expect from us.
Is there a particular topic you'd love us to tackle in future episodes? Now is the perfect time to share your thoughts! We’re eager to hear from you, so reach out via email or social media with your questions, feedback, or suggestions. Let's continue to build this community together during our short hiatus.
I want to thank you for your support and participation. We're already excited to return to your favorite podcast platforms soon with a fresh perspective, exciting guests, and a renewed commitment to bringing you the best insights into quality and reliability in design. Until then, stay inspired, curious, and in touch!
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Jeffrey Lewis about new product development: how timing the right activities can lead to product success.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Jeffrey
Jeff is a senior director of corporate quality at Globus Medical. He's a quality, reliability, risk management and product development professional. He is experienced at building quality into products, manufacturing processes and all business processes. Jeff is an accomplished executive with experience directing design and development and quality staff to meet company goals and objectives.
Jeffrey and Dianna talk about:
- The delicate balance between knowing what you know and discovering what you don't.
- Incorporating reliability tools like Design FMEA (failure mode and effects analysis) and TAFT (test-analyze-fix-test) into the design process to improve designs and make products more reliable and manufacturable.
- Signs that a product development process needs improvement.
- How, by fostering a collaborative environment, product designers can balance the pressures of completing a project within a given timeframe and still ensure the quality and reliability of their work.
Jeff's wealth of experience and insights provide a roadmap for quality and reliability in product design, making it a must-listen for all in product development and design.
So, join us for this interview to gain a different perspective of incorporating quality and reliability into your work.
Visit the podcast blog for more information.
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
What if you could shift your approach in product design to focus on what really matters, and thereby create products that truly resonate with your customers?
We've been discovering the importance of considering a variety of inputs early in the design process. Now, we navigate the challenge of prioritizing these inputs to make the crucial trade-off decisions that can make or break your product.
We journey through the world of early concept development, discussing how setting priorities can ensure we deliver what's truly important. We look at how these priorities can guide the product development process and how they can be adjusted when new information arises. From surprising test failures to unexpected customer issues, we explore how to reassess our priorities based on these fresh insights.
Along the way, I'll be sharing more tools and techniques from previous episodes to help you prioritize your ideas effectively. Get ready to enhance your approach to product design and development and create products that your customers will love!
Visit the podcast blog for more.
Give us a Rating & Review
NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Gain insights into working effectively with cross-functional teams, collecting invaluable design inputs without succumbing to the overwhelming flow of information.
We'll discuss the magic behind the 'concept space', an efficient approach to dissect potential customer experiences, streamlining concept development at the start.
What about after that high-level concept development, when we begin our engineering design?
Early engineering diagrams can prove instrumental in evaluating modularity, layout, and interactions in product design with a team. Dianna guides us through part of a Quality During Design course lesson, shedding light on how these diagrams can be used. Each function has a different reason to look at these three aspects of product design, and it's worth asking to help us achieve Design for Excellence.
Learn how the collective wisdom of these teams can influence design choices, ensuring that the final product appeases both the internal and external customers. So, buckle up for this enlightening episode as we demystify product design and stress the crucial role of a synchronized team effort.
Visit the podcast blog for more.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
As a product designer, you need design inputs. Many of us have communication problems with our cross-functional teams about product ideas which then morph into product development problems later.
In this episode, we unravel the importance of communication and self-advocacy in the realm of product design. In our chat, we share how to take the lead in working meetings with cross-functional teams to get design inputs. Learn the art of preparation, involvement, maintaining an open mind, and making the most of the knowledge gained.
Let's dig into the power of active communication and how it can not only resolve issues but also enhance outcomes for all parties involved. This episode is a unique blend of design engineering, self-advocacy, and quality during the design process. Tune in, absorb, and apply these insights to your professional journey. You won't regret it!
Visit the podcast blog for additional links and information.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Kevin Bailey, from Design 1st, about supply chain management during design: how product design engineers and product development leadership can be affected by and affect the supply chain for their products.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Kevin
Kevin Bailey is the Founder and CEO of Design 1st, a leading product development consultancy. With a dedicated team specializing in various aspects of product development, including industrial design, user experience, mechanical, electrical, and software engineering, Design 1st is at the forefront of delivering top-quality product designs. Kevin is known for his expertise in integrating cost considerations early in the design process and helping clients navigate supply chain solutions, ensuring a seamless development journey for their projects.
Kevin and Dianna talk about:
- How to approach supply chain management from a risk point-of-view, including balancing risk and opportunity.
- Kevin's framework for successful supply chain management: FACT. Feasible, Available, Constraints, and Test.
- Engineers' responsibilities toward supply chain management, and Leaderships responsibilities toward enabling those activities.
- His views of the current state of supply chain management challenges.
Hear Kevin's take on why engineers need to factor in supply chain management while designing products and how crucial it is for leadership and other teammates to lend support to engineers when liaising with suppliers. We'll also talk about how the size of the project and the roles within it should influence the product engineer's approach.
Don't miss out on Kevin's thoughts on the intersection of AI and product development and a sneak peek into his company's upcoming project. Join us for this insightful episode, packed with actionable advice for product development leaders, designers, and engineers.
Visit the podcast blog for links to
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
FREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ever wished you could ace the art of product design using quality frameworks? Your wish is just about to come true!
We unravel the ADEPT framework, your magic wand for creating products that are not just satisfactory, but loved by users. We'll also be discussing how to lead a team effectively, conduct hands-on meetings, and choose the right participants. These handy tips will enable you to develop top-notch products using cross-functional collaboration.
We're also unveiling how quality itself can be a strategic gamechanger in product design. The ADEPT framework, applicable to any quality tool, will bring alignment, discovery, examination, prioritization, and teamwork to your concept development process.
With Quality during Design's unique approach and with these resources at your fingertips, you're ready to step up your product design game.
View the podcast blog for helpful graphics and links.
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NEW COURSE
FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling students now. Visit the course page for more information and to sign up today! Click Here
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Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ready to sharpen your toolset with the wisdom of ancient warriors?
Today's episode includes knowledge to guide your journey into the world of quality tools and reliability frameworks. Drawing inspiration from the seven weapons of warrior monk Benkei, we introduce the first seven quality tools collected by industry quality professional, Ishikawa. Discover how these types of tools, more typically used for monitoring and continuous improvement, can also be leveraged for early concept development, thus leading to successful product designs.
For those seeking to put theory into practice, we delve into a strategic system model that centers on customer inputs, intended and unintended outputs, and the use process, demonstrating how these tools can be applied to concept development. By the end of this episode, you'll have a deeper understanding of how quality thinking can revolutionize your product design and development process.
Don't forget to check out the additional resources on qualityduringdesign.com, including our informative blog and recorded workshop. Thanks for tuning in and remember, in the world of design, quality is king!
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Are you prepared to untap the potential of cross-functional collaboration in product design?
On this episode of Quality during Design, we pull back the curtains on the dynamics of cross-functional teams in product design. Dianna Deeney, your host and seasoned quality professional, shares her insights on navigating the complex world of cross-functional teams, addressing common misconceptions, and maximizing brainstorming through structure.
We’re about to take a deep dive into the power of diverse perspectives in shaping a holistic vision for a product. Hear about the concept of internal customers in product design, the process of gathering design inputs, and unlocking the potential of directed co-work. This episode is a must-listen for anyone aiming for cross-functional co-work for design inputs. Let's get started!
Visit the podcast blog for extra links.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ever wonder why many product designs fail or why projects don't always come out as planned? The answer might lie in how we approach the 'problem space' versus the 'solution space'.
We're celebrating two and a half years of Quality During Design podcast by revisiting the fundamental principles that guide our product design processes, and exploring how we can apply these principles to avoid common pitfalls.
We talk about the importance of staying longer in the problem space, using quality tools for teamwork, and understanding the power of pre-work in meetings. Listen-in to challenge our thinking and push us to rethink how we engage with new projects. Plus, gain insights on how questioning, investigating, and experimental approaches during project planning will empower you to refine your design processes.
We're inviting you to consider how the Quality During Design methodology can streamline your design process, reduce product failures, and create more meaningful customer experiences. This isn't just about designing products; it's about redefining how we perceive and approach the entire design process.
Visit the podcast blog for images and transcripts.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps product designers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods.
She consults with businesses to incorporate quality within their product development processes. She also coaches individuals in using Quality during Design for their projects.
She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ever wondered how the world of product development can be viewed through the lens of a physicist? How the future of AI will impact our existence? What a champion poker player has to say about quitting, and what we can learn about product development from an architect?
This week, we dive headfirst into those questions with four fascinating reads: 'Loonshots' by Safi Bahcall, 'AI 2041' by Kai Fu Lee and Chen Quifan, 'Quit' by Annie Duke, and 'How Big Things Get Done' by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner.
These books have reshaped my perspective and I believe they hold interesting insights for you too. We’ll explore how these books apply to new product development projects and how they can help us do it better. I also share why I thought some were better together, read in pairs.
For those of you who love a good discussion, I'm inviting you to join my virtual book club where we can further unravel these intriguing books. Let me know if you're interested!
So, tune in for a conversation that promises to be as enlightening as it is engaging!
Visit the podcast blog.
*Join me for a free webinar on August 22***
Learn more about the topic and register here: Flowcharts for Technical Communication: Taking it Further with Quality Tools (brighttalk.com)
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ever felt overwhelmed with the mountain of data during the design process? Wondered how best to prioritize tasks to meet user needs? I'm Dianna Deeney, and this episode of the Quality During Design Podcast promises to guide you through the chaos. We delve deep into the concept of an urgent/important matrix, a simple two-way matrix that can help you align your design priorities based on the user.
We get practical, applying this matrix to a real-world scenario - designing a bicycle stand. As we navigate through preliminary user data, we'll explore how tasks can be categorized based on urgency and importance. From assembling the stand to recycling the packaging materials, high-level tasks are prioritized. Tune in and uncover how you can leverage this straightforward tool to streamline your design process and create products that truly resonate with user requirements.
This is a Quality during Design Redux episode originally titled "Design for User Tasks using an Urgent/Important Matrix". Visit the podcast blog for examples and other links.
*Join me for a free webinar on August 22***
Learn more about the topic and register here: Flowcharts for Technical Communication: Taking it Further with Quality Tools (brighttalk.com)
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Scott Abel about why members of the technical documentation team should be brought into product design process earlier rather than later. And to encourage product design teams to incorporate the insights available from technical documentation professionals into their design decisions.
This episode is Part 2 of our interview. Part 1 (published earlier) was a discussion involving information development management. This Part 2 focuses on technical communication in design.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Scott
Scott Abel serves as Content Strategy Evangelist at Heretto. He also runs a consultancy called The Content Wrangler, which helps companies improve how they author, maintain, manage, and deliver technical product information to those who need it, when, where, and how they prefer it. He writes regularly for content industry publications, produces a series of content strategy-focused books for XML Press, and is a dynamic presenter often featured at content industry events worldwide.
Scott and Dianna talk about:
- Today's approaches of information developers and how they work in project teams.
- Today's challenges with content and why it's not just an instruction manual. We talk about limits to the ability to scale, deliverability, personalization, and relationships with customer service call centers.
- Regulations, standards, and awards within the information developer's world.
- How to approach, engage, and incorporate technical communication people and information developers into an engineering project.
Visit the podcast blog for extra information and links! www.qualityduringdesign.com
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Scott Abel about information development management, a discipline concerned with best practices for managing and coordinating all activities related to the development, production, and distribution of information. He shares ideas, strategies, and best practices for unifying all product information - technical documentation, product specifications, customer support, training, and on-boarding - in a single online knowledge center.
This is Part 1 of 2 episodes with Scott. In Part 1 (this episode) we talk about information development management. In Part 2 (next episode), we talk about technical communication as part of product design success.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About ScottScott Abel serves as Content Strategy Evangelist at Heretto. He also runs a consultancy called The Content Wrangler, which helps companies improve how they author, maintain, manage, and deliver technical product information to those who need it, when, where, and how they prefer it. He writes regularly for content industry publications, produces a series of content strategy-focused books for XML Press, and is a dynamic presenter often featured at content industry events worldwide.
In Part 1, Scott and Dianna talk about:
- Why technical documentation is more important than it's generally treated: it relates to the success of existing customers, the loyalty of customers to a brand, attracts new customers, and provides confidence to perspective customers.
- How technical documentation affects regulated products, and why "future fear of noncompliance" is a trap that leads to a loss of information management advancements and their benefits.
- What object-oriented technical communication management is and COPE (create once, publish everywhere).
Visit the podcast blog for links and extra information! www.qualityduringdesign.com
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Ready to hone your technical writing skills as an engineer? This episode of the Quality During Design podcast is a must-listen! We delve into the critical role of technical communication in engineering, and why written communication skills are non-negotiable for engineers. Join me, Dianna Deeney, as we consider different perspectives to make your technical writing the best it can be.
Our chat takes us on a journey through the past, present, and future of technical writing, as we root ourselves in the realities of presenting findings, interpreting data, and making actionable decisions. In the spirit of past, present, and future, we discuss techniques to ensure that your writing is effective and reaches your audience - be it your project team, auditors, or a future engineer referencing your work. Grab your pen and paper or open your word document as we together make strides in improving our technical communication skills.
This Quality during Design Redux episode was originally "The Spirits of Technical Writing Past, Present, and Future". Visit the podcast blog, here.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Who wouldn't want a treasure trove of product knowledge right at their fingertips? We explore FMEA (Failure Mode Effects Analysis) and unlock its potential for complaint investigation. Harness the power of FMEA - not just a tool, but a wellspring of team knowledge about your product.
But we're not finished there - we're turning FMEA data into actionable knowledge. We delve into the use of FMEA for field failure investigation and innovation. We'll dissect the various components of FMEA, showing you how they can be used to evaluate data and investigate causes.
Come with us as we turn information into knowledge, and then innovate with FMEA.
This is a Quality during Design Redux episode, originally "How to use FMEA for Complaint Investigation". Visit the podcast blog, here.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Are you ready to elevate your understanding of reliability during design to the next level? This episode is an absolute must-listen! I'm your host, Dianna Deeney, and I'll help you dissect the world of reliability life testing in design. We'll explore how the integration of critical reliability data into the decision-making process can revolutionize your design approach.
Ever felt confused by accelerated stress testing? You're not alone. This episode will give you an in-depth understanding of this subset of reliability life testing methods and when to use it in your design process. We'll also discuss the importance of reliability prediction methods and how to effectively test your own products. You'll learn why accelerated stress testing is crucial, how to interpret the results, and most importantly, how to apply them to influence your design decisions. So, let's get started and ensure our designs are as reliable as they are innovative.
This is a Quality during Design Redux episode, originally "Results-Driven Decisions, Faster: Accelerated Stress Testing as a Reliability Life Test". Visit the podcast blog, here.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
When you design a product, you consider the field reliability. Use environment usually comes to mind first. Do you also consider the stresses it undergoes from its creation to the end user's hands?
We talk about designing for reliability, accounting for not just the product's use but also its journey from production to the consumer. As a part of our in-depth discussion, we'll look into the role of various environments - field and production - in affecting a product's reliability.
By the end of this episode, you'll see field reliability as including the various stresses acting on a product from its inception. So, buckle up as we embark on this journey to rethink reliability during design.
Visit the podcast blog for links to other podcast episodes to take these ideas further.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
We're continuing to explore topics about reliability engineering during design.
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We have a reliability target for our system. But we're not meeting it.
To avoid this scenario, what is something we can do in early development?
When we're figuring out our concept, we can better learn about our options. We can work with Reliability Engineers to understand what we know, the risk in what we don't know, and to prioritize reliability of the modules to be able to meet the reliability of our whole system.
We talk about using reliability allocation to help us choose reliability goals for modules of our product design.
There is much more on the podcast blog: graphics, lists, and extra links. Be sure to visit it at the website!
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Dianna Deeney interviews Adam Bahret about reliability engineering during design: how product design engineers and product development leadership can incorporate reliability engineering.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Adam
Adam Bahret is the founder of Apex Ridge Consulting and a leading reliability expert who writes, speaks and coaches executive teams on reliability as a competitive edge. His reliability-culture change program has delivered millions in savings for clients while mitigating risk and forming a foundation for reliability-fueled growth and brand dominance. His clients range across multiple industry segments, including medical devices, robotics, semiconductor, aerospace, consumer, and automotive.
Adam works with technical teams to improve the design while mentoring leadership teams in adopting the processes, language, and behaviors to build a reliability culture. He also introduces key reliability metrics such as “time-to-reliability” that guide organizational thinking and build a robust reliability culture that’s the hallmark of dominant top-performing technology companies.
Adam has deep technical expertise and over 25 years of experience in product development and reliability engineering. He has an MS in Mechanical Engineering from Northeastern University, is an ASQ nationally certified reliability engineer, and an international speaker on technology, leadership, and product development. More information on Adam and Apex Ridge can be found at www.apexridge.com.
Adam and Dianna talk about:
- What "time to reliability" is, and how it can be used to measure the completeness of a project instead of other metrics, like date of prototype release.
- How naming problems helps others identify with it and provides an avenue to solve and measure results.
- The trap of not incentivizing reliability leadership metrics.
- The mindset shift needed by product design engineers to design for reliability.
- How Reliability Engineers can be an advisor, not opposition.
- Things teams can do to avoid being traumatized by FMEA.
Visit the podcast blog for additional information and links, including a list of Adam's books.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Part of Quality during Design is using reliability engineering as part of the design process.
We're warming up to the topic this week with a QDD Redux episode - pulling an episode from our archive from last year that's a good overview of some things we'll be getting more into.
Next week, I'm interviewing a Reliability Engineer as part of the series A Chat with Cross-Functional Experts. You won't want to miss it!
So, let's stretch and warm-up to Reliability during Design!
We're uncovering risks during our new product development, about our design. How do we manage risks? What options do we have?
There are at least 5 options we can take to manage risks. We talk about each, and how quality and reliability methods and techniques may help us with the next steps to be able to make decisions with our team.
Visit the podcast blog for links to episodes that explore concepts a little deeper.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
We do projects all the time. Some projects are about developing new things, and others are about improving what we have – continuous improvement.
In the quality realm, there's what they call the instant glory model. This same kind of thing can happen in product design, too.
We talk about what quality folks call an instant glory, and what to do about it in product design engineering.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links.
Support the showFREE RESOURCES
Quality during Design engineering and new product development is actionable. It's also a mindset. Subscribe for consistency, inspiration, and ideas at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
About meDianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development.
Virtual meetings are here to stay.
What does this mean when product design engineers are trying to get design inputs from the cross-functional team?
It means we need to adapt and to show that we're consistent and that we can be trusted to facilitate the meeting within time and with goals achieved.
Visit the podcast blog.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
We've been talking about how to best work with our cross-functional team at early concept development - to use quality and reliability tools in working meetings to really understand the concept space as a way to design for how the customer may experience our new concept idea.
Coming out of our talks make be questions about unknowns or misalignments. We may need to meet our customers where they're at to get clarity.
When engineers say, "I'd like to talk with a customer about this," we usually get push-back.
We need to tackle objections and remove obstacles between design engineers and their customers. For ideas, I've pulled an episode from the archive, originally published December 2021.
Listen-in to learn how we can take next steps in the concept space when visiting customers.
See the podcast blog for some more information.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Dianna Deeney interviews Sol Rosenbaum about engineering with receptivity: how an openness toward others for new impressions and different ideas can lead to a successful engineering career.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects.
About Sol
Sol Rosenbaum graduated with a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering and is currently the Owner & Managing Engineer of a small firm providing engineering support and energy analysis to commercial properties as part of the mortgage financing process. He also has a passion for mentoring younger engineers and founded The Engineering Mentor where he provides material geared towards younger engineers and helping them along in their engineering journey.
Sol and Dianna talk about:
- Differences in project work, in seeing things through from project start-to-finish or becoming an expert in one aspect of a project.
- How new technologies make things more efficient, and how an understanding of the underlying basics is needed, too.
- The importance of showing up with openness and humility.
- What types of things experienced engineers can do to help less experienced engineers.
- How less experienced engineers can approach teamwork and their important contributions.
Visit the podcast blog for a link to Sol's website of resources and his other recommendations.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
A goal without a plan is just a wish.
We take these wishes...
"I wish I had the cross functional input that I need for design inputs."
"I wish I could work with my cross functional team."
"I wish my team would accept my design idea."
...and we add a plan to make them a GOAL.
We plan for what it is we want and how we're going to get there using Quality during Design.
Join the waitlist for the Quality during Design Journey for a special offer.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
We're given information about an opportunity for a new product.
We talk about what can happen when we start solution-building just with what we're given. And we talk about an alternative start to a new engineering project.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney helps engineers work with their cross-functional team to reduce concept design time and increase product success, using quality and reliability methods. She founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by using Quality during Design engineering and product development. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
In this special episode of Quality during Design Redux, we're pulling episodes from our archive about test results analysis.
In our Season 1 - Episode 93 titled "The Fundamental Thing to Know from Statistics for Design Engineering", we talked about hypothesis testing: how it is used for lots of data analysis techniques.
The next 4 episodes of this QDD Redux are taking the next steps.
_________________________________________
When we’re looking at results (like measures of a characteristic), we need to take care not to get too hung-up on what the statistics is trying to tell us. Yes, statistical tools are a good way for us to make decisions and the results can act as proof for us. But, there’s a practical, engineering side to results, too. We need to evaluate the statistical significance along with the practical significance.
We review an example and how to document it.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and resources.
Join me for a virtual workshop on May 4
Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster. Reserve your seat today!
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
In this special episode of Quality during Design Redux, we're pulling episodes from our archive about test results analysis.
In our Season 1 - Episode 93 titled "The Fundamental Thing to Know from Statistics for Design Engineering", we talked about hypothesis testing: how it is used for lots of data analysis techniques.
The next 4 episodes of this QDD Redux are taking the next steps.
_________________________________________
When trying to fit a probability distribution to quantitative results, sometimes the normal probability doesn't fit. Minitab has a wealth of distributions to pick from. Do you just pick whichever one Minitab tells you fits the best? Maybe not. Just because the distribution fits your data doesn't mean it's a good one to use. We review my top 3 distributions for product testing and some other ones that come up but may not be appropriate to use. We'll also share what you need to think about when picking a distribution.
The podcast blog includes useful links.
Join me for a virtual workshop on May 4
Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster. Reserve your seat today!
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
In this special episode of Quality during Design Redux, we're pulling episodes from our archive about test results analysis.
In our Season 1 - Episode 93 titled "The Fundamental Thing to Know from Statistics for Design Engineering", we talked about hypothesis testing: how it is used for lots of data analysis techniques.
The next 4 episodes of this QDD Redux are taking the next steps.
_________________________________________
If we're not careful with or ignore failure modes, we can choose the wrong reliability model or statistical distribution. If our product performance is close to the required limits and/or we need a very accurate model, this could be a big problem.
We talk about the importance of failure modes and step-through a tensile-test example to explore these other topics:
- competing failure modes
- suspensions
- independent vs. dependent
- reliability block diagrams
The podcast blog includes extra useful information/links.
Join me for a virtual workshop on May 4
Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster. Reserve your seat today!
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
In this special episode of Quality during Design Redux, we're pulling episodes from our archive about test results analysis.
In our Season 1 - Episode 93 titled "The Fundamental Thing to Know from Statistics for Design Engineering", we talked about hypothesis testing: how it is used for lots of data analysis techniques.
The next 4 episodes of this QDD Redux are taking the next steps.
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In this episode we review sampling for design tests. We talk through a generic thought process for choosing a statistically relevant sample size and propose some basics that we can all learn about to better understand sampling.
Our goal is for us to be able to better talk through a sampling scenario with our quality and reliability engineering friends, and to better prepare for the information that they're going to want to know when asked, "How many do we need to test?"
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and more.
Join me for a virtual workshop on May 4
Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster. Reserve your seat today!
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
A quiz:
What statistical concept is used in these design activities?
- DOE (design of experiments)
- Sampling
- Test results analysis
- Gage R&R studies
- Test method validations
- SPC (with some rules in monitoring changes in a process)
If you answered, "Hypothesis Testing", you're right on!
Even if you’re not really into statistics, there’s still basics that we should learn and understand, especially in design engineering.
One of those basics is hypothesis testing. So much of our decisions about whether a design is good or not good (or good enough) is based on this concept. It will fundamentally change how you look at design activities – so much so, it’s a responsibility to understand it.
The podcast blog for this episode includes links to videos to introduce or refresh you on this fundamental topic.
Support the showRegister for the upcoming workshop! Click here: I want to sign up!
Workshop title: "Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster"
Seats are limited, so reserve yours today.
About me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
We all like effective and efficient working meetings.
What do we do to plan them, or how do we improve our recurring ones?
Are we prepared to do things differently? If so, we can collect information so we know what we want to improve and by how much.
We talk about best practices of meeting evaluations for those that we plan and facilitate and those recurring team meetings.
What about your meetings now? Do you think WHAT you do (its effectiveness) needs to be improved? Or HOW you do it (its efficiency) could be better? What statement would you first put on your evaluation form?
Visit the podcast blog for a list of prompts for an evaluation form.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Use Meetings to Add Productivity
Get clarity on goals with a continuum
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
How do we even begin a design for the user without getting into engineering prototypes?
Don't we need to do lots of iterations of prototypes and physical mockups to get design inputs from other people?
While these things can be useful, they're not always practical or necessary, No - we don't need to do lots of iterations of different mockups to get design inputs.
In fact, we want to explore the use space with our team before we even start engineering stuff, including the mockups. So how do we get started talking with our team about a design concept without having something to show them?
This episode describes just one way we could do it: how to get design inputs with flowcharts.
If you want more on this topic, register for the workshop! Registration Link
Workshop title: "Ideation with Flowcharts: Get Easier Buy-In on Engineering Concepts, Faster"
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
How are quality tools Legos of development?
We talk about two philosophies of brick building and our use of the family of quality tools.
We also talk about seven uses of quality tools in product development.
Visit the podcast blog for fun graphics.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Choosing Quality Tools (Mind Map vs. Flowchart vs. Spaghetti Diagram)
Quality as a Strategic Asset vs. Quality as a Control
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
What types of things might happen when we don't fully understand, explore, or address:
- the breadth of the whole concept space,
- a product's many users, and
- the voice of the customer?
We explore a public consumer complaint and upset over coffee pods. And we imagine what may have happened (or didn't happen) during design development that could have helped avoid the issues from the start.
We explore this ongoing, public story to gain some insight and maybe some lessons learned that we can apply to our own designs.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links to videos and other sites.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Remaking Risk-Based Decisions: Allowing Ourselves to Change our Minds.
Challenges Getting Team Input in Concept Development
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
Dianna Deeney and Shere Tuckey talk about Crucial Conversations® in an engineering environment: how to prepare for and have difficult conversations with peers, managers, and everyone else.
This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
About Shere
Shere is a Branch Chief in the Air Force Research Laboratory, Munitions Directorate, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. She is responsible for advocating, planning, budgeting, organizing, and directing the execution of a high-priority technology development portfolio as well as direct supervision and management of all personnel within the branch. Over the last twenty-nine years, she has managed twelve different teams across many engineering disciplines from shock physics experimentation to weapon effects modeling and simulation.
Shere has taken a special interest in leadership, mentoring, and helping teams communicate effectively. After being asked to serve as the Dean of Leadership for her organization’s workforce development program, she became certified to teach the Crucial Conversations® course as a foundational element of leadership development.
She has taught five highly rated classes to high level managers, junior employees, and everyone in between. The positive feedback received from these classes and the course’s universal applicability, has motivated Shere to share this knowledge in as many forums as possible.
Shere and Dianna talk about:
- what makes a dialogue a Crucial Conversation®
- how she discovered the Crucial Conversation® framework
- why she trains others at her work in the Crucial Conversations® model and champions its use
Shere also shares stories of success.
Visit the podcast blog for extra show notes and links to Shere's recommended videos.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
This is the wrap-up, final episode of our series - the 7th episode in our series about generating ideas with a team toward action.
Since the start of 2023, we focused on a few quality tools and methods to both generate ideas and then choose which idea to pursue.
We've talked about:
- Changing our scope to a closed world, to failures or questions, or design heuristics
- Brainstorming within a problem-solving framework
- Grouping many ideas and then further refining them
- Prioritizing many ideas by comparing them to 2 criteria or by using team voting
- Choosing an idea by using paired comparisons or a structured decision-making solution like DMRCS
- Giving individuals a process to create a full design concept
We also interviewed an expert in brainstorming and learned the importance of planning for teamwork, including choosing our team.
What have we learned through the last few weeks? Let's highlight take-aways and next steps.
Visit the podcast blog of this episode for extra notes and links!
Previous episodes in our series about generating ideas with our team toward action:
Episode 1: Ways to Gather Ideas with a Team
Episode 2: Product Design with Brainstorming, with Emily Haidemenos (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Episode 3: After the 'Storm: Group and Explore Ideas
Episode 4: After the 'Storm: Pareto Voting and Screening Methods
Episode 5: After the 'Storm: Compare and Prioritize Ideas
Episode 6: Brainstorming within Design Sprints
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We're in our 6th episode into our series about generating ideas with our team toward action. The first two episodes were all about idea generation. The 3rd through 5th episodes was about using Quality Tools to help us group, explore, prioritize, and decide on an idea.
This episode is exploring a Design Sprint, a method to develop a design concept with a team in 5 working days. We build upon what we've already covered, plus some big takeaways about brainstorming from the book, "Sprint".
- Give individuals a four-step idea-generating process
- Use iterations of voting to pick stand-out ideas
- Help the team decide what to prototype and test in the last 2 days of the sprint
Visit the podcast blog of this episode for extra information.
Previous episodes in our series about generating ideas with our team toward action:
Episode 1: Ways to Gather Ideas with a Team
Episode 2: Product Design with Brainstorming, with Emily Haidemenos (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Episode 3: After the 'Storm: Group and Explore Ideas
Episode 4: After the 'Storm: Pareto Voting and Screening Methods
Episode 5: After the 'Storm: Compare and Prioritize Ideas
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We're in our 5th episode of our series about generating ideas with our team toward action. The first two episodes were all about idea generation. The 3rd was about grouping and exploring ideas. The 4th was about screening ideas. Now, we'll look at ways to compare ideas.
We’re still considering that we're just after brainstorming, at the point where we have many ideas and no next steps.
Let's compare ideas with our team so we can move toward action. We explore these Quality Tools and how to use them after a brainstorming or other idea-generating team activity:
- paired comparison
- prioritization matrix
- DMRCS
Visit the podcast blog for extra images, links, and more.
Previous episodes in our series about generating ideas with our team toward action:
Episode 1: Ways to Gather Ideas with a Team
Episode 2: Product Design with Brainstorming, with Emily Haidemenos (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Episode 3: After the 'Storm: Group and Explore Ideas
Episode 4: After the 'Storm: Pareto Voting and Screening Methods
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We're in our 4th episode into our series about generating ideas with our team toward action. The first two episodes were all about idea generation. The 3rd was about grouping and exploring ideas.
We’re still considering that we're just after brainstorming, at the point where we have many ideas and no next steps.
Let's instead screen our ideas so we can move toward action. We explore these Quality Tools and how to use them after a brainstorming or other idea-generating team activity:
- 2x2 chart
- Systematic list reduction
- Multivoting or Pareto Voting
Visit the podcast blog for extra graphics, links, and recommendations.
Previous episodes in our series about generating ideas with our team toward action:
Episode 1: Ways to Gather Ideas with a Team
Episode 2: Product Design with Brainstorming, with Emily Haidemenos (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Episode 3: After the 'Storm: Group and Explore Ideas
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We're on our 3rd episode in our series about generating ideas with our team toward action. The previous two episodes were all about idea generation.
We’re now at the point where we have many ideas and no next steps.
Let's group and explore our ideas so we can move toward action. We explore these Quality Tools and how to use them after a brainstorming or other idea-generating team activity:
- Affinity Diagram team sorting method
- Fishbone
- Tree Diagrams
Visit the podcast blog for more links and best practices.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
This episode is part of our interview series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts". Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
Emily Haidemenos joins us to talk about brainstorming for product development. She hosted a workshop at a conference about this topic titled, "Brainstorming: The Solution to Structured Problem Solving”. We welcome her to the show to share some of her insights and stories of success.
Emily has a Master's Degree in Design and Manufacturing Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Lowell. After initially working as a Design Engineer Emily left and moved into a New Product Development Quality Engineering position. In this role, she worked with multiple cross-functional engineering teams to ensure the effectiveness of quality systems while earning her Six Sigma Black Belt certification. Now as a Chief Engineer for next generation high voltage automotive products, she aims to grow and develop a team of technically competent individuals who realize their maximum potential.
We talk about:
- Common pitfalls of brainstorming from a perspective of taking defensive action against those pitfalls.
- We go over the basic steps of brainstorming, but then circle back to the planning phase. There’s a lot we can do in the planning phases, and Emily shares specifics about planning for brainstorming so we can get the most out of it, including setting up those defenses.
- Best practices for leading a brainstorming session.
- Successes she’s had with it, and what her team thinks about it.
Visit the podcast blog for links to Emily's recommendations.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
Sometimes we need to gather with our team and come up with some ideas. Whether we’re looking for new product ideas, trying to discover possible solutions, or need to improve a service, gathering a team to come up with ideas is common.
What are some of the ways we approach this activity?
We talk about systematic and structured methods and new approaches to brainstorming.
Doing the same, old thing doesn't lead to new thinking and can leave us with stale ideas. We can try something new to keep things fresh.
Visit the podcast blog for links to other resources and related podcast episodes.
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
As engineers, we need to write reports all the time.
Are ours getting returned by reviewers frequently?
Or are we not getting any feedback and are not sure when our report is 'done'?
We explore the spirits of technical writing past, present, and future. We explore how and why they help us to write for ALL of our audiences.
Visit the podcast blog for excerpts.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
About Using Slide Decks for Technical Design Reviews
QDD Book Cast
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
What are the gifts others bring to new product development?
It takes intentional actions and acknowledgement to understand how to bring design inputs into our designs from other people.
We consider project teams like a neighborhood and how this frame of mind can help our designs.
Visit the podcast blog.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
The DFE Part of DFX (Design For Environment and eXcellence)
How to Self-Advocate for More Customer Face Time
Product Design from a Marketing Viewpoint, with Laura Krick (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
During product development, we're consistently looking for ways to learn more about the product in order to make design decisions. Some of that comes from test.
What do we do when our test results are...surprising?
We talk about some next steps I typically take when tasked with surprises: revisiting the purpose, understanding failure modes at test vs. what we expected (requirements and FMEA), finding a root cause (with the help of FMEA), and deciding what to do next.
Visit the podcast blog.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
How to Handle Competing Failure Modes
Remaking Risk-Based Decisions: Allowing Ourselves to Change our Minds.
5 Aspects of Good Reliability Goals and Requirements
The Way We Test Matters
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We have a reliability target for our system. But we're not meeting it.
To avoid this scenario, what is something we can do in early development?
When we're figuring out our concept, we can better learn about our options. We can work with Reliability Engineers to understand what we know, the risk in what we don't know, and to prioritize reliability of the modules to be able to meet the reliability of our whole system.
We talk about using reliability allocation to help us choose reliability goals for modules of our product design.
There is much more on the podcast blog: graphics, lists, and extra links. Be sure to visit it at the website!
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
New product development projects are really exciting at the start. Even though we know very little about what the final product is going to look like, we can still use a quick graphical tool to help us direct our engineering attention.
We talk about ways to use a very simple System Architecture Diagram to help us investigate what is new, different, or has been a problem in the past. We also discuss ways we can continue to iterate on it throughout development to help us communicate and make decisions.
Visit the podcast blog, here.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
5 Options to Manage Risks during Product Engineering
What do we do with FMEA early in design concept?
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.QualityDuringDesign.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
We can find Quality at the back-end of product creation, where it's used for compliance. We want to pick up some of it and move it to the front-end, where design decisions are happening. It's there that we can yield like a tool to work with our cross-functional team, to help us doing the engineering work that's important for great designs.
We explore why Quality can help us PRUNE the development process just by the nature of how it's used.
And we highlight the 3 areas that we focus on in Quality during Design: risk-based decisions, quality and reliability engineering partnership, and the user's process.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and more links.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Quality as a Strategic Asset vs. Quality as a Control
More about the PRUNE strategy:
Quality during Design Framework: PRUNE - Quality During Design
The driving forces behind Quality during Design:
First time here? - Quality During Design
Support the showAbout me Dianna Deeney founded Quality during Design through her company Deeney Enterprises, LLC. Her mission is to bridge product designers to the world's quality initiatives and quality-minded people. She teaches product development engineers how to use quality and reliability methods early in design for risk, use, and technical aspects of a product. Engineers that use quality early and iteratively improve the design and the design process, and it helps them to be recognized as star performers. Her vision is a world of products that are easy to use, dependable, and safe – possible by strategically using Quality during Design for products others love, for less. See more about her products and services at www.qualityduring design.com.
Download a free checklist about things a team should have in early development. www.qualityduringdesign.com/programs/12things
Learn more about all the resources offered through Quality during Design. www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd-members...
Where do we sometimes need to look for inspiration? Books!
We talk about 11 books in 5 different topics that are useful for different perspectives on engineering and design topics.
And I tell you what I'm most looking forward to reading next.
What book recommendations do you have for me?
Find a link to the book list on the podcast blog.
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What is engineering in the color economy?
We explore facets of sustainable economic models: Green, Blue, Yellow, and Orange.
Where do you fit in now? Where would you like to be? And how can you make design choices within each (or all!) of these color economies?
There's more on the blog for this podcast:
Want to download the 12 things checklist? Visit this link.
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What makes a great design?
It depends.
We talk about the spectrum of designs (from great to spam), the various customers engineers need to design for, and how engineers can work with their team toward defining what a great design should be.
You're invited to download a checklist: 12 things you should have before a design concept makes it to the engineering drawing board. Download Here
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We worked on a project with our team and met our goal!
Except, management isn't happy - they expected something else.
Seeing if we have alignment on goals is easy if we gather the team and stakeholders for 10 minutes and use a continuum.
There are certain categories that goals will fall within. A continuum is a way we can list those categories, get alignment, and gain an understanding of how 'big' of a project this is going to be. We get clarity on our goals.
Is it hard? Not at all. Is it eye-opening? Sometimes. It can help us move forward with a discussion to help ensure we're all successful.
Visit the podcast blog for an example.
I mentioned this previous QDD episode:
Do you have SMART ACORN objectives? - Quality During Design
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Relationships matter! And they can be difficult to understand.
We're taking relationships between variables. Does one variable affect another? Or do they just correlate? Understanding which matters to the values of our decisions.
We talk about the saying "Correlation does not imply causation", how to find a confounding variable, and ways to check that we've got the triggering cause that's going to affect our outcome.
When we're under pressure to figure something out, it's helpful to stop and remember some fundamentals.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links.
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Meetings to ADD productivity to our day? Yes!
We need our time to be productive, individually.
We also need input from our team. We can use meetings to add productivity to our day, if done right.
We break it down: hours in a day, limits of humans, and the minimum requirements of a good meeting.
Visit the podcast blog for extra information about Lean Coffee(tm).
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Product Design from a Data Professional Viewpoint, with Gabor Szabo (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Product Design from a Marketing Viewpoint, with Laura Krick (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
Quality as a Strategic Asset vs. Quality as a Control
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We have test results but realize that testing didn't go as planned.
What can we do to help prevent this scenario?
We talk about ways to partner with test engineers and test technicians and the importance of still maintaining their independence.
The podcast blog and others are available on www.qualityduringdesign.com.
Other Quality during Design podcast episodes you might like:
Design Input & Specs vs. Test & Measure Capability
Choosing a Confidence Level for Test using FMEA
The Way We Test Matters
How Many Do We Need To Test?
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I've mentioned in previous episodes that it's best to do FMEA early in the design concept phases of development.
Well, if we do FMEA early, then what can with do with it?
We explore how to study any risk analyses (system risks, FMEA, hazard analysis) to help design-out problems, set-up design inputs, and help us figure out test methods. We also talk a bit about why a team is a necessary part of risk analyses.
Visit the podcast blog for extra notes.
If you like this episode, here are other episodes with related topics:
Use FMEA to Design for In-Process Testing
Use FMEA to Choose Critical Design Features
Choosing a Confidence Level for Test using FMEA
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We can develop a severity rating scale based on us: our company, our customer, our product... And we can relate the categories that we use to the quality dimensions that matter to us.
We talk about the 7 principal quality dimensions of goods and services, the 5 principal dimensions of quality in customer service, and how we might customize our severity scale based on these dimensions.
The podcast blog of this episode includes an example severity scale that incorporates these dimensions.
Other episodes you might like:
5 Options to Manage Risks during Product Engineering
Remaking Risk-Based Decisions: Allowing Ourselves to Change our Minds.
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A force field analysis is a tool in the quality toolbox. Its typical use case is to help a team analyze a change by understanding the forces involved. We can also use it to help us solve a problem.
We can use a force field analysis to understand nuances or to get a handle on a change that involves many different people or departments.
We envision a force field analysis as a football field during a game. Listen-in and then gather your team and try it out for your next change!
Visit the podcast blog for links to related episodes.
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There is a lot of use information about a new product concept that we can develop, even if we don't have an engineering prototype. We want this information especially before we start prototyping!
We talk about what type of information we can gather and a stepwise approach to get it with our cross-functional team.
Do you want to explore a little more?
How to Self-Advocate for More Customer Face Time (and why it’s important)
Product Design from a Marketing Viewpoint, with Laura Krick (A Chat with Cross Functional Experts)
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Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is not a substitute for product test. It can be used as a supplement to design and test. There are lots of ways to use it during design: to evaluate differences in prototype options, as test inputs, and even to help with root cause analysis.
We talk about FEA and when to work with Quality Engineers and Reliability Engineers for next steps.
Visit the podcast blog for links to additional resources.
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What are 2 lessons about remote work, coming out of the pandemic? We talk about a couple of perspectives that can apply to design engineering:
- Feedback from our friends that were remote pre-pandemic
- Being intentional about gaining a frame of reference
Have you done a lessons learned about your communications, coming out of the pandemic? What are you carrying forward into the next phase of your engineering career? Leave me a comment on the podcast blog, and maybe you'll inspire others with your idea, too.
Related QDD episodes:
Gemba for Product Design Engineering
Internal Customers vs. External Customers
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We don't just rely on the numbers - we always plot the data! We review how we use plots to look past the numbers, and to be aware of common gotchas.
Visit the podcast blog to comment.
Related, previous QDD episodes:
How to Handle Competing Failure Modes - Quality During Design
Discrete Data vs. Continuous Data - Quality During Design
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Supplier control plans and design specs can go hand-in-hand in the quest for quality.
Control plans aren't just for quality professionals! Learn how partnering with suppliers for a simple control plan can benefit your design process.
Visit the podcast blog for a list of benefits.
Want to explore controls a little further? Try these other QDD episodes:
Prevention Controls vs. Detection Controls
How many controls do we need to reduce risk?
Design Specs vs. Process Control, Capability, and SPC
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Our manufacturing friends are approaching us with a problem.
They want to test the product during manufacturing. The way the product is currently designed doesn't let them do this, or not easily.
Can we make a design change so they can test?
Imagine that they're coming to us with this question before we've completed the design. Can they really see the future?
Perhaps, with strategic use of FMEA. We talk through a scenario of how to do it.
Visit this podcast blog to add a comment.
These other QDD episodes expand on some concepts:
Design Specs vs. Process Control, Capability, and SPC
Prevention Controls vs. Detection Controls
Use FMEA to Choose Critical Design Features
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We're heading into pilot production, where some initial parts might be made.
We've got to finish those design specs and engineering drawings!
- Manufacturing wants to start cutting steel for molds.
- Suppliers want to work out the specs on their end.
- QA is asking what they should inspect.
Before you pass it along, have you identified what features are critical? Does it align with managing risk? And are you communicating that effectively on your specs and drawings?
Creating design specs is an important part of engineering design. We review a way to choose critical design features, based on risk.
Check out these other podcast episodes to further explore some of these topics:
- The Way We Test Matters
- Designing Specs for QA
Visit the podcast blog for links to related episodes.
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We can get stuck when trying to discover a solution to a problem.
We talk about a Nine Windows tool and TRIZ - more thought-provoking methods that we can use to get unstuck and move on to the next step.
Visit the podcast blog for graphics and lots of helpful links.
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We can get stuck when trying to discover a solution to a problem. Sometimes it helps to expand our thinking into other avenues. We can reframe our problem within its contradictions. What is it not?
We review an Is/Is-Not Matrix: how it's built, its purpose, and how it can help us.
Visit the podcast blog for the matrix.
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We're uncovering risks during our new product development, about our design. How do we manage risks? What options do we have?
There are at least 5 options we can take to manage risks. We talk about each, and how quality and reliability methods and techniques may help us with the next steps to be able to make decisions with our team.
Visit the podcast blog for links to episodes that explore concepts a little deeper.
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As a design engineer, you’re tasked with translating vague customer statements into something technical and measurable. And you also need to identify what requirements are important: filtering the “must meet” requirements against the “should have” requirements. And, finally, you need to do this with your cross-functional team.
What if you miss something important?
It’s difficult. There is a method that we can use. Let’s talk about the House of Quality and how you can use it no matter if your company uses QFD or not.
See the podcast blog for a graphic and other references.
Link to the June 8 webinar: Webinar June 8: Adding “Technical” back into Design Reviews - Quality During Design
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If you have quality friends, you may have heard of Gemba. What is Gemba and can it help with product design?
Gemba is an ideology.
And, yes, it can help with product design!
We explore how and talk about why you might want to adopt the term "Gemba" for Product Design Engineering.
Visit the podcast blog for links and other QDD episodes that explore these ideas more.
Link to the June 8 webinar: Webinar June 8: Adding “Technical” back into Design Reviews - Quality During Design
Support the show
"A Chat with Cross Functional Experts" is a Quality during Design interview series. Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
Today we talk with Gabor Szabo. Gabor is an engineering and data professional with experience in numerous industries, including the medical device and automotive industries. In his current role a Sr. Principal Engineer of Operations Excellence, he works with various cross-functional teams on validating new processes and products, launching new products, helps them diagnose and solve technical problems. He hosts the Critical Talks podcast. He also develops software and builds data products in R.
We talk about:
- managing ongoing team information
- new product development as a "discovery mission"
- confirming that it is good to have problems
- how aligning the head and the heart can lead to success
- his ventures into the R programming language with his motivation to serve the engineering and quality communities
Visit the podcast blog for links to Jocko and Gabor's book recommendation.
Register for a live webinar on June 8, 2022 about Design Reviews! Click here to learn more.
Link to the June 8 webinar: Webinar June 8: Adding “Technical” back into Design Reviews - Quality During Design
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Reliability Engineering isn't just about assessments. It's about providing information to make decisions. How does reliability engineering affect design?
We answer all the questions from the classical Kipling Method:
- What kind of design inputs can we expect from a Reliability Engineering working relationship?
- Why is their point of view important?
- When should we get them involved in the product development cycle?
- Who can we generally look to for a reliability engineering viewpoint?
- How can we get them involved?
- Where do we find out more information?
Related QDD episodes:
5 Aspects of Good Reliability Goals and Requirements - Quality During Design
Visit the podcast blog of this episode.
Link to the June 8 webinar: Webinar June 8: Adding “Technical” back into Design Reviews - Quality During Design
Support the show
FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) is a tool we can use to help us investigate complaints from the field. The FMEA is the collective team knowledge about the risks of this product, so it’s a valuable source in our investigation about what’s going on in the field.
We talk through how to go about using FMEA for complaint investigation and what we can do with the information.
Visit the QDD Blog for additional links.
Other, related QDD posts that you may be interested in:
Getting Started with FMEA: It All Begins with a Plan
Choosing a Confidence Level for Test using FMEA
How many controls do we need to reduce risk?
Remaking Risk-Based Decisions: Allowing Ourselves to Change our Minds.
Support the show
Many presentation books and guides seem to focus on presentations that we see at conferences, for sales pitches, or for executive meetings about business topics.
They don't seem applicable to the technical design reviews that engineers host.
But they do relate.
We talk about just 3 ways that we can change how we can plan technical design reviews, using some of the principles of presentations.
Visit the podcast blog for extra links and resources.
Support the show
"A Chat with Cross Functional Experts" is a Quality during Design interview series. Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they're involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
Today we speak with Laura Krick, a VP for a global medical device manufacturer. She's involved in marketing, sales, and commercial operations for new product development.
We talk about these topics:
- Her background and what led her to her current role.
- Her roles in new product development, including her hands-on commercial operations perspective.
- Developing the user experience through data, iteration, and relationships with early adopters.
- Reasons and methods for product design engineers to get into the field.
- Ways for product design engineers to utilize the knowledge base of sales, marketing, and commercial operations reps in their cross-functional team.
- Sharing fun a risk management activity (!)
- Her recommended books and authors for engineers.
Listen to A Chat with Laura. Gain a different perspective and get actionable advice.
Visit the blog for a list of Laura's book recommendations.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) is a super-tool for a team, especially when developing concepts and requirements. Done early, iteratively, and treated as a "living" analysis helps teams throughout development and beyond.
Some people seem to either love it or hate it. I don't have a strong reaction like that, but I do think it can be a valuable option for teamwork and design - so much so that I've dedicated a few episodes to it (including this one). We touch on some of the objections to it, too.
FMEAs can have different focuses and can be built to suit the goals of the team. There are two FMEAs, in particular, that can be done in the early concept stages of development: “use” UFMEA and “systems design” DFMEA.
- What is the difference between these two FMEAs?
- How do they relate to one another?
- Should we do both of them?
- What do we do with the information?
Visit the blog post for a VENN Diagram and additional info.
Visit these other blogs to explore these topics further:
Getting Started with FMEA: It All Begins with a Plan
Choosing a Confidence Level for Test using FMEA
Remaking Risk-Based Decisions: Allowing Ourselves to Change our Minds.
Prevention Controls vs. Detection Controls
The Designer's Risk Analysis affects Business, Projects, and Suppliers
A big failure and too many causes? Try this analysis. (FTA)
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
When defining design inputs and specifications, what does a design engineer need to consider about the test and measure capability? What are the typical ways that we assess the variability that a test or measurement introduces into our result?
Visit the website for additional links and a Venn diagram. https://www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd/design-input--specs-vs-test--measure-capability
Watch this episode on YouTube.
Explore More. Get a deeper dive of these topics through these other QDD episodes:
The Way We Test Matters
Statistical vs. Practical Significance
What is ‘Production Equivalent’ and Why Does it Matter?
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Reliability engineers may suggest environmental stress tests. There are many types of tests in an RE's toolbox. We compare two types of commonly known tests that are used for design: ALT vs. HALT. What are the important distinctions between these two methods? What value do they each bring to design engineering? And how do they fit into other reliability test methods?
Visit the website for additional links, downloads, and a venn diagram. Plus, I link to another fun video. https://www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd/ALT-vs-HALT/
View the video on YouTube
Further explore these topics from these other QDD episodes:
HALT! Watch out for that weakest link.
Results-Driven Decisions, Faster: Accelerated Stress Testing as a Reliability Life Test
Environmental Stress Testing for Robust Designs
Getting Comfortable with using Reliability Results
5 Aspects of Good Reliability Goals and Requirements
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Viewing Quality as a strategic asset to new product development can help us create those products that others love, for less. We talk about some challenges with new product development, the ideal state, and how we can use quality to get there. Use quality engineering and reliability engineering to P.R.U.N.E. the development process so we can develop the best products that we can.
Visit the blog for more information and citations.
Need more help getting started? Try these episodes.
Using SIPOC to Get Started
Types of Design Analyses possible with User Process Flowcharts
Getting Started with FMEA – It All Begins with a Plan
Choosing Quality Tools (Mind Map vs. Flowchart vs. Spaghetti Diagram)
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
This fourth episode of the "QDD Versus" series focuses on concepts relating to Design for Manufacturability. Understand how design specs fit into process control, process capability, and SPC and where they typically don't fit at all.
We talk about things to think about when setting limits on design features.
And, when defining controls for potential failures, knowing how processes are controlled can help us decide if the controls we have are good enough or not.
Watch on YouTube.
Visit the blog for additional graphics.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
We talk about customers of design information. It takes many people to realize a product design into something that can be sold and used. Those people need design information to ensure that they're performing their tasks to produce a high-quality product, and to be able to use our product appropriately. We review who our customers are and what type of information they need from design engineers.
Visit the blog for additional graphics, transcripts, and videos.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Once we've decided to control something (think of our prevention and detection controls), we then need to decide how to measure it. Different controls may need different measuring requirements, which can give us discrete or continuous data. We treat these data types differently when collecting it, determining sample sizes, and analyzing it for results. Tune-in to learn more about how to take the next step in defining controls: figuring out how to measure it and considering the data.
Another QDD episode you might like:
Designing Specs for QA
New! Watch the video on YouTube
Visit this episode at https://www.qualityduringdesign.com/qdd/discrete-data-vs-continuous-data/ for additional graphics, transcripts, and links.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Not all controls are equal, and we don't have to wait for something bad to happen to start designing with them. We compare different types of controls in product development and design engineering: Prevention Controls vs. Detection Controls. We review concepts, uses for controls, risk-based controls, and how to prioritize design efforts for the right controls.
Visit the podcast blog for a Venn diagram and other links.
Get the poka-yoke mistake-proofing checklist here: Mistake-Proofing - The Poka-Yoke of Usability - Quality During Design
Another QDD podcast episode you might like: How many controls do we need to reduce risk?
NEW! Watch the video on YouTube.
Visit www.qualityduringdesign.com for more topics.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Your team is faced with a complex decision. Maybe it's complex because you have a lot of options or maybe it's complex because it's technically challenging and requires some testing. You may want to consider a structured approach: DMRCS.
Define
Measure
Reduce
Combine
Select
Learn more about this approach by statisticians Dr. Anderson-Cook and Dr. Lu.
Check the podcast blog for their articles and examples.
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We’ve identified safety concerns about our product design. How concerned do we need to be about quality while we’re determining root causes? There is an intersection of quality, reliability, and safety. We talk about how they fit together.
Visit the podcast blog at QualityDuringDesign.com for a graphic that shows how they fit together.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
We’re at the concept phases of our product design, trying to get our heads around the high-level steps that our users are going to take to use our product. We have an idea that we’ll have many different user groups interacting with our product, but we’re not so clear about the big picture – who is doing what, when and who needs what afterwards. To put it all together, we can help ourselves with a common quality tool: a SIPOC diagram.
SIPOC is an acronym for Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, Customers
We talk about when to use it and what steps to take to complete one (hint: we don't usually fill it in from left-to-right).
Visit the podcast blog at QualityDuringDesign.com for a completed example.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
There's a model that can help us visualize and consider the different barriers to harm: The Swiss Cheese Model of Accident Causation.
Learn what makes up this model and how ideas are represented. There are also different ways that the model is being used today.
How can we design for controls, policies, or actions that are part of the use of our product but outside of our control? We step through an example of a situation where we're thinking about our product design in this way.
Visit the podcast blog at qualityduringdesign.com for graphics, extra links, and a fun video.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
There is a rather large family of test methods associated with Qualitative Accelerated Tests. They're also known as RETs (or Reliability Enhancement Tests).
Today, we’re focused on the models that are used to help us with the design. Awareness about these methods will help us with future test plans and project management. We talk about environmental stress testing and remind ourselves a little about HALT.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript.
If you'd like to explore some of today's topics more, then I recommend these other QDD podcasts.
Episode 6: HALT! Watch out for that weakest link.
Episode 36: When to use DOE (Design of Experiments)
Episode 37: Results-Driven Decisions, Faster: Accelerated Stress Testing as a Reliability Life Test
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
We’re developing requirements for our product, including setting reliability requirements. Or we’re setting acceptance criteria for our test plans.
What confidence levels do we choose? We don’t have to blindly set them - we can base it off the risks of failure, using our FMEA (failure mode effects analysis). FMEA is a great tool for us to refer to, to help us choose a relevant confidence level by basing our decision on one or more metrics that the FMEA can provide.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
We’re starting to populate an FMEA table with our team. We get it started, but then we get stuck in disagreements. Or we think we finish it and then we don’t know what to do with it.
We can avoid these headaches with a little planning (or maybe a lot of planning - it depends on the project). We talk about risk management planning as it relates to FMEA.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
It's almost a new calendar year!
We look back at the most popular episodes, my favorite episodes, recommendations for conferences, and a look ahead at what 2022 will bring to Quality during Design.
Subscribe for a weekly newsletter and to keep up to date with the new offerings in 2022.
Let me know what you like by filling out this brief survey - it will help me to develop the type of content that's just for you!
Thank you for listening in 2021, and I look forward to working with you more in 2022.
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We talk about the 8D methodology, describe situations where we could benefit from it, list each of the 8 Disciplines, and compare it to PDSA and DMAIC.
Check the podcast blog for the stopwatch graphic from Chris S.P. Visser, download a summary sheet, my book recommendation, and a link to 8D forms.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
How do we go about mistake-proofing our product design? There are steps we can take and a checklist we can use, based on a well-known manufacturing production method: poka-yoke.
Download the guidelines and checklist, and then follow-along with the podcast.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
We want to engage a reliability engineer in an analysis for our product design. They can help us produce some great information from which we can make decisions. You might be feeling uncomfortable about our team making a design decision based on those results. You don’t quite understand how the reliability engineer came up with the answer. You want to know where that information comes from so you can gauge the level of project risk of our decision.
We peel-back the curtain on reliability engineering methods. We explore reliability engineering's roots and development, from the 1950's through today, to better understand the results of an analysis. Having a general understanding of reliability methods can help us get comfortable with using the results.
Visit the podcast blog for a couple of standards-based references, a recommended reference of an example of Physics of Failure, and the other, related podcasts.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
There are many stories of design successes attributed to the right level of understanding of the customer. Product designers make decisions, daily, about how a product is going to look and perform. So, we need to really understand the customer. And, to really get the customer, engineers need to spend time with them.
Sometimes, the business doesn’t want us to interact with the customer or doesn’t think it would be valuable. Objections include that we're not prepared for the user's environment, that we're too blunt or honest, or that we just overgeneralize what we learn, anyway. Or, there's a reluctance because of costs. Besides seeing these objections first hand, someone also listed them out in a published book! This shows that this is common across industries.
Is that fair to design engineers? No matter if it’s fair or not. We can prepare ourselves to address those objections. We talk about how we can prepare ourselves to self-advocate for more customer face time.
Visit the podcast blog.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Within our quality toolbox, there are a lot of graphical organizers. Some are better at fulfilling different goals than others. If we have a goal in mind, then we may choose a certain tool. However, we don’t want analysis paralysis about which tool is best to stop us from using any tool at all.
I share my 3 general guidelines about choosing a graphical quality tool, how to draw them, and when to use them.
Plus, we talk about 3 tools in particular, prompted by a social media ask: mind map, process flowchart, and spaghetti diagram. We get into what they are, when we're most likely to use them, and how they can be used for design.
Visit the podcast blog for links to suggested resources and videos.
If you’d like to get more into process flow charting, then there are two previous Quality During Design episodes I recommend:
Episode 29 “Types of Design Analyses possible with User Process Flowcharts” talks about a lot of various analyses we can do with a process flow chart, like identifying important tasks, making the process more efficient, and performing a costs analysis.
Episode 2 “My product works. Why don't they want it?” talks about a process flow chart for the user’s process and the appropriate level of detail we may need to identify the true customer needs and requirements for our design.
Support the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/DiannaD)
Design for Excellence (DFX) is a concept that includes many initiatives, like design for usability, design for manufacturability and assembly, and design for environment and disassembly. It’s a focus on doing things right, exceeding customer expectations, optimizing what’s needed while minimizing costs, and continuous improvement.
Today we take a deep dive on one of those aspects: design for environment (DFE), including design for disassembly. What are reasons that a business would consider this important, and how does a design engineer fit in?
Visit the podcast blog for links to additional reading.
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This episode talks about options for reliability life testing, specifically accelerated stress testing. We explore how accelerated stress testing is one subset of other reliability life testing, when it's a good idea, how we can approach doing it, and what we can do with the results.
Visit the podcast blog for links and references.
Related episodes:
Episode 6 “HALT! Watch out for that weakest link”
Episode 10 “How to Handle Competing Failure Modes”
Episode 30 “Using Failure Rate Functions to Drive Early Design Decisions”
Episode 31 “5 Aspects of Good Reliability Goals and Requirements”
Episode 36 “When to use DOE (Design of Experiments)”
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What is design of experiments, or DOE? What do we use it for and what is it all about? We talk about when we might want to use it during the design cycle, and we do this without getting into all of the how-to and mathematical equations.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript.
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We’ve collected all sorts of preliminary information about our users that we’re using for a new product design. We may be faced with so much data we’re not sure where to turn first, or what design feature is a priority. There’s a simple, 2-way matrix we can use to help us sort it all out: an urgent/important matrix. We may have used it to prioritize tasks for ourselves or as a management strategy for our team. But, we can also use it to evaluate the tasks our users take when using our product.
We talk more about this matrix in the podcast, and we talk through an example of how to use it to evaluate user tasks.
Visit the podcast blog for urgent/important matrix examples, including the example we stepped through.
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When we’re looking at results (like measures of a characteristic), we need to take care not to get too hung-up on what the statistics is trying to tell us. Yes, statistical tools are a good way for us to make decisions and the results can act as proof for us. But, there’s a practical, engineering side to results, too. We need to evaluate the statistical significance along with the practical significance.
We review an example and how to document it.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and resources.
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In this episode we review sampling for design tests. We talk through a generic thought process for choosing a statistically relevant sample size and propose some basics that we can all learn about to better understand sampling.
Our goal is for us to be able to better talk through a sampling scenario with our quality and reliability engineering friends, and to better prepare for the information that they're going to want to know when asked, "How many do we need to test?"
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and more.
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It costs our customers to own our designed products. It costs them initially to purchase it, but it also costs them to use it, maintain it, repair it, and eventually dispose of it. And it costs our company in ways too, like processing, training requirements for customers, and warranty repair costs.
Life cycle costing can help our team choose between design alternatives, like alternate design options, features, manufacturing methods or suppliers. This type of analysis is a big topic in certain sectors of design like civil, transportation, construction, and capital equipment. But, we can use it for our smaller product designs, too, to compare our design choices - where it makes sense.
Visit the podcast blog at www.QualityDuringDesign.com for equations, an example life cycle cost analysis, and a recommended book.
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Good reliability requirements are going to drive our design decisions relating to the concept, the components, the materials, and other stuff. So, the moment to start defining reliability requirements is early in the design process. But, what makes a well-defined reliability requirement? There are five aspects it should cover: do you know what they are?
We'll describe what makes a good reliability requirement and examples of common (but not good) requirements.
Visit the podcast blog for links to reliability engineering articles and sites about "No MTBF".
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We have good requirements for the reliability of our design. We also have a preliminary design with ideas of how we're going to manufacture it. Is our design idea good enough? Are there things we should do to improve its performance and reliability?
For a physical product, there are three general stages in its life cycle. In many cases the failure rates of physical products can be represented by a reliability bathtub curve. This curve is really a plot of a hazard rate function, also known as a failure rate function. We talk about data collection in the early design phase, what types of failures are typical for each phase, and design decisions we may make to improve our reliability, based on the failure rate function we plot for our system.
Visit the podcast blog for graphics and transcripts.
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Flowcharting isn't just useful for manufacturing processes. We can use them in lots of ways to help us with design of products and to identify quality characteristics. After all, products are used by people, and the way in which they use them is a process.
- compare ideal vs. actual flowcharts
- identify where there is disagreement about correct sequence or steps
- identify common mistakes/problems at each step to mistake-proof the process and design
- analyze cycle time, look for holds or delays, find the critical path
We also talk about specific flowchart analyses and how they can be used to analyze the User Process for Design.
- Cost-of-Poor-Quality
- Critical-to-Quality
- Value-Added Analysis
- Deployment Flowchart
Visit the podcast blog for a graphic of common symbols of flowcharts.
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Genichi Taguchi related his measure of quality (variation from the target spec) with economics, called the Taguchi Loss Function. It’s used to calculate the cost (in money) of a certain deviation from a target value. It assumes that the farther our quality characteristic is from our target value, the more costly it is to us.
We talk about how we can use the Taguchi Loss Functions as a way for us to set tolerances for our designs. Visit the podcast blog to get an interactive tool and the equations.
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When we've identified a risk to our design or user process - and that risk can pose a potential harm - how many controls do we need to add?
We discuss prevention vs. detection controls, ALARP, as low as possible, and some scenarios where we could (and maybe couldn't) justify a risk as acceptable without adding additional controls.
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How we describe and approach the issues we need to solve can affect how we react to them. We know we’re supposed to be solving for root causes. But are we, instead, really just addressing symptoms? Are we celebrating the quick fix and then moving on without addressing the root of our issue?
Recognize the common mishaps of us solving symptoms instead of really getting to the causes. And, clearly describe our problem in two parts (statement and description of facts) to be confident that we’re moving toward solving the causes.
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Objectives are goalposts of what it is we’re trying to accomplish. Though they’re only a part of planning a project, if we don’t have well-defined and clear objectives, it could lead to us not having the stellar project results we want. Our objective should be a SMART ACORN. We review these two, complementing acronyms as ways to check that we're setting up our project for success.
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Standards are everywhere, and lots of organizations are sourcing and creating them. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission held a workshop 2019 that recently made the news, again, in July 2021. It was called “Nixing the Fix: a Workshop on Repair Restrictions”. Here’s what it's about: manufacturers are not creating products with standard parts, or their design is created so its difficult for consumers to repair.
Are standards part of the answer? How can we proactively use them them for design? Why should we?
See the transcript and a link to the FTC workshop at the podcast blog.
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Before we can link customer needs to design, production, and service of our products, we need to listen to and understand the voice of the customer. We review 6 common VOC collection strategies, and talk about their pros and cons. We also discuss an affinity diagram process, which may help our team organize all of the data to get to customer needs.
Visit the podcast blog for a transcript and extra links and citations.
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We can look at test methods like a product in and of itself. Because tests also have requirements and need to produce usable results, we validate against those requirements. Validating our test method also ensures that they are precise and accurate.
We talk about things to consider when looking at product tests: tying test methods to the product's use environment, standards, and cumulative effects of testing.
See the podcast blog for some extra links and articles.
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Creating specs for suppliers and producers is generally at the forefront of our thoughts about the activity. But, it's also important to design for our QA friends, too, for inspection.
We talk about what acceptance sampling is all about. We also step through a thought process for identifying and creating design features for inspection using FMEA.
See the transcript at the podcast blog.
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When designs fail we can take on damaging mindsets while we're deciding our next steps, and this can lead us to bad decisions. We explore this and give some examples of pitfalls. We also talk about what to do within the design-realm to prepare for and combat those mindsets. Finally, I share my mantra when designing activities get tough with failures.
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In the quality world, kaizen is a tool for continuous improvement under the umbrella of a Lean philosophy. The quality-tool kaizen is just one layer of a larger, overarching idea that we benefit from small, incremental improvements made consistently.
Kaizen as a tool involves all employees of the company toward continuous improvement. The way kaizen events are done helps to promote the continuous improvement philosophy throughout the business through its effect on culture, time, proof, and teamwork. We talk more about how this all fits together in the podcast.
The podcast blog includes more information about books, articles, and links to videos and other websites.
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A Fishbone Diagram is named for its looks because it resembles the bones of a fish drawn on paper. Its less creative names are Cause-and-Effect Diagram and Ishikawa Diagram. It's popularly known to help with root cause analysis. But, we can also use it to help with goals and to evaluate a potential solution.
Why is it a Supertool? Just creating its headings helps us to better define our question. Writing it out as a graphical organizer helps organize jumbled thoughts. And, when paired with a 5W2H approach and the 5-whys, it can help us dig to the root causes.
Listen to hear more about Fishbones.
Visit the podcast blog for Fishbone Diagram examples, transcripts, and other links.
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We're in the middle of our design process and we're getting some of the first parts in hand, either from prototyping or benchtops, or our manufacturing cell. Let's test them and finish our verification testing! Maybe we shouldn’t.
We talk about the concept of production equivalent: what it means and when it's important to consider.
For a transcript and extra links, see the podcast blog.
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"A picture is worth a thousand words" is an old saying, and it holds true! Visual standards, visual aids, and quality standards are a great tool, especially in design when communicating the limits of acceptability. This episode explores areas to capture this type of information and how it can be used not just for Quality Assurance and Production, but also for FMEA, root cause analysis, and future field defect investigations (to name a few).
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The likeness of the Pareto Principle can be compared to Murphy's Law and the Peter Principle: it's a curious phenomenon. So, how did it make its way into quality? If using it to make decisions, there are some common pitfalls which can lead to delays in fixing a problem or even misdirect our efforts. So, what is it, and how can we use it for design?
Get to know the Pareto Chart. If it's built and applied properly, it can help us prioritize: root cause analysis, new design features based on user input, or to help us tackle a problem that just seems too big to even start (just to name a few examples).
We review the Pareto Principle, what a Pareto Chart is, what we need to consider when building one, and how we need to be careful when interpreting its results.
Get extra graphics, links, and articles at this podcast blog, at www.qualityduringdesign.com.
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Part of being an effective team member is knowing what the other teammates are responsible for doing. It's important because we need to know who to ask or interface with at certain points in our design process. This episode introduces (or reintroduces) some of our quality friends in design: Quality Engineer, Reliability Engineer, Supplier Quality, Calibration Technician, Quality Technician, and Quality Inspector.
The podcast blog discusses more about cross-functional teams.
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When trying to fit a probability distribution to quantitative results, sometimes the normal probability doesn't fit. Minitab has a wealth of distributions to pick from. Do you just pick whichever one Minitab tells you fits the best? Maybe not. Just because the distribution fits your data doesn't mean it's a good one to use. We review my top 3 distributions for product testing and some other ones that come up but may not be appropriate to use. We'll also share what you need to think about when picking a distribution.
The podcast blog includes useful links.
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You may have heard of QMS (Quality Management Systems) but are not sure how your activities fit in. Or, you’ve heard of QFD, ISO 9000, Six Sigma, Lean...these cryptic names that you’re not sure what they’re about. You may be doing activities under one of your company’s procedures and asking, “Why am I spending time on this?" Sometimes it’s good to re-orient to the big picture. That’s what we’ll be doing in this episode: reorienting to the QMS.
We'll also talk about some of the standard Quality Management System philosophies:
- TQM (Total Quality Management)
- ISO 9000
- QFD (Quality Function Deployment)
- Six Sigma
- Lean
- Malcom Baldrige National Quality Award
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Because of your role as a designer in product development, you have great input into the planning for what field (or real-use) data should be monitored for your product. We talk about this as post market surveillance, which is a typical term used for medical devices. This episode talks about how the post market surveillance engine follows the PDSA (plan-do-study-act) continuous improvement cycle, some expectations of post market surveillance systems, and what inputs designers have in its planning.
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If we're not careful with or ignore failure modes, we can choose the wrong reliability model or statistical distribution. If our product performance is close to the required limits and/or we need a very accurate model, this could be a big problem.
We talk about the importance of failure modes and step-through a tensile-test example to explore these other topics:
- competing failure modes
- suspensions
- independent vs. dependent
- reliability block diagrams
The podcast blog includes extra useful information/links.
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A danger of using slide decks for technical design reviews is loss of important technical information. In order to summarize something in a slide or slide deck, the presenter thins-out information without its raw data and divorces it from the plots, graphs, and other technical analyses.
Slide decks are useful to the presenter to pull together a meeting. Slide decks are terrible for the reviewers who need to review technical information and make decisions from it.
In this episode, I review some alternatives.
The podcast blog includes extra information, links, and citations.
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Recent news highlights an accident involving a product with tragic results. This podcast explores this as cautionary tale and example outside of our own design house. The goal is to shift our perspectives to let us gain a better understanding of risk-based decisions. We also talk about allowing ourselves room to change our minds about risk acceptability when we learn new information, both during the design process and from the field.
The podcast blog includes extra links and updates.
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When we're trying to innovate, we can get trapped into the old thinking that the solution has to be out there somewhere. We need to think outside the box to find the solution to a problem.
We should stop brainstorming and, instead, think inside the box with Systematic Inventive Thinking. We use systematic approaches to do lots of things, and being innovative can be one of them, too.
This podcast blog talks about the shortcomings of group brainstorming sessions and a different approach to innovation.
The podcast blog includes works cited and extra information.
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HALT (Highly Accelerated Life Test) uses the weakest link mentality. We apply stresses beyond what our designs would normally see in the environment to make something fail. It's meant to be an iterative test program where you are testing, analyzing the results, determining the root cause, fixing the design, and then testing it, again.
This podcast reveals more about its roots, why you should perform HALT (or not), when in the design process it's best (hint: really early), and who likely needs to be involved. Also understand how HALT is different from ALT.
The podcast blog includes extra information and links.
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It takes a village to produce a design from concept to realization. Everyone along the way seems to think of risk a little bit differently. Designers are both directly and indirectly involved with all these risk management methods, but it's important to understand who is looking at what type of information. Why? Because of communication. One group might think that risk management is covered in the way they're thinking it should be, when in actuality it's not.
This podcast will review risk management of other functional groups and how a designer's risk affects them.
- Business/Marketing risk management
- Project Manager risk management
- Supplier Management
As a designer you have an important job and a unique perspective to analyze risk of your design and a responsibility to communicate it so everyone can help reduce risks.The podcast blog includes a link to an infographic.
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You have identified a potential failure in your design. It's a complicated failure that has multiple potential root causes, and some that are conditional. Is there a tool that can capture it all and help prioritize your reactions to get rid of this problem? Yes, there is: Fault Tree Analysis!
Learn what it is and how it can help you get a handle on that big failure.
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You're nearing the end of your project, getting cross-functional approval on your design, when your QE or RE friend comes running with a big, red STOP button!
Let's avoid that! Quality and Reliability are INPUTS into the design process, much earlier than by the time we have a prototype in-hand (even at the black-box, input-output phase). Getting the QEs and REs involved early will help your design be a success with suppliers, manufacturers, and your cross-functional team.
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Have you ever designed a product that works but that customers just don’t want to use? This podcast will review some tools and strategies to help prevent that from happening before product launch, or to help as a starting point when you plan for your version 2.0.
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You have a design you want to make better. Or you're working within a designing framework that you think needs to be updated. Quality folks use and promote some standard problem solving and continuous improvement methods, and you’ll want to to get started with the right one, or reference the right acronym when getting buy-in for your project. You may have heard of PDCA, PDSA, and DMAIC. You vaguely know they’re improvement, but don’t really know what their differences are. When should you use which one, and for what? This installment demystifies the titles and explores their development history so you can get started with the right model. Know who in Quality can help you get started within your organization.
The podcast blog includes extra information and citations.
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