Capturing, storing and retrieving design knowledge in a distributed environment

Summary form only given. The industrial world is changing rapidly and engineering organisations must adapt to remain competitive. Some of the pressures faced by these organisations include: (1) the increasing commercial competition that demands continual improvements in quality, shorter lead times and reduced costs; (2) the increasing complexity of both products and processes; (3) the problems of retaining and retrieving knowledge and experience; and (4) the trend towards globalisation with increasingly distributed design and manufacturing teams. In order to progress their designs, designers need to acquire the appropriate knowledge. Research has shown that up to a quarter of the working day can be spent by designers on knowledge acquisition. Providing effective computer-based information retrieval systems is therefore a key factor in contributing to the future commercial success of an engineering organisation. Traditionally design knowledge and experience have been retained in the heads of individuals. It is known that in the majority of cases when seeking information designers prefer to ask a colleague rather than search through a document or a database. It is also known that designers frequently do not know what information they are looking for and need to discover it, that is, they do not know what questions to ask. Because industrial organisations are becoming more transient and distributed, and workforces more mobile, the opportunities to talk to experts, particularly face to face, are diminishing. For some time many companies have been experiencing a significant loss of knowledge and experience due to ´knowledge carriers´ moving to another company or retiring. Therefore a key question is: How is design knowledge to be acquired when it may not be possible to consult colleagues? The presentation will discuss issues surrounding this question, including the capture, storage and retrieval of design information. It will draw extensively on a series of empirical studies that have been undertaken in the aerospace industry during the past 15 years.