Waste in design management operations from the viewpoint of project needs

Abstract

Waste in all project processes is hindering productivity and project’s financial goals. Successful design management operations ensure error-free design documentation just in time so that production may start when scheduled with confidence for design quality. However, traditional design management processes aim to remove waste on individual design processes, thus neglecting to view the process as a whole. This research answers the question: How the project participants perceive waste in design management operations, and in which ways the waste could be eliminated? Following a design science research approach, methods applied in this research consist of a single-case study and semi-structured interviews with the project’s design-related organization as well as orientation to previous research related to waste in design management process. Several factors related to waste in design management process are identified, and potential countermeasures are proposed. A conceptual, holistically optimized design management process is presented to remove waste to support project teams’ struggle in reaching shared goals. The key aspects are a shared technical design process in combination with decentralized team-based processes, emphasizing designer’s resilience and ability to solve uncertain events by themselves. The flow between these two perspectives is acquired by a social collaboration that is initiated through trust.