case study 1
the first diamond: exploring and understanding
the issue
The prevailing culture in engineering firms is pragmatic: the engineering problem-solving style is to start from the third diamond, from known solutions, which are then adapted through trial and error, or prototyping, until a new solution is found - sometimes without having a complete picture of what the issue is.
We raised awareness of the importance of working through the 3 stages of the process, increasing their ability to explore the issue thoroughly and generate a wider variety of possible and more innovative solutions.
Below are some examples of the wide range of issues we have worked on with two multinational engineering firms in the aerospace and defence sectors:
- "How to implement a system developed in the UK subsidiary of a French multinational across national and organisational cultural barriers in the other national subsidiaries."
- "How to transform the existing Sales & Customer Support function into a Strategic Business Unit"
- "How to increase the yield on a non-automated batch manufacturing process"
- "How to identify competencies in the electronics design, manufacturing and R&D areas to:
- 1) "enable them to work concurrently on realising new technologies and
- 2) "allow the company to move away from outsourcing and towards increased in-house manufacturing of electronic components and systems."
