CAD Dept. Management Challenge!! (Productivity)

[cadtag]

In the real world (that's not meant to sound dismissive), IME, an estimator provides a figure for man-hours. If the figure is exceeded, it's the drafters' fault no matter how unrealistic the figure might be. :shrug: It's part of the job.
Anyway, getting back to the subject - the historical approach is the only one and now is a good time to start recording history OR employ someone in the estimating job who already knows how the job is done - one of your drafters, perhaps.

Yes, that's generally the case no matter what part of the business you're in. On the flip side though, all problems in business are management problems. [Either because management causes them, of management is supposed to fix them ]

Hans - looking at other companies for benchmarking data might be interesting, but you'll always end up comparing bananas to bricks. There are just going to be too many differences, in everything from company culture to work flows to business processes. Your only real source of pertinent data is your own organization, and the historical data you can mine from the past several decades of financial records. I'm not saying it's easy, but you've got the title and get the bucks, and this is part of the job.

However -- an old mentor once claimed that there are three important factors in the engineering biz -- People, Process, and Technology. And in that order! If you've got the wrong people, or have succeeded in demotivating the right people so they no longer care about organizational success, you're hosed.

After that, it's the business processes, workflow, and even the organizational culture. From the little bit you've mentioned, that sounds to be seriously borked. It definitely appears that there is an "Us vs Them" attitude between management and staff, which is a fatal disease invariably caused by management attitudes. If your staff are 'soldiering', then it's because of poor relations between the workers and the bosses. If the workers are disengaged, you need to get them engaged. Not just give them "Thou Shalt or Else".

I'll skip technology, because that's so far down the pike here it's unimportant. Start by doing the research into historical data, and use that to understand where you ought to be. Then think about how to get your people on board with company success. As an example: How much trainging are yiou offering to your cad folk? What's their career path in the organization? Are you providing decent hardware/software for them to do their job? Do they feel like they matter to the company, or do they believe they are marginalized and not respected?

Then look at the company management -- probably will really need an outsider to come in and really lay out the management and communication problems, although that's apt to be a hard sell.

Good luck

Renderman: of course you've got project estimators, although they may not be called that. They are the people putting proposals together, and the project managers running the job after it's won. Whether they actually have a database of historical data to look at, damifino -- they may just be doing their manhour predictions from years of experience.

[jaberwok]

It definitely appears that there is an "Us vs Them" attitude between management and staff, which is a fatal disease invariably caused by management attitudes.

At last! Someone who agrees with me. I've long maintained that the "Us v Them" attitude works down from the boardroom, not up from the shopfloor.

[BlackBox]

Cadtag - You made several solid points in your last post.

Renderman: of course you've got project estimators, although they may not be called that. They are the people putting proposals together, and the project managers running the job after it's won. Whether they actually have a database of historical data to look at, damifino -- they may just be doing their manhour predictions from years of experience.

I think we're approaching semantics over whether one performs a given task, as compared to what one's role actually is. By your loose definition I too am an estimator; which is not my defined role.

While every role has multiple facets, there does exist a clear distinction between performing a task periodically, and being responsible for said task daily.

The fact is that the person responsible for divvying out the man-hour estimation in my small pond is not a full-time estimator - Period.

[dgorsman]

This is where one of our metrics comes in to play - trend reports. Whenever somebody wants to make a major change to a project, they submit a trend report containing whats getting changed, what the importance level is, what impact it will have on the schedule, who is requesting the change, supporting documentation, and so on. Trends get reviewed by managers and/or the client who approve or reject the changes, based on consulting the client, experience, and just plain talking with the design group. This way if the schedule starts expanding, issue dates slip, etc. there is a paper trail of where the extra time is going and agreements of whats been changed. If there is no reason for missing scheduled issue dates then those responsible aren't qualified and get re-assigned to something more suited to their level of ability - which sometimes means being shown the door. After particularly bad projects there is also a post-mortem to find out why and how it went wrong.

[karalon10]

I haven't read all of the responses on here, so forgive me if I repeat anything already said.

To address the most recent points, I personally can attest to my frustration over these issues during my own career history. I am referring to the project timeline part mostly.

In my experience, and I have been doing this job now for more than 12 years. Currently, I am at the point where I've had enough of it. There is a culture in this industry (at least in my country) where the drafters are not only often required to do overtime, but it is an expectation. Now I wouldn't have all that much problem with overtime, except it's not ever paid for, or compensated. Several companies I have worked for have a "no time in lieu, no overtime pay" policy. In fact one company I worked for, the project manager promised me time in lieu to finish off a project to meet issue deadlines. Myself and another drafter came in, worked 8 hours saturday and sunday, and I then followed that up with a 12 hour monday. I was thinking sweet, almost 3 days off I can take a long weekend and catch up with my girlfriend, but on the tuesday myself and other drafter were taken aside and told that the company had a "no time in lieu or overtime" policy. That's great, thanks for promising something then taking it away after we've done the work for you. How this is different to stealing I'm not sure. Needless to say, this resulted in both of us quitting that work not long after.

My point really is, that its very hard to stomach the fact that my life, my time, and my effort are EXPECTED to be given for free to fulfill the unrealistic promises that someone else made without even consulting the person involved on how long they estimate tasks should take. Essentially they are writing cheques that I have to fund. Not only does this cause resentment, there is absolutely no or very low motivation from day to day pretty much caused by over working, burnout is probably the best way to put it. Drafters are treated, in general, as something you can just use up, burn out, and replace.

Without going on too much with sour grapes, I am hoping you've got the idea that this builds resentment in your workforce. Compensate your staff for overtimes, time in lieu at the very minimum. Keep them VERY aware of timelines and consult them regularly regarding the timelines, and furthermore take their advice when they tell you something wont be done in time, or is unrealistic. Meaning allocate more resources, dont just expect someone to stay all weekend to pick up the slack. If they can't hit a deadline it doesnt mean they arent working hard, maybe it means unrealistic timelines have been set.

In a carrot on a stick reference, the carrot is much more effective when used as an incentive rather than the stick being used to beat, and the carrot inserted in the other end. I can tell you right now the whip is not a good motivational tool, so the timelines/overtimes issue is way more important than you might think.

[duhvinci]

Hello Hans,

You've touched upon a subject that is very important to me. But first let me comment on something you said in your post. The general gist of it was that you are creating a 3d model from your 2d design. It is my opinion that this approach is exactly backwards from a more efficient approach of creating the 2d details (or layouts, etc) from the 3d model. How did I form this opinion? Hopefully It will become evident.

So, to your main theme, you are interested in determining a method whereby you can estimate more accurately the amount of time it takes to produce a drawing (or design, or project).

First and foremost, do you know accurately how much time it had previously taken to produce a particular drawing? You must establish a benchmark, and really a very gross estimate isn't good enough.

Next, do you know how long it takes you to produce a particular type of drawing? Do you know how long it takes Hans Johnson. to produce a similar drawing? Do you know if your efficiency is greater or less than his? Are the drawings in question worked on by both you and him? Is one producer 's final drawing a higher quality than the other and conforms to the standards in place?

If you do not know the answers to these (and many more) question then you need to put into place the means to begin answering them. You need to begin monitoring, logging and examining the logs. You might want to start by trying my CadTempo software http://www.cadtempo.com for a 30 day trial.

Ok, how did I form my opinion about going from 3d to 2d? hopefully my departure from your question will help answer some of your other questions.

I started my business 20 years ago. Prior to that I had been doing the same type of work on the drawing board and had kept meticulous records of my time involvement. I do machine design and each machine will have a number of compontents whether they are designed, detailed, and manufactured or are commercially available. By knowing the component count I could determine how long an average machine of xxx component type took to design or "layout", then detail, then check.

During start up I decided to do all my work in AutoCAD because it was highly customizable and also offered AutoLISP as a programming language. I discovered that AutoCAD's TIME command was essentially useless. When you save one drawing into another name the time would carry along. Also if you left a drawing open the timer would just keep ticking along. Not a very good way of determining how much time it took to produce a drawing. So the first order was to create a lisp program that would track my time more accurately.

I learned it took longer to produce a design than manually drafting did, much of it having to do with the learning curve. After some menu tweaking, some custom lisps etc the time came down to a little less than board drafting. I knew I could get it down further so I set a goal for myself and began determining what needed to be done. Looking at my logs I could determine if things appeared out of the ordinary from my previous experience. And it occurred to me. Why am I drafting most everything six times??? Yep, that's right six times - during layout: front, top, side...during detail: front top side. Why not draw it once in 3d then extract the drawings and views as needed.

Any long term AutoCAD user knows that the earlier releases of AutoCAD did not lend themselves to convenient 3d work so I had to create some 3d lisp routines and menus and macros to speed things up. It worked! My design and detail time started improving dramatically, I'll not bore you with details but I continued to improve my methods and techniques and a lot of different things. Every change resulted in moving my time up (bad, so let's not do that) or down (good, ok maybe I can do that even better).

It is not a task to be taken lightly, it takes persistence and determination to arrive at your goal but it starts out by benchmarking.

[duhvinci]

Well after reading the whole thread I see that you already "get it" about benchmarking so sorry for my emphasis about that. Is your management on board with things?

It looks like you've got some problem employees. Are they identified and are good employees identified and properly valued? I'm not a big proponent for punitive actions for bad behavour but something that may be much worse than that is rewarding a slacker that is really good at masking his slacking with management. His coworkers know who he is (or they) and it can be very demoralizing. A really good slacker will not only get his unjust award but they will prey upon a more timid individual that will do all the work but never be recognized for their effort.

One aspect of the program I mentioned earlier is it will very precisely measure who is doing the work and how efficiently it is being done. Along with the benchmarking it can serve as an equatable way of distributing incentive and goal setting.

[Liamnacuac]

Wow, good topic for CAD Management forum! If you get the Okie dokey from your boss, you may want to take your problem CAD Monkeys aside for a one to one conference, and show them that their projects are either losing money by cost overruns on the design side, or losing money by making the more expensive 3D converter spend more money because they are rushing their work, and undoubtedly making errors that have to be fixed. As has been stated before, you surely have a number for hours to accomplish the task somewhere in the proposal process. Having said that, I can appreciate your dilemma if you are one who has to determine those hours. This, to me, is what makes a standout manager, and is a skill worth honing. you will have to watch closely the performance of each individual, and you will have to have the authority to do something about the performance. without it, it dosn't matter what you say to either the workers or the management.
We have a unique situation at our offices. We have a good CAD manager who knows the drafting capabilities of all those doing so, and will stand up for all the drafters, yet will also let them know if they are screwing up. You have a lot of power in the current work enviroment, I imagine, as there are a lot of good workers that are un-employed and would love another opportunity at a good steady job. Maybe you might want to remind some of your workers that everyone is replaceable in a company. at the same time, you may want to tell management that the bottom line is probably being affected by a lack of ability to track costs at design, and could use some help in developing a procedure for tracking.
We also have another unique situation (maybe). We are one of those companies that does the 3D detailing after a 2D design, and we are making money.

[Hans_2011]

Admittedly, we've only been offered one side of this story.

However, I find it interesting that the workers (by your description) are so compelled to make more $$$ that they're willing to risk their employment with your company by conspiring together to slow down production levels, so that the company will have to pay them more!?

... Do any of them have family members that are part of OPEC? (<- I'm kidding).

Look, having a schmucky employee is common, there's one in nearly every group... but to have the lot of them allegedly conspiring!? That's a whole other host of issues.

That suggests to me that the employees don't feel that there is any real-world consequences for their negative behavior, and that in doing "the right thing" by finishing their work on time (if not early) has no incentive at all. It's as true for humans, as it is dogs... bad behavior that is not corrected, is repeated.

If initial estimation is an ongoing issue, then you don't have the right individuals in that group's leadership positions. For example, a Senior Designer *should* be capable of estimating the man-hours needed to complete a job (to the initial scope), by combining their work experience, and their knowledge of the junior CAD staff that will be working on the project with them.

Sound like you're management team needs to ask some tough questions, and perhaps give Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" a read:



... Food for thought.

Dear Renderman,

I am absolutely aware of the management problem we have.
The issue is much more complex than what I have explained, so I have just asked one problem I am facing and which I need help with.
HR issues need to be handled corectly with correct incentives to get each person in the organisation to improve by it's own, but in the engineering depmt it has been difficult to establis the correct incentives since payments for extratime have resulted in higher operation costs without proven increased productivity (in terms of amount of work done per usual working hours w/o extra time). So in the end, from the top mgmt perspective, we are trashing money while the drafters are very happy getting extra pay.

When you can't measure you can't manage. In the engineering depmt. we are not being able to measure and as a result we can't identify where the problem is exactly.
Thanks for your post.

[Hans_2011]

Hello Hans,

You've touched upon a subject that is very important to me. But first let me comment on something you said in your post. The general gist of it was that you are creating a 3d model from your 2d design. It is my opinion that this approach is exactly backwards from a more efficient approach of creating the 2d details (or layouts, etc) from the 3d model. How did I form this opinion? Hopefully It will become evident.

So, to your main theme, you are interested in determining a method whereby you can estimate more accurately the amount of time it takes to produce a drawing (or design, or project).

First and foremost, do you know accurately how much time it had previously taken to produce a particular drawing? You must establish a benchmark, and really a very gross estimate isn't good enough.

Next, do you know how long it takes you to produce a particular type of drawing? Do you know how long it takes Hans Johnson. to produce a similar drawing? Do you know if your efficiency is greater or less than his? Are the drawings in question worked on by both you and him? Is one producer 's final drawing a higher quality than the other and conforms to the standards in place?

If you do not know the answers to these (and many more) question then you need to put into place the means to begin answering them. You need to begin monitoring, logging and examining the logs. You might want to start by trying my CadTempo software http://www.cadtempo.com for a 30 day trial.

Ok, how did I form my opinion about going from 3d to 2d? hopefully my departure from your question will help answer some of your other questions.

I started my business 20 years ago. Prior to that I had been doing the same type of work on the drawing board and had kept meticulous records of my time involvement. I do machine design and each machine will have a number of compontents whether they are designed, detailed, and manufactured or are commercially available. By knowing the component count I could determine how long an average machine of xxx component type took to design or "layout", then detail, then check.

During start up I decided to do all my work in AutoCAD because it was highly customizable and also offered AutoLISP as a programming language. I discovered that AutoCAD's TIME command was essentially useless. When you save one drawing into another name the time would carry along. Also if you left a drawing open the timer would just keep ticking along. Not a very good way of determining how much time it took to produce a drawing. So the first order was to create a lisp program that would track my time more accurately.

I learned it took longer to produce a design than manually drafting did, much of it having to do with the learning curve. After some menu tweaking, some custom lisps etc the time came down to a little less than board drafting. I knew I could get it down further so I set a goal for myself and began determining what needed to be done. Looking at my logs I could determine if things appeared out of the ordinary from my previous experience. And it occurred to me. Why am I drafting most everything six times??? Yep, that's right six times - during layout: front, top, side...during detail: front top side. Why not draw it once in 3d then extract the drawings and views as needed.

Any long term AutoCAD user knows that the earlier releases of AutoCAD did not lend themselves to convenient 3d work so I had to create some 3d lisp routines and menus and macros to speed things up. It worked! My design and detail time started improving dramatically, I'll not bore you with details but I continued to improve my methods and techniques and a lot of different things. Every change resulted in moving my time up (bad, so let's not do that) or down (good, ok maybe I can do that even better).

It is not a task to be taken lightly, it takes persistence and determination to arrive at your goal but it starts out by benchmarking.

Dear Duhvinci,

I am very interested to check the CADTempo software to see if I can measure the time spent on the CAD drawings by each of our drafters. This is what I need to start recording performance and then use it as a benchmark.
But even supposing I have these measures, I will not be able to solve my problem since as I mention, designs change every time and then a previous drawing might have nothing to do with the new ones. Hence, I have to determine a way to determine a factor to apply to a previous work to adjust for the increased/decreased difficulty of the new design.
There are also more difficulties regarding design changes, and the difficulty to determine how much time it should take to finish the version 2 design compared to the original estimated time.


Regarding your questions about me knowing exactly the time it takes to draw, I looking at this problem from the top, and I am not an expert in CAD drawing (although I do know how to handle it and how it works in general from my Mech. Engineer background) so I cannot determine myself the time required. I do have a Mgr. who knows this and who is heading the Engineering Dept. but in the actual project there are so many variables (design changes requested by client, response time from client to approve designs, subcontracted third parties involved in design, etc...) that it is very difficult even for him to determine the sources of inefficiency. Even though he has an opinion it is difficult to take improtant measures (like unfortunately having to fire someone) without a more decent level of confidence.

Regards,
---
Hans