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  • Book
  • © 2005

Design Process Improvement

A review of current practice

  • Gives the reader a unique combination of the carefully-laid-out requirements of industrial design and the solutions which are available from academia
  • The second part of the book is devoted to a survey of current research from the leading academic design institutes all over the world and will be kept up to date online at

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Softcover Book USD 179.99
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Table of contents (42 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xv
  2. Introduction

    1. The reality of design

      • Claudia Eckert, John Clarkson
      Pages 1-29
  3. Design issues

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 30-31
    2. Models of design

      1. Models of designing
        • David Wynn, John Clarkson
        Pages 34-59
      2. Design planning and modelling
        • Brendan O’Donovan, Claudia Eckert, John Clarkson, Tyson R Browning
        Pages 60-87
      3. Systems engineering
        • Peter Buckle, John Clarkson
        Pages 89-113
    3. Perspectives on design

      1. Requirements engineering
        • Pericles Loucopoulos
        Pages 116-139
      2. Human resources
        • Martina Dürndorfer
        Pages 140-157
      3. Complexity
        • Chris Earl, Jeffrey Johnson, Claudia Eckert
        Pages 174-197
      4. Thinking and representing in design
        • Martin Stacey, Kristina Lauche
        Pages 198-229
    4. Design practice

      1. Communication in design
        • Claudia Eckert, Anja Maier, Chris McMahon
        Pages 232-261
      2. Engineering change
        • Timothy Jarratt, John Clarkson, Claudia Eckert
        Pages 262-285
      3. Risk in the design process
        • Chris McMahon, Jerry Busby
        Pages 286-305
      4. Design for X
        • Harald Meerkamm, Michael Koch
        Pages 306-323
    5. Design management

      1. Engineering knowledge management
        • Ken Wallace, Saeema Ahmed, Rob Bracewell
        Pages 326-343
      2. Quality management
        • Graham Thompson
        Pages 344-365
      3. Workflow for design
        • Sándor Vajna
        Pages 366-385
      4. Integrated new product development
        • Jonathan Cagan, Craig M Vogel
        Pages 386-403
      5. Product portfolio management
        • Marco Cantamessa
        Pages 404-435

About this book

vi The process is important! I learned this lesson the hard way during my previous existence working as a design engineer with PA Consulting Group's Cambridge Technology Centre. One of my earliest assignments involved the development of a piece of labo- tory automation equipment for a major European pharmaceutical manufacturer.Two things stick in my mind from those early days – first, that the equipment was always to be ready for delivery in three weeks and,second,that being able to write well structured Pascal was not sufficient to deliver reliable software performance. Delivery was ultimately six months late,the project ran some sixty percent over budget and I gained my first promotion to Senior Engineer. At the time it puzzled me that I had been unable to predict the John Clarkson real effort required to complete the automation project – I had Reader in Engineering Design, genuinely believed that the project would be finished in three Director, Cambridge Engineering weeks.It was some years later that I discovered Kenneth Cooper's Design Centre papers describing the Rework Cycle and realised that I had been the victim of “undiscovered rework”.I quickly learned that project plans were not just inaccurate,as most project managers would attest,but often grossly misleading,bearing little resemblance to actual development practice.

Editors and Affiliations

  • Engineering Design Centre, Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    John Clarkson, Claudia Eckert

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

Softcover Book USD 179.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access