Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1348195
18 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I MARCH 2021 We had to do this recently with a project where we were working over the holiday to get it out. We were very transparent, saying, "Okay, this is not going to be pretty. Bring us the most important parts of your project. at's what we're putting the most time on." Matties: When they come to you with the con- straints, do you go back and, especially if it's a time constraint, clarify your expectations of them? Kolar: Yes, you have to, and we did that a lot on this par- ticular customer. We said, "Here's our expectation of response times. You're specifying this. You don't get to make changes aer this certain date. You have these reviews lined up." If you're on a time schedule like that, then everybody has to be on board. Matties: Is that a good practice to do as a mat- ter of routine for every customer? Define what their role is and what you expect of them, as much as what they expect from you. Kolar: I think that's really important, and the experienced, front-end designers know that. ere are some customers that I just look for- ward to working with. I know I'm going to get a wonderful package that's completely clear. e netlist is going to come in right the first time. en there are customers who I guar- antee I'm going to be iterating with 10 times before I can even get a proper netlist, much less to get started. Matties: How will the industry overcome the most critical component with what you do: experience? When are the young design- ers going to plug in, and how are they going to manage when what you're talking about is experience based, and a lot of it, I'm sure, is tribal knowledge? Kolar: I think there's experience, but there's also best practice, and ideally they are learning with the help of those guidelines and best prac- tices. We have people with decades of expe- rience in our company, and we have a whole process where we mentor people and work together as a team to bring them up, but it is a lot harder for a designer in a one- or two-person shop to get that skill. We bring in somebody who's been at a large company, and might be institutionalized in doing things in one way on one certain type of project for a very long time. ey may have a hard time catching up with current technology as they start shiing, but I think good management is part of it. Matties: So, one of the first things is to define the process, or at least go back, revisit the pro- cess that you have and make sure it's still valid, because, oentimes, a process that's written doesn't match reality. Kolar: Right, and where does this process tend to fall down? If I'm always trying to get this data, but I know that the engineer almost never has it, what could I work with instead that would be easier to get? If I'm in Altium, I'd love to get a STEP file. If I'm in Cadence, I want a DXF. We work with medical device companies where it's absolutely critical that not a dot changes on a note without approval because they're FDA-approved designs. Matties: Mark, what are your thoughts here? Thompson: I can confirm what Jen's talking about. We talked about incoming problems.