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60 PCB007 MAGAZINE I MAY 2021 Other Essential Skills ere are a few other skills (what we call so skills) that I see as being absent in many of the facilities I visit. Here are a few of these critical so skills that one needs to learn: Design of Experiments First and foremost, understand how to de- sign an experiment (DOE). is requires brain- storming and certainly a team approach to solv- ing the problem. DOE methods are for engineers to employ during experimentations. Whether it is "problem solving" or "process development," the DOE experimental methods provide the most efficient means of determining the cor- rect answers, and it is critical for troubleshoot- ing. It also helps one understand those variables that are weighing more heavily on the issue and those that are of little consequence. Start with a brainstorming session and con- struct a fishbone diagram or something simi- lar. is will help put in perspective the possi- ble causes of the problem you are seeing. From there, focus on the most likely causes of the de- fect, then design the experiment to investigate the most likely causes. TQC/Six-Sigma/Statistics/Curve Fitting Total Quality Control and Six-Sigma (6S) is the philosophy of continuous improvement through statistical techniques and a commit- ment to excellence. e PDCA process (Plan- Do-Check-Act) is a central theme using the nine basic tools (cause-effect, process flow, Pareto, scatter, histograms, process capability index, control charts, time-series, and check sheets). A useful book is the free Statistical En- gineering Handbook available for download Table 2: An example of just one failure mode related to use of an inner layer bonding process.