Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1507822
38 PCB007 MAGAZINE I SEPTEMBER 2023 that same information can be readily available to anyone requiring it? e biggest trouble with tribal knowledge is the effect it can have on company culture. Sometimes, tribal knowledge can lead to an "us vs. them" mentality within a working team. Rather than working together to solve a prob- lem, more knowledgeable individuals may intentionally gatekeep informa- tion to maintain their status as "valuable" to the company. is mentality can prevent the team from making head- way on problems, especially if newer employees feel they don't have as much to add. New employees can also feel overwhelmed by the amount of information required to perform their job. Without docu- mentation they can refer to, they may feel embarrassed to ask what an acronym stands for or how to perform an undocumented process step. ese feelings are damaging to any com- pany looking to create a team-based culture. While tribal knowledge is crucial to the suc- cess of all companies, it can be equally trou- bling. To maintain a baseline of information needed to advance, this information should be documented and readily available to the nec- essary parties. It should also be shared freely as a way to develop a team-based culture. How- ever, to be truly helpful, when tribal knowl- edge is recorded, it must be accurate and rel- evant. Information should be shared in a con- sistent manner and format. It needs to be controlled by a small group of individuals to prevent loss of pertinent information. What information at your facility can be put into a formalized archive for the future generation to learn from? PCB007 Paige Fiet is a process engineer at TTM-Logan and in the IPC Emerg- ing Engineer Program. To read past columns, click here. in an unbalanced design to cause severe warp- age. e plan was to use these details to create a knowledge database that any engineer could access to create an adequate process flow for a new job. Unfortunately, we were met with the all-too-common response, "I can just tell by looking at the design and stackup." It took some time and a lot of conversation to begin the process of quantify- ing information he hadn't even thought to quantify before. Once initial information had been collected, it was properly documented in a living docu- ment. Inevitably, the FEE team came back with more prob- lems not initially included in the document. is allowed the document to grow with details that were previously forgotten. e most important part of this story is that the information was captured for years to come. Five to 10 years aer our lamination engineer is long retired, the new lamination engineer can reference documents that include this per- tinent information instead of taking a consid- erable amount of time to learn it for himself. Beyond the risk of losing the knowledge curated by experience, tribal knowledge can be dangerous to the productivity of a facility. For example, if plating operators need to ask the engineering team about the current, pro- cessing time, or waveforms that should be used on every new job booked, the plating engineer could not get much done outside of setting up new jobs. What would happen if the plat- ing engineer took a two-week vacation with no cell service? Would all the new jobs have to wait until that person returned? A less extreme example might be operators who are able to perform the set-up of most product on a plat- ing line but have not learned the subtleties of waveforms for more complex work. Even for the most experienced operators, the details may be lost in translation. Why take the time to wait for one person to respond to an email if The biggest trouble with tribal knowledge is the effect it can have on company culture.