Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1517130
MARCH 2024 I DESIGN007 MAGAZINE 27 log of things I'm reading because I want to know about stuff. I'm curious. People say that if you want to get something done, give it to a busy person because that's someone who has developed the muscle of doing. I don't have to be the biggest genius in the room, but I will win by sheer effort. Edison, in fact, said, "Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration." Is every designer capable of being great? Within reason. We all start with a certain hand we've been dealt. My point is more tied to what you might call "the pursuit of greatness." In addition to reading, I try to find people who are smarter than me about a subject. I track them down, and most people are nice enough to answer questions about something they have expertise in. I have a list in my mind of experts on certain topics. One really smart laminate guy told me, "You never ask easy questions." And I thought, "at's good. I like that I'm not asking easy questions." ere is an analogy I use in my class: ere's a breed of caterpillar called the pine tree cater- pillar. ey're also called processional caterpil- lars. e ultimate goal, of course, is that they turn into butterflies. And if you put them in a row on top of a flowerpot, they will go around that circle following the one in front of them until they all starve. And, to me, that's an anal- ogy for doing the bare minimum to "stay in line." Connecting it back to stackups and PCB design, they're just focused on the X-Y direc- tion; if they focused on the Z direction, they could get off that flowerpot and go find a leaf to eat and survive. It's what I close my workshops with: "Don't be a pine tree caterpillar. Don't just follow what everyone else is doing. Be dif- ferent. Be ambitious." When I was a Boeing engineer, they hosted free classes aer work, focused on soware mainly, but also hardware. I took almost all of them. But I never once saw any of my co-workers in the classes. ey got the hell out of dodge aer work. ere's always some- thing to learn if you're curious. Right now, I want to know more about vias, power integ- rity, thermal effects, and rigid-flex design. So I read, research, and find people that are smarter than me on these subjects. Being curious seems to be a key requirement to be a good designer. Curiosity killed the cat, but it never killed an engineer. I may steal that line. Do you have any final words of advice for new designers and design engineers? Be inquisitive and curious. Find people with expertise and ask questions. Most of those guys are happy to teach you. We all want to leave a legacy behind. If you're an older guy and you can find younger, hungry, curious people, that's a good thing. If you're one of those young people, find those older people, and don't be afraid to ask them questions. Thanks for speaking with me, Bill. ank you, Andy. DESIGN007 Bill Hargin