Process Modeling and Tracking for Product Development
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Solution Overview
Problem
The existing processes for product development involving multiple entities are error-prone, inefficient, and subjective, with changes often not being effectively communicated across teams, leading to time-consuming and difficult manual cross-checks to ensure requirements are met.
Innovation Solution
A computerized modeling and tracking system that defines and tracks processes involving multiple entities, allowing for the creation of process instances, tracking of requirements and solutions, and providing instant feedback on changes, using a creative process modeler and tracker with modules for process mapping, instance management, and relationship tracking.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If manual cross-check between documents is used to ensure requirements are met, then reliability of requirement satisfaction is improved, but time consumption and operational complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically tracks the status of requirements and solutions, providing real-time feedback on whether requirements are met. The tracking system monitors process instances and notifies relevant entities when requirements are satisfied or changes occur, eliminating the need for manual cross-checking while maintaining high reliability.
Solution Approach 2:
The system enables self-monitoring of requirement satisfaction through automated tracking. Process instances automatically record and verify that requirements are met by their associated solutions, allowing the system to verify its own work without requiring manual intervention from multiple teams.
2Loss of information
If formal handoff meetings are conducted between teams, then communication between entities is improved, but process efficiency and productivity decrease
Solution Approach 1:
The system provides continuous automated feedback to all entities involved in a process instance. When requirements are met, solutions are updated, or changes occur, the system automatically notifies relevant teams through the tracking system, eliminating the need for scheduled handoff meetings while ensuring comprehensive communication.
Solution Approach 2:
The tracking system operates continuously to monitor and communicate process status, eliminating interruptions caused by scheduled meetings. The system maintains constant awareness of requirement satisfaction and solution status across all entities, enabling continuous productive work without communication pauses.
3Measurement precision
If multiple entities manually track process status, then measurement precision of requirement satisfaction is improved, but device complexity and operational difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The tracking system serves multiple functions simultaneously: it monitors requirement satisfaction, tracks solution status, notifies relevant entities, and maintains process state across all entities. This multi-functional approach consolidates what would otherwise require multiple separate manual tracking mechanisms into a single unified system.
Data Source
AI summary
One embodiment is a system that allows multiple entities to track a process for developing a product. The system receives a process defined in terms of the entities, which are involved in the process, and the relationships, which exist among the entities. The system permits a process instance to be created from the defined process upon deeming that the process is valid, and permits the first process instance to be tracked with respect to requirements and solutions that are specified by entities in the process instance.