Knowledge Operations and Industrial Design

-- Haohan Product Design Co., Ltd. Chen Wenlong

Industrial design requires the integration of knowledge, transforming requirements into commodities with intangible value.

From a knowledge point of view: Because industrial design is a capability that requires the conversion of information, it can deal with complex affairs in a complex form; tangled up with complex information and needs of aesthetics, engineering, and business, and consume the market. The transformation of popular intelligence and corporate strategy into visual creativity is a "knowledge" work.

From another point of view, in the era of knowledge economy, the emphasis is on applying knowledge to create intangible values. All manufacturers and companies want to try to convert tangible values ​​(manpower, mechanical equipment, factories...) into higher intangible values. The value of the tangible goods themselves is limited, and the meaning attached to the goods includes the concept behind the goods, the taste they represent, the feeling they bring to the user, and the sense of belonging is the intangible economic value. These intangible values ​​are usually derived from “innovation, brand, trust and relationship”; industrial design is to increase the value-added products by shaping new products, thus satisfying the interests of consumers and producers. , so it also meets the traits of knowledge work.

According to Porter’s competition theory, the cost, speed, and differentiation are currently the competitiveness that manufacturers in the digital era should have. In the digital era today, more emphasis is placed on "speed, connectivity, and intangible values"; that is, more emphasis is placed on "time, space, and quality." Therefore, how to apply knowledge management to industrial design to gain competitive advantage in cost, speed and differentiation? It will be a new topic and direction of industrial design.

Industrial design and industry can improve the competitive advantage of these three items. It must be a kind of “knowledge integration” model to face the digital age and achieve competitive advantage.

1. In product differentiation: Industrial design uses knowledge to create ideas.

When designing and developing new products, we will first think of its positioning? There are usually two main directions: "Elevate prices and reduce costs." What most companies are doing today is to reduce costs, but the question is how long will the strategy that depends on reducing costs last? When more and more countries and manufacturers have similar production factors, technologies or human resources; to increase the value of products in the minds of consumers can no longer just rely on price competition, that is, development differentiation - "design and development Differentiated products make you differentiate from other products, create unique values, grasp the different needs of consumers, and satisfy the products they want, which is the winning strategy. This is because when most companies are doing price competition rather than differentiated competition, they may fall into the bottleneck of “competitive convergence,” that is, everyone is competing in the same direction. There is no difference in the products, consumers can only be forced to choose from the price, because the manufacturers do not have much difference between each other, and may eventually lose all.

Differentiating innovative performance in the overall product is a kind of "truth, goodness, and beauty" that is accepted and loved by the general public. Although the appearance of the United States is a common visual standard, the designer wants to shape the aesthetic experience into an intuition. The professional knowledge, besides being able to understand it, must be able to draw conclusions. In addition to continuous drills, comparisons, and insights, it also learns and exchanges experiences with other sources of technical information so as to maintain its ability to innovate continuously. For a design organization, it is even more necessary to construct a network system for knowledge exchange, so that people with knowledge and those who need knowledge can combine to form a framework for knowledge work, and to add different skills through the interaction of internal and external knowledge. Ideas and values ​​are deliberately combined to inspire more creative solutions. This framework will be illustrated with Haohan's example.

2. In terms of relative speed and competitor speed advantage: Industrial design should use digital advanced technical knowledge to complete creativity.

How to achieve rapid product design can start from two aspects, digital technology and effective management system, because of the development of the network, so that knowledge management has become a new basic platform.

Therefore, industrial design must be competitive with “speed”. I think that its concept is in the process of the development of design ideas (from appearance, structure, function to production and marketing can be carried out synchronously), through practical experience. Fully apply digital technology, integrate information and data into a shared "managed system," and let this system circulate among all relevant departments and personnel who will participate in the work. Its purpose is to significantly increase the timeliness and quality because there are enough The information provided fully provides the basis for decision-making, so that the design and development process and methods can be continuously improved. This large architecture will involve the application and concept of knowledge management.

Taking Haohan design as an example, before the company did not expand its international business base, because of its centralized location, it is possible to know the entire company’s operating status or the progress of various projects through the weekly cadre meeting and the implementation of walking management. . After Haohan's internationalization, based on the scale of operations, Haohan Design has probably performed dozens of projects at the same time around the world. In addition, managers and project managers often need to travel around the world. Grasping the status and operating performance of each branch's project, it is difficult to fully grasp it based on past management methods.

In order to improve this situation and to face the e-century speed competition, Haohan made an adjustment in the internal organization to flatten the internal organization of the company, and designed and set up a “Knowledge Management Office (KMO) Knowledge Management”. The platform (as shown in the figure) facilitates communication and allows knowledge to be embedded in flexible decision-making so as to form a chaotic and orderly chaotic management model. Among them, there are professional organizations that form so-called organizations in the same industry, and combine local branches and alliance partners to form an organic design networking organization. The general management office is transformed into the backoffice role of support and arbitration. Such a system supports project managers in the control of design projects and the acquisition of data and knowledge in various design projects. It also provides a system that can generate new benefits in the knowledge of innovation. Through the Internet, regardless of where you are, you can quickly and easily understand the execution status of various projects within the company through the KMO platform. The system can also implement resources through early warning or countermeasures for the implementation of problematic projects. Connect with each other and resolve related issues as early as possible.

3. In terms of low-cost implementation: Industrial design is based on the knowledge of resource integration to achieve integration, which can be classified as "consistent". If a new product is developed and its positioning is in price competition, the manufacturer must determine its policy must Implementing it in the whole enterprise, not only in the part of designing, developing, manufacturing, and controlling costs; in others, such as: service, marketing, etc., any policy must be consistent with the principle of low cost, so that the cost can be “multiple” through the product. Become "less." The other is “complementary”. At this time, activities related to the design and development of new products will involve all the resources that participate in synchronous interaction and support replenishment, resulting in a competitive advantage through integration; and increasing the difficulty of imitation by competitors. . Because integration requires interaction and mutual trust, and the dialogue and communication of technology complement each other, it takes time to run and build.

If an organization can establish an "ultra-vertical integration" system, it will go from upstream to downstream - from research, design, structure, experiment, confirmation to mold, production, and all cooperative professional manufacturers or individuals, so that the environment for information acquisition can be established. With a full and effective internet & intranet, it is possible to grasp the process and direction of new product development at any time to facilitate the formation of information and decision-making. Once the design work is unfolded, in addition to linking the target client with a virtual prototype of the computer, the customer (including the subscriber, user and third party) communicates on the design proposal in real time and will determine The result is intelligence feedback, because the information system runs through all the value chain activities; it provides the opportunity for all activities to improve efficiency, and the best and most cost-competitive combination can be found for design and development work. The good "smart capital" design team will have a competitive edge in cost.

Someone has defined a new economy for the future, the new economy has been powered by technology, driven by ideas, rooted the innovation and enterprise. From these four keywords: technology, ideas, innovation, enterprise, I think the core of the new economy should be innovation and adventurous spirit. The essence of industrial design is innovation, so how to promote it becomes a task of “knowledge integration”, and turning industrial design knowledge into higher intangible value should be the direction in which we must strive!