Design Project Management

Design Project Management roles are a very important part of an organization’s success, are a key process for any project to be successful. Therefore, someone projects to be completed, must manage the process of meeting organization requirements in a timely, cost-effective manner.

The process of Design Project Management is very vast and has everything right from assigning tasks to the project closure. It covers the complete project from the initial requirements to the final delivery of the finalized product, including all the documentation related to the project.

The project manager is the director of the orchestra formed by Design Engineers (Mechanical, SW, and HW), Reliability Engineers, components suppliers, finance, purchasing and logistic teams, manufacturing, Quality, industrialization engineering, tooling suppliers, HHRR, sales teams…  and of course, the person dealing with the customer during the project execution.

Design project manager

The project manager is responsible for the project during all its phases, starting on the RFQ and ending with the HW shipping to the customer, including risk management. Project management must keep focused on the goal of the project being managed, the resources needed to complete it, the cost control, and the timing plan.

It requires deep knowledge of all the project aspects like design, project quality, manufacturing, logistics, purchasing and strong technical, communications (internally with the different groups as well as with customers), and negotiation skills.

Under the current situation of the electronics market, with prices and availability of components in permanent change, the development of a time to market strategy for the product has become essential.

Phases of design project management

Depending on the type of project, there could be different phases of project management for a given project: