Achieving productivity gains with PDM

Product Data Management (PDM) systems, like Dassault’s Enterprise PDM, are effective tools at managing the product development process, however, there are numerous stories of PDM systems disappointing users and not providing the anticipated productivity gains.

PDM systems are process management tools, so to achieve the anticipated productivity gains, the processes being mapped onto the PDM systems need to be effective and efficient, otherwise regardless of the PDM system, the productivity gains cannot be realized.

Companies often begin setting up PDM before understanding their processes, resulting in an ever-changing ad-hoc PDM setup process that typically results in a non-intuitive, disjointed workflow, frustrating users and never achieving the anticipated productivity gains.

So before implementing a PDM system, evaluate the effectiveness of the existing processes.

Things to consider are:

• Are the process for the PDM system well understood?
• Are the processes documented and available for easy reference by the users?
• Are the processes fully mapped out in an easy-to-understand flow chart?
• Do the processes meet industry standards?

If no is answered for any of the above questions, before implementing PDM, consider reviewing, refining and fully documenting the processes.

Processes that are understood and documented before being mapped to PDM allow for a simpler, top-down, and relatively quick setup of PDM, which is intuitive to users and achieves the anticipated productivity gains.

If you have other experiences setting up PDM or PLM, please leave a comment below.  If you have other concerns about PDM, PLM, or CAD, don’t hesitate to contact Soul of Design.