For a medical device project I agree that the manager must provide the balance of executive deadlines and taken into consideration the overall safety of the users. However, the role of the manager should not be limited to a business aspect. In my experience a manager is most effective when they have technical expertise and experience in the specific project/role they are managing. Throughout my time in industry I have been on teams in which the manager does not have this technical background and it results in many issues arising during the project because of lack of insight, which could have been avoided with experience.

Krp76 is absolutely right about a manager needing experience to avoid mistakes and issues during a project. A technical background helps a manager avoid make small but potentially catastrophic mistakes. Further, a manager with an experienced background will have realistic expectations and an idea of how a project will develop. For these reasons, it is often best to have a manager for a group of engineers be someone that was also an engineer before being promoted.

Although I do not have experience with this, I imagine a manager that has a relevant and experienced background is almost more likely to be respected by the engineers under him/her (and vice-versa). Does this sound like anything you guys have experienced?

In my experience, it is preferable for a manager to be someone who has come from a similar background or even better yet, has been in the shoes of the engineer. Specifically in manufacturing medical devices, a manager with only a business and leadership background will not entirely understand what an engineer's concerns are for a project. This manager might not see the importance of bio-compatibility testing and FDA regulations as much as they care for the money making aspect and the business climate of the product market. Where an engineer is concerned about the mechanical soundness of the product, a manager with no background might just be concerned with meeting a deadline.

If a manager is well versed in medicine or engineering or both, there will be a more pleasantly symbiotic relationship. The engineer should always feel comfortable voicing their opinions and even further, should feel confident that their manager will act on the advice that they gave. In my workplace, my current manager was once an engineer that climbed the ranks. With this experience, they understand where the engineer is coming from and will respect them in every aspect of the project cycle.

I really appreciate this question. That's a good one to discuss. So for a medical device project or any project related to medicine, its better to have a manager who has some basic knowledge with respect to the project. For instance, Placing a manager who worked in some automobile manufacturing projects into a medical device projects will lead to this type of issues. The manager would be known with the automobile stuffs and he would have never been familiar with the medical device stuffs. So employing a manager of the medical device domain would be a dynamic way to avoid this kind of failures. I also recommend the transparency between the project members would also avoid failures.

In a perfect world, managers would have all the technical knowledge that all the engineers under him/her have. This is not realistic or feasible. However, a good manager makes the effort to be involved in all the projects their employees have going on, at least on an overview level. The more involved a manager is in understanding the operations and challenges faced by their team members, the better they will be able to communicate in both directions (up and down the chain of command). While there may be no substitute for technical skills and knowledge, a manager can make up for some of it with effective communication and attention to their employees input and concerns.

Managers and engineers play completely different roles in projects, which can cause ethical dilemmas that has no clear answer(s). Managers are mostly concerned with the end results where they must meet certain deadlines, budget and etc. to make a profit for the company. Engineers, on the other hand, are the mind behind these projects where their specialties are tailored to make these projects/devices into reality that will ensure that the device is safe for public use.The engineers will be running all stages of the project up to completion with supervision by the managers to make sure that the project is running on time and will be delivered. Here is where I believe the problem starts; Problems are rarely absent in projects which causes a delay or the need for more funding arises which are two setbacks a manager avoids. With different views in the project, managers and engineers might not be on the same page when it comes to solving such problems. A manager may overlook the engineers' concerns just to meet deadlines and budget then where does the engineer go to to voice their concerns? Do they whistleblow? or Should they stay quiet and let it pass?

I believe a large part of this issue is also people not being able to admit that other people might be better at certain aspects of a project. When companies begin to micromanage and have people working outside of their strong suits a project can suffer. The manager’s inability to listen to the engineers strong understanding of mechanics and engineering caused the deaths of innocent astronaut. People in the workplace need to utilize each other’s technical abilities to handle a project in the most efficient way possible.

Adding on to KRP76 points, I believe that in order to achieve success in the project, to have a proper collaboration of several teams and to establish communication between them, the project manager needs to be sound in his technical skills. A technical expert can understand the deliverables and assign roles/duties for all the teams accordingly. Timelines can be reasonable and teams can work efficiently in such situations.

To revive this discussion, I believe the roles of managers and engineers in a project fit a Venn Diagram. One circle is strictly managerial/business tasks and the other is purely design and build tasks. In the overlap are the skills that both managers and engineers should be versed in. The overlapping skills are technical knowledge of the task, consequence foresight, feasibility foresight, and motivation. All personnel on a project need to have these skills in order for the project to run smoothly. Managers have some tasks, such as planning and organizing the project, setting deadlines, allocating resources, and keeping up to date with the ever-changing customer needs. Engineers concern themselves with task completion and the technical side of completing the task. A good manager is 80% manager and 20% engineer. A good engineer is 80% engineer and 20% worker.

Although I agree with many points from jz365, I don't agree with the percentages. I believe that managers should be promoted from the engineers, so that they have a total grasp of what the engineers beneath them are doing. Knowing the issues that may arise would allow the manager to plan more accurately knowing what problems may arise and how to avoid them. They would also have a good grasp on the timeline required in order to make a product. The engineers should also have a degree of knowing what the project needs management-wise. If they are lacking any management skills they can be trained to become more proficient.I believe it is easier to train an engineer to become a manager than vice versa. Does anyone believe that the opposite is true?

I also agree with the idea that managers should be promoted from among the engineers since they have a better grasp of what the engineers have to do, thus being a better manager. From prior experience in working in a 3D printing lab as the "engineer", my manager had an extensive knowledge on how to work and repair the printers. If I did not know how to repair the printer, I would speak with my manager for advice and help if I could not figure it out. I believe that the managers should understand the role of whom they are managing as it can ultimately get a project done quickly and efficiently. Needless to say, there has been countless engineering projects that have failed miserably due to the lack of communication and knowledge of what needs to be done between the engineers and the manager. In most of these cases, if the manager knew exactly what had to be done by the engineers and knew their roles, these tragedies would not have occurred. Anyone agree or disagree with this point?

From the initial post, I too believe having a more transparent connection between the manager and the engineers under him or her is key to guarantee the elimination of unexpected drawbacks and mistakes during a project. Personally, the dynamic my company enforces on our teams is a very realistic and suitable method that accomplishes just that. Each team in my company has what is called a VPM (visual project management) board. This board consists of a series of rows, each belonging to a single member, and a set of columns for each week for the timeline of a project. The cells within this board contain tasks and important milestones that correspond to the respected individual and the week it begins, is due, or occurs. This visual representation helps the manager and the engineers on the team tremendously to ensure that not only each engineer is aware of the deadlines, but also helps the engineers remain aware of other tasks that may impact their personal timeline. In addition, each team holds their own weekly alignment meetings, as well as brief daily meetings that involve all members of the team. This ensures that everyone is aware of the current state of everyone's tasks and allows the manager to make alterations, provide resources, and reprioritize certain tasks early enough to ensure that deadlines are met.

From personal experience and what I've outlined, I strongly believe that a team with a dynamic that takes advantage of visual representations and constant communication between all members of the team on nearly a daily basis is on the right track to ensure an efficient and successful execution of any project.

I agree with what a lot of people have said here, in so far that the best managers are those that can blend their managerial and engineering skills to benefit the project. Having someone who is great at the managing but cannot understand the technical part of the project is pointless as they wont be able to communicate the importance of the project. Having someone who understands all the technical aspects will be unable to put the project in the scope of benefit to the company. The best teams are merely an extension of this. Having a team with members that can both understand the technical aspects whilst also understanding the business and managerial aspects leads to better outcomes. The teams must also not be fully staffed with people who are perfect 50/50 splits of these abilities. The more technical people can complete the more technical aspects whilst the others can complete the non-technical aspects.

Teams are all about balance, so a good team successfully balances the strengths of its members. There is no magic ration, but it requires trial and error to get correct.

The best work dynamic for a medical device project is a team whose members trust each other and have an ownership mentality. Each member should contribute to the project. It is important to have someone lead the project which a lot of times is the manager. To avoid issues such as the Space Challenger incident in 1986, every member on the team must communicate with each other, not just the manager. A project comes together when the team works together. The only way for this to happen is to communicate with one another.

I recently was part of a project that involved working with a team from our headquarters. The lack of communication between the team caused a delay in the project. It was frustrating for me as well as the other members because of how disorganized it was. If we communicated more and set weekly meetings, the project could have been done on time.