During the planning process, inputs are taken from the customer. Those that have worked in the industry, what is the most unreasonable input request you have received from a customer? How did you handle it?
I used to work in a opthalmology devices manufacturing company, the product i was working on was fundus camera. During the planning phase we were working with a doctor who used to give us inputs for each phase of the device planning, he used to test the device every time during the device cycle on the subjects and used to give his feedback on it. His feedback was taken positively and was taken into consideration while in the implementation phase.
When the device was in the market there were many requests for changes in the device which we took positively as ultimately we want to give a good product to the customer and since he/she is paying it they have all the right to give their feedback.
Our device required dilation of eye for taking the image and the customer had asked us to have the device without dilation which was very unreasonable as it was a budget device and the image quality would be lower if we did that.
I was service engineer in Medtronic. I used to deal with Ventriculoperitoneal Shunt, Lumboperitoneal shunt, Neuro Drills. Neuro Drills used to make burr hole in the skull, so that Minimal Invasive Surgery can be performed. I used to go for breakdown calls for neuro drills, So the request that i got from the customers that the burr for neuro drills should be reuseable but the company has made burr for the patient safety made non-reuseable.
Part of a workflow our company supports involves scanning in a jaw model of a patient so that a dental restoration can be designed and milled. One step in the scanning workflow requires the customer to screw in a "locator" post that screws into the implant replica in the model. This locator is required to be scanned in so the screw channel for the implant crown or bridge can be calculated by our software. Of course,the customer will need to scan the model without the locator as well to receive a clear STL to be designed on top of. One customer requested to implement a way for the software to be able to automatically remove the locator from the rest of the jaw when it is time to design so that the customer will not need to scan the model a second time. Of course, this would be rather difficult and essentially impossible to develop while maintaining accuracy. Especially since the locator blocks a small area of the model while being scanned.
This was handled by informing the customer that the ticket had been sent in as a software request. To satisfy the customer, guidelines and tips on how to streamline and expedite the scanning workflow were sent.
The purpose of customer input is to translate the customer requirements. Customer inputs is usually garnered via surveys and complaints. Customer involvement entails engaging customer in a two- way iterative conversation using a variety of mediums including focus group, surveys, on- line communities, complaints, social media and direct contact. The needs of customer are : Action, Appreciation, price, service and a good quality.
Based on my work experience, and working with vaccines research and development, based on the customers/the market requests of working on a corona virus, my company has decided not to invest in making one because the corona virus isn't as risky as the rest of the viruses, the corona virus is just over hyped by the news and social media. In fact the flue and pneumonia have more reported deaths every year.
in some cases the customer's opinion, is not based on facts and evidence therefore the executives decide not to abide or act on it.
Getting the right customer input through the product development cycle is essential to know whether the companies are aiming at the desired product to the markets. Various customer perspectives can be built into the development plan to test the product from start to finish for improving the odds of success. The purpose of the customer input is to translate the customer requirements.
Getting the right customer view throughout the product development cycle is essential to get the product right and to aim at the right target. As the product takes shape throughout the various development stages, it goes through constant iterations to eventually get to the final product. Various customer perspectives can be built into the development plan to test the product from start to finish to improve the odds of success.
At my company, we manufacture heart lung machines and disposible tubing kits to be used with the machines. These tubing kits are customized depending on the components and configuration desired by the hospital, so the customer's input is directly translated into each unique tubing kit design. I am not aware if there have been any unreasonable requests from customers for these kits, but we have a wide array of tubings, connectors, critical parts such as oxygenators and other components so we are able to accomodate the needs of most surgeons and perfusionists. If there was a request for a specific type of component which isn't part of our current catalog I think my company would do our best to work with our purchasing team in order to source it from either a new supplier or one of our established suppliers, but if that is not feasible we would discuss with the customer if it was possible to find an alternate solution using something from our existing catalog.
During the planning process, inputs are taken from the customer. Those that have worked in the industry, what is the most unreasonable input request you have received from a customer? How did you handle it?
In one of the projects I worked on, I had to create an instrument to register the patient's bone for a robotic knee replacement procedure. The surgeon I was working with wanted the instrument to be patient-specific - in other words, the instrument would be re-designed every time to match the patient's anatomy and would be discarded after each surgery. I mentioned to him that this type of device doesn't fit into my company's portfolio or business model, and instead designed a reusable instrument that came in multiple sizes to fit a range of patient's bones. We tested this reusable instrument in a cadaver lab and the surgeon was happy with how it functioned and the fit of the instrument on numerous specimen, so we proceeded with my design despite the fact that it was different from what the surgeon initially asked for, since it still served the primary function that the surgeon was looking for (registering the patient's bone).
For my master’s thesis there are three key people with input in the design, myself, my advisor, and our clinical collaborator. The clinical collaborator is the least involved in the day to day of the project, so during the planning phase of the project he was most often coming up with ideas that were outside the scope of the master’s thesis. The device is going to be for diagnosing a specific set of eye movement disorders for which there is not currently a good diagnostic tool. His ideas were for including a therapeutic element, and usage in long term studies to assess different treatment options for patients. Many of those ideas, whilst good ideas, are far beyond the scope of a master’s thesis. Luckily my adviser and I were on the same page about what was and what was not achievable within the time-frame of a masters. Together we were able to explain to him what was and was not going to be in the masters thesis, and create a plan that would include as much as he wanted without making the project too large.
Customer input and managing the expectations of project deliverables are very similar in that it is important for the customer to understand the limitations and boundaries within a project. If they do not understand this on a fundamental level, then information can be miscommunicated and managers/customers that manufacturers are working with can come to an impasse where the one thinks a deliverable can be accomplished, but their requirements are not within the scope of what is possible. In this regard, it is extremely important to establish clear expectations and guidelines from the outset before getting inputs later.
the company should precisely identify the needs and desires of its internal and external customers alike. This is achieved through doing marketing research and studies that he knows what the customer wants. Achieving the client’s needs, desires gives the company an advantage and makes it in a better competitive position.
The competitor faces most of the problems and obstacles you face, so you have to study their products that they offer, in order to stand on the advantages of the competitor's product so you try to develop it in your product, and to know the defects of the competitor's product so that it meets the market need in it.
On a previous project to create a protective device for children, the customer wanted the device to look aesthetic or socially acceptable so that children would want to wear it. The challenge of this was that making a device look socially acceptable is both very vague and opinions can vary significantly as to what is acceptable to different individuals, which made this user need seem unreasonable. This was solved by using questionnaires and user feedback to determine what socially acceptable meant to the population that would be using the device. Once what was socially acceptable was determined, this was translated into specific shape, dimensions, and colors that can be used to create design inputs. My project team found that the best way to handle vague customer needs was to use surveys and questionnaires to translate the information into design inputs that can actually be used to create a device.
I have not worked directly with customers before when I was employed but I did receive a fairly large number of unreasonable requests given the product I was working on and my work schedule. I was developing machine learning models for patient readmission into hospitals while being a contractor and a full-time student. As such, I was not able to produce the consistent updates given the difficult nature of the work. But I would routinely be told by my boss that our sales team had made completely ludicrous promises to our customers on a product that had not even been completed at the time. In my case I handled the situation by being lucky as my boss understood that completing these promises was unlikely and also that the reason behind some of the delays was due to the product being inconsistent, which would have caused more issues for our customers.
