I believe what motivates me the most is the impact of my projects. Thinking about who it will help and how it will help them. As biomeds we have a unique opportunity to touch so many lives with our work,…   Read more»

I was at first surprised how low meaningful work was in the list then thought about it. If your job has poor pay with a bad work environment and boring work, even if the work helps others, you are likely…   Read more»

I really enjoy making stuff. My heart lies with R&D, but I would like a managerial role as well. I believe my best path is learning as much as I can, as hands on as I can as an engineer…   Read more»

Sometimes you have to weight what yo love about the job and some other options that may be available to you. But if you are loving what yo do, and are ablet to support yourself and find it fulfilling, i…   Read more»

I think each point you listed has a strong effect on employee retention. Satisfaction is strong cause you need to be doing the work you want to be doing, but bad interpersonal relationships, problems with supervisors, and pay can be…   Read more»

I believe working to prevent demotivation within their current workforce is more important. Any self motivated individual will eventually get burnt out like the rest of the company’s workers if there is a problem. So, I believe it is more…   Read more»

As the sim stated that at first we were not even going to have a backup supplier in the first place, I thought one would be fine. I also only liked one of the available back up coatings, which pushed…   Read more»

From my experience, I have found that QC focuses on testing devices during the manufacturing and R&D process to ensure they meet expected standards. So things like measurement testing, material testing, etc. The QA members focuses more on matching those…   Read more»

For contracts I would focus more on the business end of things as well as quality. If both companies have equal products, I would look at how strict their codes are and how well they control their products. I would…   Read more»

I am in agreeance that for me right now understanding budgeting is the most difficult. I believe that once we are exposed to industry experience we will start to understanding pricing structures for materials and know what to expect when…   Read more»

 What are some reasons that increase the cost of the project, and how to avoid them? There are plenty of reasons that can increase the cost of a project. The main two that come to my mind are vendor pricing…   Read more»

@qbs2  Deciding priorates is a difficult task that may change job to job. We saw in one of the recent simulations how budget and quality can go head to head. Depending on which route you took, you either limited your…   Read more»

Firstly, thank you for making this post, I am really enjoying the responses and learning about personal experiences at companies nearby. I had worked an internship at Weiss-Aug in their surgical products division. They work to produce parts for laparoscopic…   Read more»

It causes a big ethical dilemma when trying to decide between getting a product out on the market to help patients as soon as possible and delaying the release for extra testing. It is best ethically to take the time…   Read more»

The researchers and industry need to start their relationships with very clear expectations of what can and cannot be shared with clear terms to their NDAs. Some projects may allow for researchers to share specific findings or manufacturing methods. As…   Read more»

I fell that keeping steady contact with the manufacturing team during the design process, especially toward the end of the process is very important. The manufacturing team would have much more in depth knowledge on how the product would scale…   Read more»

I would start by reaching out to the vendor and ask them to send replacements as the shipment was not up to their usual standards, hopefully it was just a bad batch, and hopefully it is a quick replacement. If…   Read more»

The mini-sim was luckily set in a way where civilized conversations solved the problems. We were lucky that the people involved trusted each other’s opinions and experience. It is not always like this in the world. Sometimes management does not…   Read more»

My first ideas is to call a meeting with as many of the project team members as possible, as soon as possible. In this meeting we would brain storm possible theories about what has gone wrong, why it has gone…   Read more»

A project manager would ideally have as much flexibility as possible while still being able to keep the project on track. It is important to have some give and be able to take surprises and work with them. However, if…   Read more»