CATI Technotes: Ten Strategies for Becoming an Effective CAD Leader

Strategy 2:
Develop skills and retain talents

Equally as important as choosing the right CAD tool to
support your operations is putting it in the hands of skilled designers and
engineers. No matter how automated technology becomes, product design will
remain a creative, innovative process that depends upon the contributions of
talented, highly skilled professionals. As a CAD leader, you are responsible
for providing your team members with the tools that they need to perform their
jobs successfully.

It’s also your job to provide for continuing skills
development and find ways to retain your most valuable engineering talent.
These goals go hand in hand. If you help your team members acquire skills,
through ongoing CAD training and professional development, and help them remain
motivated in their work by feeding them a steady diet of engineering
challenges, you will have done your part in keeping them interested and
satisfied in their work.

But not just any training will do. You should tailor your
training program toward the needs of both your organization and the individual.
Try to match your company’s needs with the interests and talents of specific
team members. If your process requires
advanced surface modeling and one of your designers has an obvious industrial
design bent, providing that type of training addresses both needs. Look at your
processes and assess your people. When it makes sense, customize training to meet
the specific requirements of your group.

Some managers see the time and money allocated to CAD
training as a budgetary item that they can cut. This view lacks foresight
because the costs related to training are investments rather than
expenses—investments in your organization’s ability to efficiently solve
engineering challenges and investments towards retaining your most talented
engineers. An effective CAD leader understands the important role that training
plays in a team’s long-term success.

Read past articles:

Strategy 1: Embrace best practices and new technologies

Strategy 2: Develop skills and retain talents

Strategy 3: Maximize integration and automation

Strategy 4: Foster collaboration and innovation

Strategy 5: Focus on continuous quality improvement

Strategy 6: Leverage design data throughout the enterprise

Strategy 7: Document and analyze productivity

Strategy 8: Manage product design data efficiently

Strategy 9: Communicate effectively with business personnel

Strategy 10: Demonstrate product development contributions

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