R&D conference
Wednesday, Thursday and Friday there was a big R&D conference in Boston. Our engineering manager for the freezers suggested it to my boss and he had reservations made for all of us.
(The freezer manger then only attended half of Wednesday and have of Thursday before heading off for the long weekend. So, it makes me think he wanted airfare to Boston as he is the only one of us who doesn’t live in the general area…)
There are several hundred folks from a VERY wide range of industries taking about design and development.
The first day I sat with some folks who make train engines, one who makes toilet valves and one who makes food additives.
Day two I was with someone who makes lens for glasses, a pharmaceutical person, a person who makes ceramic chips for computers and two other food folks.
The talks have ranged from how Netflix determines what packages they offer (not very good) to how the Covid Vaccine was done in one year instead of 12 (Very good).
There is a lot of cross talk and networking, which my boss loves. He coerced us into staying for the cocktail party last night so we could mingle with others. And, we did get into a very in-depth conversation with one of the women who had made a presentation on reducing development time for medications. (Who happens to be a big customer of ours, which is why I think my boss was interested in taking with her.)
So, there are interesting folks and they have some interesting stories.
There are clearly some rivalries here too. Several different pharmaceutical companies are all making sure they get heard. And, if the Pepsi folks say something, you know the Coke folks are going to demand the microphone. (One woman from Coke yesterday asked for the mike to ask a question and basically went on a 5 minute lecture on how Coke did it better than what the speaker had presented. I think they could have cut off her mike, but that’s me…)
I’m not one for mingling and networking. Just not in my nature.
But, it is interesting to see such a wide cross section of design folks together.
And, they’re from across the world. Most are from the US, but still a good percentage from Europe and South America. Not too many from other places, but it is still wider than many of these events.
And, I’d guess about 40% women both in attendance and giving presentations.
As an old white guy, I’m glad there are a lot of folks who don’t look like me here.
If we really want to get a lot of different ideas, the first step is in making sure we get a wide variety of folks suggesting things. And, that’s something they’ve done fairly well here.
Still more old white guys than anyone else, but at least they’re not a super majority.
It is also strange to me that all these “powerhouses of industry” are decades younger than me.
20 years in an industry is considered an old hand.
I’ve been working as a design engineer for 37 years. (OK, OK, I know you want to hear that it is 37 years, 7 days and 4 minutes since I started my first job as a design engineer as I write this. But, the time keeps creeping up…)
So, it’s strange to me when they say things like “most of you don’t remember what it was like back in the 90’s. And, I think, “yeah, I was on my third job after school then. And, that was at the start of the 90’s…” I’ve worked for my boss since 97. And, that was at my 5th job.
I don’t know how much of what comes out of this conference is going to be directly actionable. But, it is giving ideas on different ways to look at things. And, ways to try and speed up some things and gather wider information in other areas.
A theme from almost everyone is “we need to cut down red tape”. My company is no exception to this. We’ve been getting worse lately and need some ways to rein it in.
I took the train in day 1 and it was OK. It’s still 1 1/2 km walk from the train station, so not super close, but walkable. Day 2 I drove as I knew I’d be staying late for the cocktail thing and that would put me past the express train time.
Today I drove as the event is supposed to close early and I want to get home quickly as my wife and I are driving 5 hours to a show this weekend this evening. I’d like to start that as soon as possible.
I am glad I got to take the train one day as I do prefer that method, even if it rarely works out for me logistically.
This event has been better than I expected. But, I’m still not 100% sure worth it.
I guess we’ll see if we can actually use any of the ideas that come out of it.
Making them work will take buy in from other parts of the company, and I’m not sure how well that will go over.