The Intern Diaries — Part III
Garrett Schaefer is a student at Heritage Christian High School and a Mechanical Design intern at Glassboard
My Product Development Expectations
Before interning at Glassboard, I had a superficial understanding of what product development was. Upon hearing the term “product development” I would immediately think of tech titans like Amazon, Apple, and GM. Every day, these companies each have thousands of engineers working to design and build new products which come to consumers through a coordinated rollout in massive quantities. I thought that these large companies were responsible for almost all the technological innovation occurring and that it would be nearly impossible for a small company to match the innovations and technologies these corporations constantly develop. Instead, I figured that a small product development firm would design and build simpler products as they would be inhibited by a lack of manpower and resources.
After a week of starting my internship, I realized that my initial perception could not have been further from the truth.
The development of high tech, quality products does not require a massive team; rather, it simply requires a group of talented individuals who know how to work together and combine their respective skill sets.
Seeing people with varying specialties come together to solve problems that cross multiple disciplines happened daily at Glassboard. This resulted in innovative solutions that were not only genius but also effective. This gave me a new perspective on what product development truly was. It did not have to be a massive company using state of the art tech to solve a problem; instead, product development is simply the transferring of an idea into reality, and a small company can accomplish this feat just as well as a tech titan.
It is hard to make an idea into reality
Regardless of the size of a company, product development does not happen easily or overnight. I learned that there is a complex, active process that ideas are subjected to before they can emerge as products for the market to buy. This process consists of designing, sourcing, prototyping, and manufacturing a product. As a high school student, I was hardly qualified to contribute to any of these areas considering my limited experience. However, by the end of the summer, I had a basic understanding of how to design products and go through the rest of the process to fully develop them. After an entire summer, I still have only scratched the surface of understanding product development which has given me a greater appreciation for those who routinely produce new products.
Communication - A Necessity
After living product development for a summer, I think that the key to a product being developed successfully in communication. This communication manifests itself in several ways:
1st — the customer must be able to effectively communicate their idea, demands, and constraints to the development firm. Otherwise, no one truly has a complete understanding of what they are supposed to be building.
2nd — there must be communication between members of the development team. At Glassboard, this process was streamlined to make sure that everyone knew what role they were playing in every project.
3rd — there must be communication between the product development firm and those manufacturing their product. If everyone does not have the same files and objective, a faulty product will be manufactured. Engineers are typically not known for their excellent ability to converse and express their ideas, but in the product development space, this is exactly what is needed to succeed.
In addition to verbal communication, technological communication is necessary for products to be developed. Over the summer, I had the opportunity to construct the housing for an electrical board that a fellow intern designed. Because we were seamlessly able to share files, the design process became exponentially easier, and we were able to design more quickly and with greater accuracy. I learned that being able to share Inventor and other CAD files are vital in developing a successful product.
Making Your Own Parts
Many new products are capable of being constructed using pre-existing products. By combining off the shelf components, a new, innovative solution can be formed. However, I had the valuable experience of designing and making my own components because there were no off the shelf products that could fulfill our unique design requirements. Because of this, I not only developed the skills to 3D print specific parts, but I also became proficient in casting parts with silicone. This allowed me to use plastics or soft, flexible silicone to create specific parts that were not commercially available. Since I had this option of materials, I was able to solve a wider range of problems and design more effectively: something that is of paramount importance in product development.
In addition to crafting my own parts, I learned that off the shelf parts can also be modified to suit purposes that they were not originally intended for. Over the summer, I saw traditional products be used in ways that they are not explicitly designed for. This taught me to expand how I viewed off the shelf component because with slight modifications they can often provide an unorthodox solution to a problem.
One final lesson I learned (and one of the most valuable) is that sandpaper can be used to repurpose almost anything!
Whether it is being used to make sure a product seals properly or to shave material off a component to make a better fit, sandpaper truly is a gift to engineers.
My Conclusions
I entered the summer having virtually no engineering experience. I did not know how to design or build products - let alone how to make my own parts. Additionally, my perception of product development was completely misguided. However, as the summer progressed, I gradually became adept at designing components, and I learned how to tailor off the shelf components to needs that they were not initially designed for. Additionally, I gained experience 3D printing and using silicone to create custom parts to create products. However, perhaps the most important thing I took away from my summer is how a small team can accomplish the feat of creating amazing products. I learned that product development does not require a large corporation with multiple engineering departments; rather, a small company like Glassboard can innovate equally as effectively. After my summer as an intern at Glassboard, I know that I will never look at a new product the same again because I will see the immense amount of work that went into its design and production. Product development is an arduous process, but when you have a talented team around you, it becomes a little easier.
Garrett Schaefer is a Mechanical Engineering intern at Glassboard, a hardware focused product development company.
