Manage & Control 101

Don’t Skip the Formalities

Elephants may never forget things, but people do. In the lifecycle of any project, there are a number of moments where things can go wrong — someone works from the wrong file, parts get lost, or a team member requests changes without the requisite approval.

Using Cloud Services makes it easy to implement formal change processes that increase efficiency throughout the design lifecycle, while decreasing the likelihood of human error. If your business has more advanced data management needs that go beyond data sharing and secure storage, Manage & Control features are for you.

Who Needs Manage & Control?

If you need a more robust solution to control your data and ensure all stakeholders can work together to initiate changes with formal approvals, Manage & Control capabilities have you covered. You can use the 3DEXPERIENCE platform to manage changes with change management apps like the Change Execution and Issue Management apps.

Any organization with multiple stakeholders may want to use SOLIDWORKS’ Manage & Control capabilities, but there are a few clear cases for it:

1. Organizations with multiple approvers.

When a design is finished and ready to be submitted for approval, how many people need to approve it? If it needs to be approved by various managers, Cloud Services can help you easily achieve that.

  2.  Projects with issues that need to be fixed. 

Imagine you have a new design, but there are issues to fix. Without Cloud Services, you’d email the engineer the markups with no way of knowing whether they were received or what the project status is. Now imagine a week has gone by, and your colleague says they never saw the email.

With Cloud Services and the 3DEXPERIENCE platform you have access to the Issue Management app to alleviate those types of situations. Using the app, you can simply tag someone in your organization to an issue, and they’ll get a 3D notification with additional details. Clicking the link in the notification will take you right to the issue in question. Simple as that.

  3. Organizations that need documentation for compliance standards. 

If you need a higher level of documentation for International Organization for Standardization (ISO) audits, the Change Execution and Issue Management apps can keep historic records to make compliance reporting easier.

Why Formal Change Processes Matter

Document control is a challenge for any organization, as designs are shared, reviewed and revised by multiple stakeholders. And now that all those stakeholders are working remotely, there are even more obstacles, such as collaborating across different time zones and using distinct communication channels (e.g. email, cloud servers, and local media).

When an engineer receives changes from several stakeholders using different formats, simply updating a file can be a complicated task.

Cloud Services enables you to formalize change processes throughout the project lifecycle to increase visibility, clarify next steps and eliminate ill-advised shortcuts.

Manage & Control Projects at Any Scale

Cloud Services enables two core Manage & Control benefits for any organization:

Many organizations may find that Revisions and Maturity States are all they need to enact a formal change process. 

However, organizations that want more customization or a more nuanced change process can further benefit from the following three features:

1. Change Actions
Change actions help you capture all the information related to your data management. They are the core mechanism to track and ensure traceability on things like signatures, documents and metadata related to changes. In addition, this functionality allows only authorized users to make design changes or grant approvals.

2. Issues
Organizations who want to expand the change process further can utilize this functionality. Anyone in the company can start an issue related to a SOLIDWORKS design, and that issue can drive the change action. This is a great way to share input directly with the designers or engineers who can make the requested changes.

3. Routes
Some organizations have more complex approval requirements (e.g. multi-step or parallel sign-off procedures). You can set up routes to ensure all projects go through the correct approval process.

Why Use Change Actions
 

Change actions can involve many different processes and systems to complete. Without Cloud Services, the process to complete a change action is manual. This is true whether you do it through email, network folders, phone calls, multiple systems or a combination of those methods. There is room for error and little visibility for stakeholders, making it a cumbersome and unreliable process in most environments.

With Cloud Services, all facets of the change action can take place in a single platform with ultimate visibility and flexibility. Using change actions allows all members of the change action to:

5 Benefits of Managing the Product Lifecycle in the Cloud

Using Cloud Services to manage and control the product lifecycle delivers a few key benefits compared to on-premise lifecycle management solutions:

How Engineers & Designers Benefit from the Formal Change Process

Managers and IT teams aren’t the only ones who benefit from Cloud Services, when it comes to managing the product lifecycle.
 

CAD-Aware Design

Engineers and designers will love the ability to save files to the cloud directly from SOLIDWORKS. With Cloud Services, designers don’t have to think about managing CAD relationships or worry about the full effect their changes will have on other parts, assemblies, and drawings. They will also no longer have to close a file before reorganizing how it’s stored. Cloud Services also virtually eliminates the possibility of accidentally overwriting another team member’s changes.

Remote designers can leverage the cloud from anywhere to preview designs, browse their design tree and access custom properties — all from a web browser.

Issue Management
 

This video shares how Issue Management benefits the engineers and designers using Cloud Services, including:
 

The Importance of Change Management at Bowhead

Learn how Bowhead has adopted Cloud Services to fit its unique needs for managing design changes, parts, inventory, materials, and communication with external suppliers and customers.