Engineers

Engineers, not surprisingly, are people who are specially training in an engineering field. In a nutshell, they design solutions to a problem.

Types of Engineers

• Design engineers solve problems by creating a product.
• Software engineers solve problems with code.
• Manufacturing engineers create processes to solve problems.

Engineers are key players in Lean companies because of their focus on problem solving. Lean, however, changes the nature of the problems that need to be solved.

For example, design engineers have to look beyond the material costs of the parts in the design and find a solution that is easy to build.

Manufacturing engineers need to understand that fast machines are not always the answer, if they don’t help create flow.

Software engineers must match the program to the process, not the other way around.

Engineers have a reputation for being a bit rigid in their thinking and for not having strong people skills. In a Lean company, engineers must break both of these stereotypes.