Social Media in Product Design

By LINDSEY CHRISTENSEN | Published: FEB 8, 2012

Social networking isn’t just for after work anymore. Companies that implement a social networking Intranet solution find a grass-roots approach to solving some of their largest problems. When engineers are able to explore design solutions in a social networking atmosphere, the results can bring a better product to market faster.

In effect, social networking at work creates an intellectual buzz throughout a company that springboards the company toward rapid knowledge sharing and success.

Creating a collaborative atmosphere at work has other benefits too. Social networks provide an early warning system and alert people to the things that collide when someone has a good idea but doesn’t know how it affects other plans or resources. For example, engineers can use networking to make a decision with input from the financial side. Marketing can know almost immediately when a product takes longer to move through the pipeline than originally planned.

Social networks also share knowledge with the right people who can act. People from engineering, marketing, and design can approach the same project together from different directions at the same time. Those pockets of information possessed by individuals can become available to the majority of their team.

These online social forums provide an ongoing context for knowledge exchange. Work-related problems may be discussed at first, but more general discussion about the direction of the industry can co-create an atmosphere conducive to people sharing more with others.

To keep the human community interested, it takes a well-planned and implemented social network.

Using engineering-specific networking tools, like Creo and Creo View, help teams improve electromechanical detailed design processes, approve designs, and get products to market faster. Companies like Jive, ThoughtFarmer, and IGLOO deliver other intranet social networking solutions.

In this episode of the Product Design Show, Vince and Allison focus on tools to help an internal design team collaborate, from social media to top-down design to skeleton models.