Enhancing collaboration: Between design and simulation departments by methods of complexity management

The signifi cance of CAD-CAE coupling has grown with the increasing use of simulations in development processes. With the focus on technical aspects like simulation data management in literature, however, there is a lack of research on the implications on collaboration. This paper uses methods of structural complexity management to improve communication and collaboration between simulation and design departments. Design structure matrices and multiple domain matrices are derived from system graphs that come from interviews. A case study uses these methods to handle data to enhance collaboration between departments. The results are techniques to deal with lacking information and low degrees of connectivity in the matrices. After an overlay of different matrices, standard procedures like triangulation and clustering can be applied that would otherwise not have been sensible. This leads to knowledge clusters and sequences of documents and task that help to integrate simulations more smoothly into the product development process.