SMALL BATCHES IN ACTION

 

To see this process in action, let me introduce you to a company in Boise, Idaho, called SGW Designworks. SGW’s specialty is rapid production techniques for physical products. Many of its clients are startups.

SGW Designworks was engaged by a client who had been asked by a military customer to build a complex field x-ray system to detect explosives and other destructive devices at border crossings and in war zones.

Conceptually, the system consisted of an advanced head unit that read x-ray film, multiple x-ray film panels, and the framework to hold the panels while the film was being exposed. The client already had the technology for the x-ray panels and the head unit, but to make the product work in rugged military settings, SGW needed to design and deliver the supporting structure that would make the technology usable in the field. The framework had to be stable to ensure a quality x-ray image, durable enough for use in a war zone, easy to deploy with minimal training, and small enough to collapse into a backpack.

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This is precisely the kind of product we are accustomed to thinking takes months or years to develop, yet new techniques are shrinking that time line. SGW immediately began to generate the visual prototypes by using 3D computer-aided design (CAD) software. The 3D models served as a rapid communication tool between the client and the SGW team to make early design decisions.

The team and client settled on a design that used an advanced locking hinge to provide the collapsibility required without compromising stability. The design also integrated a suction cup/pump mechanism to allow for fast, repeatable attachment to the x-ray panels. Sounds complicated, right?

Three days later, the SGW team delivered the first physical prototypes to the client. The prototypes were machined out of aluminum directly from the 3D model, using a technique called computer numerical control (CNC) and were hand assembled by the SGW team.

The client immediately took the prototypes to its military contact for review. The general concept was accepted with a number of minor design modifications. In the next five days, another full cycle of design iteration, prototyping, and design review was completed by the client and SGW. The first production run of forty completed units was ready for delivery three and a half weeks after the initiation of the development project.

SGW realized that this was a winning model because feedback on design decisions was nearly instantaneous. The team used the same process to design and deliver eight products, serving a wide range of functions, in a twelve-month period. Half of those products are generating revenue today, and the rest are awaiting initial orders, all thanks to the power of working in small batches.

 
THE PROJECT TIME LINE
Design and engineering of the initial virtual prototype 1 day
Production and assembly of initial hard prototypes 3 days
Design iteration: two additional cycles 5 days
Initial production run and assembly of initial forty units 15 days
 

Small Batches in Education

 

Not every type of product—as it exists today—allows for design change in small batches. But that is no excuse for sticking to outdated methods. A significant amount of work may be needed to enable innovators to experiment in small batches. As was pointed out in Chapter 2, for established companies looking to accelerate their innovation teams, building this platform for experimentation is the responsibility of senior management.

Imagine that you are a schoolteacher in charge of teaching math to middle school students. Although you may teach concepts in small batches, one day at a time, your overall curriculum cannot change very often. Because you must set up the curriculum in advance and teach the same concepts in the same order to every student in the classroom, you can try a new curriculum at most only once a year.

How could a math teacher experiment with small batches? Under the current large-batch system for educating students, it would be quite difficult; our current educational system was designed in the era of mass production and uses large batches extensively.

A new breed of startups is working hard to change all that. In School of One, students have daily “playlists” of their learning tasks that are attuned to each student’s learning needs, based on that student’s readiness and learning style. For example, Julia is way ahead of grade level in math and learns best in small groups, so her playlist might include three or four videos matched to her aptitude level, a thirty-minute one-on-one tutoring session with her teacher, and a small group activity in which she works on a math puzzle with three peers at similar aptitude levels. There are assessments built into each activity so that data can be fed back to the teacher to choose appropriate tasks for the next playlist. This data can be aggregated across classes, schools, or even whole districts.

Now imagine trying to experiment with a curriculum by using a tool such as School of One. Each student is working at his or her own pace. Let’s say you are a teacher who has a new sequence in mind for how math concepts should be taught. You can see immediately the impact of the change on those of your students who are at that point in the curriculum. If you judge it to be a good change, you could roll it out immediately for every single student; when they get to that part of the curriculum, they will get the new sequence automatically. In other words, tools like School of One enable teachers to work in much smaller batches, to the benefit of their students. (And, as tools reach wide-scale adoption, successful experiments by individual teachers can be rolled out district-, city-, or even nationwide.) This approach is having an impact and earning accolades. Time magazine recently included School of One in its “most innovative ideas” list; it was the only educational organization to make the list.5