Custom Customer Complexity

The customer is always right. But which customer? The one who wants a shot of sugar-free vanilla in their tall soy latte, or the one who wants a triple venti, half-sweet, non-fat, caramel macchiato? Both, of course. On its website, Starbucks proclaims: “Our baristas can make you any drink you want from over 80,000 different drink combinations available!”

That’s great for Starbucks’ customers, but maybe not so great for the baristas. From coffee to computers to cars, companies of all types are trying to balance customers’ expectations for personal service and customized products with the complexity it brings to product development, manufacturing and delivery. If coffee can have 80,000 different combinations, how many can a laptop, phone, plane or car have? How many options are too many? When it comes to offering customized products, design engineering teams are the baristas coming up with concoctions that customers supposedly want. But all the customers can’t be right.

Mass Customization Increases Complexity

Last year, customers were able to choose from among 341 front seat configurations when buying a new Volkswagen Golf. That’s a far cry from the line attributed to Henry Ford: “Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black.” Volkswagen, which has since announced a plan to reduce that number, isn’t alone in its efforts to deal with the choice vs. complexity conundrum. Many manufacturers are turning to technology to offer customers what they want while meeting government regulations and still developing a profitable, innovative product.

Ford was extolling the virtues of the assembly line and a common chassis for the Model T. Today’s manufacturers have a number of different innovations to consider:

• Simulation-led design and optimization to find and verify the best design iterations early in the development cycle while reducing the time needed for physical testing.

• Engineering computing power that supports multiple, simultaneous optimization and simulation runs of complex designs and systems.

• 3D printing to create realistic prototypes to speed the development cycle while fostering new design thinking that can lead to the consolidation of multiple parts to simplify manufacturing and maintenance.

• Incorporating embedded software that in some cases can provide personalization and customization to customers via a common platform.

• Product lifecycle management approaches to make supplier collaboration, change orders, model reuse and platform-based system design more efficient.

• Data collection and analytics to help discover anomalies and determine which customer requirements should be implemented vs. which would be loss leaders.

Freedom to Fail

Henry Ford’s first foray into commercial automobile production failed; so did his second. As Robert Green writes in his book “Mastery,” Ford attributed the first to trying to meet too many customers’ requirements and the second to his principal investors being too involved in the design process. More than 100 years later, the promise of digital manufacturing puts us on the cusp of another assembly line moment in industrial productivity.

Between now and when efficient, profitable mass customization is routine thanks to accurate market intelligence and flexible manufacturing lines all connected to engineering via a digital thread, many mistakes will be made. The technology already exists to take much of the guesswork out of marketing and the fear of failure out of design. The more difficult aspect of achieving efficiency in the face of complexity is a cultural one. Company leaders must be willing to invest in new technology to drive innovation, and everyone involved in product development and delivery must be willing to disrupt the status quo.