A quick peek into some research on … designing products for environmental compliance from our 2009 report. And maybe more importantly, here is the link to participate in the 2011 study on designing for compliance, cost, and sustainability. 
This year, I am expanding the research to recognize the trade-offs sometimes required between cost and compliance. Please share the link with your friends in engineering and manufacturing.
Note: For my blogging friends and those in the press, let me know if you are interested in helping gather responses, I will return the favor with some contributed content.
Research Findings – 2011
OK, it is a trick heading. There are no findings yet, take the survey and help me gather a broad perspective on the issue. If you are a consultant or a vendor, please feel free to pass along the link to an engineer or manufacturer. I will share some of the data back on this blog in return.
Research Findings – 2009
One of the most interesting findings from the last report was the broadening view of sustainability. The focus on environmental compliance information was getting the most attention in data collection from suppliers (no surprise) but the growth in focus on a broader view of sustainability was much higher (including carbon footprint, energy usage, waste/recycling). We are looking into that question again in the current survey, it will be interesting to see what has changed in the last year or so. See more of the report findings in my post on making environmental product compliance sustainable.
Cost and Sustainability
I have written about compliance before, and the need to reduce the compliance tax on product innovation. While the prior survey focused primarily on environmental product compliance, the research shows a growing interest in sustainability. But the business reality is that compliance and sustainability can’t always command a higher price, so companies have to continue to focus on controlling product cost to be commercially sustainable. You may have heard my views on designing for product cost and product cost management (PCM) before, it is something I am passionate about. So now is the opportunity to look at these issues in a holistic way.
So that was a quick peek into some recent research on compliance and a request for help in learning more, I hope you found it interesting. Let us know what it looks like from your perspective.
Please feel free to review more free research and white papers about PLM and other enterprise software for manufacturers from Tech-Clarity.