Expert CAD Management The Complete Guide phần 2 ppt

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CHAPTER 1: WHAT’S INVOLVED: DEFINING THE POSITION ■
There’s probably no one right answer to what upper management’s perspective
on the CAD manager’s role should be, but I’ve noticed that the following views are
widely held by corporate management:
• The CAD manager should enable CAD-related productivity.
• The CAD manager should strive for user efficiency and more profitable opera-
tion of the company.
• The CAD manager should remove complexity and make things simple, because
making things simple usually makes things go better.
• The CAD manager must keep CAD technology on budget and realize that there
are no blank checks for software or hardware.
In my 17 years of CAD management experience, I’ve found that CAD managers
who don’t subscribe to these views have rocky relationships with their management
teams. Conversely, if you live these ideals on a daily basis, your management probably
has a great opinion of you—and your users probably like you as well! When people
work efficiently and you don’t spend too much money, everybody is happy.
You’re Never Done, Though
One glaring difference between the perspectives of your users and your management
is that management expects constantly improving efficiency—what I like to call the
“good enough isn’t” mentality. If you do a great job facilitating productivity, making
things simple, and staying on budget as you go, you’re just setting the bar that much
higher for next year.
So what types of questions does your management ask about improving efficiency?
Here are some examples:
• How can we get the same work done in less time?
• How can we get more jobs done with the same number of people?
• What’s our CAD manager doing to make CAD processes work better six months
from now? A year from now? Two years from now?
Although your users may achieve a state of satisfaction when their hardware and
software systems are harmonized and productive, management feels no such satisfaction.

Whenever you feel particularly good about the state of your CAD environment, pat
yourself on the back and savor the feeling for a little while. But don’t pause for too
long, because management expects more from you.
In today’s hypercompetitive business environments, the effective CAD manager
must embrace a longer-term view. How do you balance management’s longer-term view
with your users’ shorter-term view? We’ll get into that in a moment.
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■ BALANCING TASKS AND PERSPECTIVES
Balancing Tasks and Perspectives
You’ve arrived at a point in defining your CAD management position where you real-
ize that you have many tasks in front of you that your users and management probably
don’t fully understand but expect you to accomplish. You have to somehow take into
account the users’ perspective and upper management’s perspective and expectations as
well. This is starting to look like a complicated job; and, to be honest, the CAD man-
ager’s job can become as complicated as you let it. The good news is that there is a
methodology you can use to approach these sometimes conflicting tasks and perspec-
tives to make sense out of the CAD manager’s position.
To me, CAD management is like solving an extremely complex equation. You
can either flounder, trying to solve an equation with way too many variables, or you can
simplify the equation by eliminating variables and making it easier to solve. Therefore,
the balancing act of taking all the different tasks and perspectives into account is about
thinking through CAD management for your particular company and breaking tasks
into manageable chunks that reinforce each other. Let’s do the exercise in the following
section to see how this works.
Simplifying Your CAD Management Equation
I’ve already recommended that you inventory all the perceived tasks you’re expected to
perform and that you break these tasks down into the real tasks that lie behind them.
If you haven’t built your task inventory do so now so that you can analyze it using the
following steps:

In this exercise you are encouraged to really think and capture all the information
you need to describe your work tasks and analyze them. It may seem easy at first, but
when you really start analyzing what you do you’ll be amazed at how complex it can all
become. So get out a few sheets of paper and get ready to really analyze your job:
1. Write down each task you do in list form and figure out which items are more in
line with your users’ expectations and which ones are more focused on the needs
of upper management.
2. Rank all the tasks in terms of priority, with users’ priorities in one list and man-
agerial priorities in another. You probably won’t get your priority order perfect,
but with some careful thought, you should get close. Reshuffle as much as you
need to before continuing, because this prioritization is the basis for the rest of
the exercise.
3. If at any point you feel that you need to expand or contract your task list, do so.
After you’ve made your changes, go back to step 2 and reshuffle.
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 as many times as required.
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CHAPTER 1: WHAT’S INVOLVED: DEFINING THE POSITION ■
5. Now the fun really begins! Sort through your lists of user-based and management-
based tasks, and look for any tasks that are similar. For example, a user-based
task may be to “provide training,” whereas a management-based task of “make
users more productive” may involve training. It always helps to look for win-win
scenarios when combining tasks: for example, users may feel they’ve received
great training, while at the same time management thinks they’ve received a more
productive work force. If both users and management are happy then you’ve
completed two tasks for the price of one.
6. Unify your task lists to reflect any symbiotic relationships between tasks. You
might, for instance, combine “provide user training” with “make users more
productive” to make a single “raise user productivity through effective training”
task on your simplified list.

7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 as many times as required, and keep looking for tasks that
have interdependencies.
8. Finalize your new, simplified task list. Put it aside for a day or two, and then
come back and review it to make sure you haven’t missed anything.
Exercise Conclusions—and Expansion
You may have spent several hours on this exercise, but it was time spent in quality
thought. You should have a single reduced or simplified list of tasks (the variables in
your CAD management equation) and should now be able to manage the tasks more
easily (because there are fewer variables to deal with).
The only thing that remains to be done is to sort through your list of CAD tasks
and decide where management-based tasks must take precedence over user-based tasks.
Remember that management is more concerned about strategic use of the resources you
have while users tend to focus on making this more optimal for themselves. Resolving
the two, sometimes, competing areas of interest can be a tough balancing act. At the
end of this (possibly laborious) process you’ll know the following things about your
CAD management job equation:
• You’ll know which variables drive the equation: the ones with highest priority.
• You’ll know which variables are interlinked, thus giving you the extra economy
of solving multiple problems at once.
• You’ll know which variables are less important than you may have thought—
and which ones are more important than you thought.
• You’ll have a thorough understanding of how to solve your CAD management
job equation from both user and management perspectives—and how to achieve
balance between the two.
Take whatever time you need to refine your list now, even if it means closing the
book and coming back later. You may need to do this exercise away from the office
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■ THE BUSINESS ANGLE: MONEY TALKS!
late at night when it’s quiet and the phone’s not ringing, so you can focus. Few things

are always true, but I’ve come to believe that CAD managers who plan, prioritize, sort,
analyze, and optimize their task lists are the ones who achieve optimal success.
The Business Angle: Money Talks!
You’ve done your analysis of all the tasks and the user and management perspectives,
and you’ve tried to get your CAD management position simplified into the most basic
equation possible, but it still seems complex, doesn’t it? No matter how much you
think about your position, and no matter how you try to simplify the tasks, you need
to accomplish a lot. And no matter how thoroughly you think things through, you
know a case will come up that involves competing priorities, right? It’s reasonable to
ask, “How do I resolve these situations?” In the business world, the uniform answer to
this question is that you have to make the decision that’s best for the company—and this
is why I say, “Money talks.”
A key to framing issues from the “money talks” perspective is to understand
how competing priorities reach the attention of your management. If an issue causes
enough discord, management will hear about it; and when they do, they’re going to
wonder why you haven’t handled the problem. Remember, you’re the CAD manager,
and you’re supposed to be facilitating optimal productivity—so why do you have
unhappy users? At this point, management will ask you, “Why was this problem ele-
vated up to us? Why haven’t you handled it?” And your immediate comeback must be,
“Because I have different people with different perspectives. They have different things
that they want and need or expect, and I can’t make everybody happy.”
Figure 1.4 Management tends to measure things financially rather than technically.So remember that the same
level of technical vigor you apply to CAD programs is exactly the way your management thinks about money!
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CHAPTER 1: WHAT’S INVOLVED: DEFINING THE POSITION ■
Management will now come back to you with another question along the lines
of, “Well, what do you think we should do?” As soon as this question is asked, you
have an opportunity to resolve the conflict using financial reasoning rather than techni-
cal reasoning. The key is to have your recommendation ready and to format it using

business metrics, from the point of view of what’s best for the company’s business
position.
A Quick Example
Let’s say you have a user revolt on your hands because the users want the latest version
of the software, but this software is expensive and the business isn’t doing well enough
to afford the expenditure at present. This is the budget reality that the CAD manager
understands but the CAD users don’t. The CAD users are complaining loudly, and the
issue has come to upper management’s attention. The dialogue of this meeting might go
something like this:
Management: “There’s a lot of user discord, and they’re telling us that we need
to go up to the new CAD System Revision 30, whereas we’re running on CAD System
Revision 28 right now. What’s the problem?”
CAD manager: “Our users feel that we should be using the most modern and
available technology. They’re tired of using technology that’s two years old, and they
feel that we should make the move.”
Management: “Well, why don’t we make the switch, then?”
CAD manager: “Going to CAD System Revision 30 would cost us $1,000 per
seat, and with 20 users in our operating environment, that’s a $20,000 software cost
that we didn’t budget. In addition, it would cost us close to $2,000 per user to get
them trained and through the ramp-up and productivity curve that always occurs when
we install new software. I’m looking at a total fee of about $60,000 to get this new
software implemented. You and I both know that’s not in the cards budgetarily over
the next six months. This is why I’ve said no to new software.”
If your management team knows that $60,000 isn’t available to upgrade soft-
ware, and if you present the argument just as I’ve articulated it here, they will respect
your judgment and be impressed that you’ve taken the initiative to handle the financial
aspect of the problem. Management’s opinion of you will only go up as they come to
understand that you’re technical and financial and that you’ve combined those skills to
look out for their business. Management also knows that you’d probably like to get
your hands on the new software as much as your users, but you have enough discipline

to say, “We can’t afford to do that now. It’s not in the best interests of the company.
Even though the users want it, buying the software isn’t in the financial business inter-
ests of our company.”
Now you should go back over your list of tasks and user and management
expectations from a budgetary or “money talks” point of view. Think about tasks that
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■ THE BUSINESS ANGLE: MONEY TALKS!
may be placed on your list—either by your management or by your users—that don’t
match up with the financial reality of your company. By ranking these tasks or expecta-
tions in terms of financial feasibility, you’ll automatically re-sort and reprioritize your
CAD management responsibilities. And by understanding what you can afford to do in
the long term, you’ve gained perspective on which jobs you can tackle first, second,
last—or not at all.
Figure 1.5 Here we see how the prioritization of a list can change dramatically when the monetary filter is applied.
Evaluating Tasks Based on Finances
The financial reality, the “money talks” perspective, becomes a useful reality check that
you can apply to any task that’s placed on your CAD management agenda. I’ll give you
an example:
Management may come to you and say that they want you to implement a com-
pletely paperless, web-driven CAD environment. However, you know that the budget
over the next 12 months will allow for only $5,000 worth of investment in software. It
therefore becomes easy to determine that the task is not realistic, because the money
isn’t available. Don’t assume that management understands the amount of money and
time required to implement a proposed task—it’s up to you to make that determination
and inform management of the task’s financial feasibility.
By vetting each task—by looking at what it will cost to do something and priori-
tizing your task list based on that “money talks” viewpoint—you’ll be able to defend
your choices and priorities based on financial arguments. And when everything is
financially based, you’ll find that management will question you less and respect your

decisions more and more as time goes by. Make no mistake: Management knows
whether you understand the financial picture, because that is a core part of what they
manage. It’s easier to gain respect from management by being financial than technical,
as counterintuitive as that may seem.
Item #1
Sort Method
Lowest Cost
Resulting Order
3, 2, 5, 1 then 4
Resulting Order
5, 1, 4, 2 then 3
Sort Method
User Desire
List Items Sorting Method Results
Item #2
Item #3
Item #4
Item #5
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CHAPTER 1: WHAT’S INVOLVED: DEFINING THE POSITION ■
Gaining the Power to Do Your Job
At this point in defining the CAD management position, you’ve completed the follow-
ing analytical steps:
• You’ve analyzed the tasks that you’re expected to accomplish.
• You’ve looked at that task list from different perspectives—from your own per-
spective, from the users’ perspective, from management’s perspective, and from
a money perspective.
• You’ve painstakingly processed and prioritized lists, thinking about what is
required to accomplish each task.

• You’ve developed a simplified multivariable equation that describes your job.
Now that you’ve come this far, you probably know more about doing your job
than 90 percent of the CAD managers I’ve ever talked to. You have a good understand-
ing of what’s expected of you in your environment and who expects it, and you have a
game plan to get there. But one important thing is missing from your CAD management
plan: authority. Your authority.
I see far too many CAD managers who are expected to do a lot but are given no
power to do their jobs. Many of these CAD managers will say their management team
doesn’t give them the power they need to do the job. But I would argue that it’s the
CAD manager’s responsibility to gain the power required to do the job. Nobody is
going to give you the power to go out and tell people how to work, until you earn it.
Your senior management is the only group that can give you the power you need. To
gain that power, you must earn your management’s respect.
This is why I’ve taken so much time in this chapter to help you develop your
task list and think things through. When management questions you, when they ulti-
mately want you to make recommendations and tell them why things should be done a
certain way, you’ll be well prepared.
How do you take the task list and all the thought, variables, and equations
you’ve developed and distill them down so you can gain the power you need to do
your job? The process is somewhat detailed, so I’ll tackle it step by step:
You must have clear documentation. It’s not enough to think about the tasks you need
to accomplish. It’s not enough to think about what order they should be done in or
how much they will cost: You have to write it down. In order for management to
Note: If you want to get management’s attention, look at your job from the business angle.
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■ GAINING THE POWER TO DO YOUR JOB
understand what you’re doing, you must have your prioritized list of tasks written in a
brief, executive-summary format. CAD managers frequently try to write their task list
in great technical detail, and they go to great lengths to talk about software versions,

RAM requirements, and so forth, even though most senior management staff won’t
understand that kind of information. Your summary should be brief and business
focused and should use “money talks” logic wherever possible.
After you’ve written it down, you have to be able to present it. If you get a chance to
present your ideas to senior management staff, you’ll probably have to go into a board
room to do so. It pays for you to have a clean, professional PowerPoint presentation
ready for such occasions. You want to hit your high points, communicating what
you’re trying to accomplish and why. Brevity is key: If you think you’ll have 15 minutes
to present your agenda to the board, build a PowerPoint presentation that takes five
minutes to run through, and assume that you’ll have 10 minutes for questions. I’ve
found this three-to-one rule pretty effective over the years. If you create a 15-minute
PowerPoint for a 15-minute meeting, you’re not leaving any time for interaction.
When you’re presenting, you must be conversant. I’ve encouraged you to diligently
define your job so that you’ll have thought through everything, not once or twice, but
many times from different perspectives. This thought and preparation will to pay off
when you’re presenting your ideas to senior management staff. When they question
you, you’ll have the answers handy and will seem on top of the material without being
nervous or struggling. You’ll know exactly what to answer because you’ll have thought
about the subject ad nauseum already.
You must ask for authority. If everyone nods and says you have a good plan, that’s
the time to strike! You must now ask, “Will you give me the authority to do this?” or
“Will you give me the budget approval to accomplish these tasks?” If you’re at the
point that management likes your planning and reasoning, they already know you need
funding or authority to do the job. They’re waiting for you to close the deal. Don’t dis-
appoint them—go ahead and ask!
Ask respectfully. When you make a presentation to senior management, they judge you
on many different levels. They try to see how effectively you present, how effectively
you think, and how well you can answer questions. They’re also asking themselves
these questions: “Can this person really make this work? Can this person do what
they say they can do?” By asking nicely for the resources required, you show that you

understand not only the issues, not only the variables, but also that it will take author-
ity and budget to accomplish the job. The last benefit is that when you deal with
management in a tactful, thoughtful way, they like you better as a person. There’s no
reason not to have that advantage!
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Making It Happen
At this point, I hope you’ve gained some thorough preparation and a framework of
understanding of all the variables, tasks, and perspectives that the CAD management
job entails. Yes, it’s a complex job. Yes, you must consider many variables to do it. But
the more you think, the more you prepare, and the better you can handle the give-
and-take and the questions, the easier it’ll be.
Probably more than other positions, the CAD manager has to balance technical
and managerial factors. That’s why the preparation you’ve gone through in this chapter
is so critical. Demonstrating the ability to judge, juggle, balance, and prioritize is
exactly what gives you the basis to gain the power to do your job.
As you plan how to attack your CAD management job, keep the following gen-
eral truths in mind:
• If management thinks that all you do is serve the user perspective, they’ll form
the opinion that you’re a great technical person but not management material.
• If you serve only the managerial perspective, your users will feel under-supported,
and their impression will ultimately get back to management.
• Handling the tough decisions using financial, “money talks” logic trumps all
other decision-making metrics because the company’s financial well-being is
your ultimate concern.
• Gaining the power to do your job is a matter of making management under-
stand that you’ve mastered the concepts I’ve discussed.
What I hope we’ve accomplished in this chapter is to prod you into thinking
about all the different aspects and facets of the CAD manager’s job. Before you read

any further in the book make sure you’ve accomplished the following tasks since they’ll
form the basis for everything you’ll do:
• Get all your tasks down in list form
• Analyze the list based on the approaches outlined
• Think, think and think some more
• Rework your list any time you think of a new task you must manage
Obviously this is a difficult process, but nobody said this job would be easy,
right? I’d rather you spend more time here in Chapter 1 really thinking about what you
need to do and how you need to do it, than have you barnstorm forward.
The time you spend here will pay you back tenfold in the future, believe me. In
Chapter 2, we’ll talk about taking stock of your current situation and how to put the
definition of your position into practice within your company.
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■ TAKING STOCK OF YOUR CURRENT SITUATION
Taking Stock of Your
Current Situation
In Chapter 1, you mapped out the tasks you need
to manage; now it’s time to take charge of your
CAD management situation. But before you
begin taking random actions, you must assess your
current situation so you can gauge what resources
are available to you. At minimum, you need to
answer the following basic questions about your
environment:
• What are your users’ strengths and weaknesses,
and how will they affect your ability to
do your job?
• What hardware and software resources do you
have, and how well matched are those resources

to your users?
• What type of network resources and processes are
in place, and how will they help or hinder you?
2
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CHAPTER 2: TAKING STOCK OF YOUR CURRENT SITUATION ■
• What kinds of work processes are in place now, and how will you need to
change them to achieve your goals?
• What kind of planning can you do to take all of the above into account and be
more effective?
• What level of budget will you be allocated to achieve your CAD management
mission?
Answering these questions is critical because the only way you can chart an
intelligent CAD management course is to acknowledge the reality of your starting
point. Although you may not consider your CAD management starting point ideal,
at least you’ll know what you’re up against.
In this chapter, I’ll take you through a step-by-step process you can use to inven-
tory your current work situation. You’ll find that the time you spend here will greatly
assist you in understanding what you can realistically achieve.
User Skills Assessment
Evaluating the skills of the users in your company is the most important assessment
you’ll undertake and thus the one you should tackle first. The reason for assessing user
skills so critically is because no other factor will limit you—or guarantee your suc-
cess—more than user expertise. The more skilled your users, are the easier it will be for
them to learn new efficiency-improving procedures. On the other hand, low user profi-
ciency makes improvement much harder.
When assessing user skills, consider measuring the following:
• Knowledge of software features
• Comprehension of standard practices

By assessing these key areas, you can identify user strengths and weaknesses in
every aspect of their software usage. And remember that users can understand their
software environment well but cost you productivity if they don’t understand company
standards.
Figure 2.1 The starting point of all work is the user,so assessing user knowledge establishes a baseline
of what you can accomplish as CAD manager.
User(s) begin
work on task
Task Assigned CAD User(s)
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■ USER SKILLS ASSESSMENT
Deploying a Test
If you have a large base of CAD users, skills assessment can be a time-consuming
process unless you automate the process. Creating a good user-assessment test requires
you to think about the questions you’ll ask and then make sure your test is clear and
accurate before you unleash it. To achieve these goals, follow this process:
1. Create a list of questions specific to your CAD software that measure user
knowledge. Be sure to cover the common functions all users must use like
geometry creation, editing, annotating, and plotting at bare minimum.
2. Create another list of questions that measure knowledge of standards. You might
want to question use of specific layers, fonts, symbology, etc., to make sure the
user has actually read the applicable standards.
3. For each question, craft a list of responses with only one right answer and sev-
eral incorrect answers that can trip up someone without adequate knowledge.
The key here is not to confuse, but to create several possible answers to allow
multiple choice testing without users being able to guess the correct answer.
4. Have your CAD power users review your questions and answers, and encourage
them to add their own questions to the test.
5. Create the actual test document as a paper handout or an HTML form, or use a

software testing application (see sidebar) to deliver the test for you.
6. Let users take the test, and grade the results.
7. Draw conclusions on user strengths and weaknesses based on the results you
observe.
I’ve developed a number of assessment tests and have found that the results are
always surprising. You may find that some users have huge gaps in their CAD knowl-
edge that they’ve been concealing for years. You may also find that some users gen-
uinely don’t understand your standards—a problem that may have misdiagnosed as
simply not reading standards in the past.
Interpreting Results
Once you deploy your custom test, you’ll have results to interpret. You should draw
conclusions about weak or strong areas of knowledge for each user. Specifically, you’re
looking for patterns of user knowledge that allow you to draw conclusions regarding
needed training and support. For example:
• If many users create geometry well, but they have weaknesses in plotting/scaling
concepts, this indicates a systemic problem with your plotting processes that
likely requires group training.
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CHAPTER 2: TAKING STOCK OF YOUR CURRENT SITUATION ■
• If only a few users have problems with filing standards, then this indicates an
isolated problem that is best tackled via individual tutoring.
• If a few users excel in all areas of testing you’ve found your power users.
By screening all your users for software and standards knowledge, you should be
able to build a list of training topics based on actual need rather than speculation. And
believe me when I say that the results of evaluating users’ skill sets can be surprising.
Using Testing Software
The value of using software to deploy tests is that you don’t have to worry about grading, timing,
or delivering a paper-based test.Although you still have to develop testing questions and load
them into the testing software, you expend no more effort than authoring a paper test but reap

the benefits of testing automation from that point on.
The only software utility I’ve located to perform automated testing is called AutoTEST Pro (see
Figure 2.2) by Academix Software (
www.academix.com).AutoTEST Pro is inexpensive and runs
in standalone or network environments, providing deployment,timing, and grading capabilities
(all key to a good testing program).To load your custom questions into AutoTEST Pro, you need
Microsoft Access; but if you’re handy with computer tools like Excel or Access,you’ll have no prob-
lems.At minimum,you should consider trying the free download trial to see what possibilities
computer-based testing can bring to the table.You may think that dealing with another piece of
software is too much to take on, but the economy of effort gained has been worth it for me.
Figure 2.2 Automated software testing tools like AutoTEST Pro take the drudgery out
of skills assessment.
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Attitudinal and Management Issues
When you conduct user assessments, you need to confront a couple of key attitude
issues before anybody gets the wrong idea about why they’re being tested. Take a
moment to think like your users, and consider that they may be asking the following
questions:
• We’ve never had skills testing before, so why now?
• What have I been doing wrong that is making them test me?
• Are they considering layoffs and figuring out whom to let go?
• Is upper management pushing this?
If you think about these questions from the users’ perspective, you have to admit
that you can see why users would wonder. And always remember that a lot of people
panic over being tested, no matter what the subject or reason. In order to mitigate these
concerns, I recommend the following approaches:
Make it positive Tell your user base that a skills assessment helps you determine which
areas you need to focus on for technical training. Tell them that you don’t want to

speculate, so you need a baseline measurement to get started.
Emphasize that there will be no firings Don’t ever let the idea take root that user-skills
assessment is being used to punish people or as a reason to fire anyone. If you hear
that sort of conversation going on, step in and stop it immediately.
De-emphasize upper management with users If your users are curious about upper
management’s involvement, tell them that upper management wants productivity, and
you’re trying to improve it. Handling the question in this way keeps the emotions
about testing between you and your users, where it should be.
Highlight productivity with your management If anyone in upper management asks
why you’re deploying tests or why you’re making people nervous, tell them that you’re
trying to gain productivity. You can further explain that knowing where your depart-
ment’s weak spots are will let you target and train to achieve your productivity goals.
Drawing Conclusions
If you undertake all the steps I’ve outlined, you’ll be armed with a volume of data that
helps you understand your user base and what areas you need to work on. I can’t stress
enough that a user-skills assessment determines what you can do, how hard you can
push, and what level of performance you can expect from your users over time by
telling you what your users already know. And when you know what your users know
it becomes a lot easier to figure out what you need to teach them.
You may find that knowing your users’ strengths and weaknesses is the most
valuable tool in your CAD management arsenal simply because it lets you plan your
future course with full awareness of what your staff can and can’t do.
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Software Assessment
Most CAD managers are expected to keep track of their software licenses and make
recommendations about new software acquisitions over time. To monitor your soft-
ware environment, you need to track not just hard parameters like license numbers,
renewal dates, upgrade fees, and so on, but also how well you’re using the software

you manage. Let’s examine the larger view of software assessment by exploring an
example where software resources are compared with a user-skills assessment like the
one you completed in the prior section:
Examining a software scenario A company has 10 copies of SolidWorks for mechani-
cal 3D modeling and 10 copies of AutoCAD for all 2D CAD tasks. All software is
found to be under a current subscription agreement that renews every year unless
cancelled.
A user-skills assessment of 20 CAD users finds that only 4 users are very skilled with
SolidWorks, and another 5 are somewhat skilled. On the AutoCAD side of assessment,
15 users are very skilled with AutoCAD, and the other 5 users are somewhat skilled.
Creating a sample assessment By comparing the user-skills profiles against the number
of software licenses owned, it seems fairly obvious that the company probably owns
too many copies of SolidWorks and not enough copies of AutoCAD based on current
usage patterns. This simple assessment should allow you to examine your company’s
software needs from a position of user skills rather than a list of serial numbers and
renewal dates.
Figure 2.3 CAD software is the filter that converts human expertise into digital design files.Having the right mix of software
tools to complement your user base allows the most efficient conversion.
Summarizing Your Findings
The sample scenario brings up some interesting questions that I’ll summarize here:
• Why would a company buy more (or less) software than it needs?
• Why would a company buy software that its users can’t operate?
• Why hasn’t anyone noticed these questions before?
CAD filter
applied here
Task Assigned
Knowledge
Captured in
Software
CAD User(s)

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The answer to these questions is most likely that the company hasn’t had a
strong CAD manager to deal with these questions. Pondering these questions over the
years has led me to some conclusions that seem to be valid in most cases:
Software should match user skills If the software tools you own don’t match the skills
of your user base, then your company is probably wasting money. Think about this
statement, and realize that it’s true for two reasons:
1. If you own software that your users don’t comprehend, then that software isn’t
being used, thus providing no value to the company.
2. If you own too little of the software that users do comprehend, then chances are
that users are waiting in line to use those tools, which costs money in the form
of delays.
In either scenario, efficiency is sacrificed because software resources haven’t been har-
monized with user skill levels. Sometimes a software assessment may point out invalid
assumptions (such as, “all users will learn 3D in the next year”) that never came to
fruition (thus causing poor utilization of the 3D software).
Acknowledge your findings If your software assessment points out any of the afore-
mentioned software/user imbalances, let your management know, and start the discus-
sion about adjusting software resources. There’s no point in performing an assessment
and not acting on the results.
Software budgets should adjust to match user skills Now that you know what soft-
ware your users can really use, and the reality of the software you own, perhaps it’s
time to adjust your budgeting and purchasing to reflect your users’ skill sets. In the
example case, it seems clear that you should at least examine converting some Solid-
Works seats to AutoCAD. Because high-end 3D software like SolidWorks costs more
per seat than AutoCAD, you can achieve costs savings as a bonus.
Hardware Assessment
As with a software assessment, you need to know what hardware resources exist

within your company and how effectively that hardware is running the software you
use. It should be fairly simple for CAD managers in smaller firms to do a physical
inventory of hardware resources; those in larger firms can work with their IT depart-
ments to gather the information. At minimum, you want to catalog the following hard-
ware attributes:
For computers/workstations/servers:
• Age of machine
• Processor version and speed
• Amount of memory
• Video adapter resolution and memory
• Hard-drive capacity
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For printers/plotters:
• Age of device
• File format handling (HPGL, CALS, JPEG, and so on)
• Amount of memory
• Computer interface (network adapter, USB, and so on)
• Driver availability for your software
Compile the information you gather in a brief list format, and sort the list in order
of hardware age. As a result, you’ll have a great start on understanding how current or
outdated your hardware is. These types of lists go a long way toward helping you get
the attention of senior management when budgeting for new hardware.
Example Case Revisited
Let’s go back to the example case illustrated in the “Software Assessment” section,
where the company has 10 copies of AutoCAD for 2D work and 10 copies of
SolidWorks for 3D work. We’ll continue the example by injecting some hardware-
assessment criteria into the equation, and see what we can conclude:
Hardware-assessment results The company owns 16 three-year-old Pentium-class

machines with minimal memory, video, and disk resources. Four users’ machines are
newer dual-core architecture with ample resources. Further investigation shows that
the four high-power machines are being used by the four high-end 3D users, and the
older machines are being used for AutoCAD.
Drawing Conclusions
The good news in the example case is that the company’s hardware matches the needs
and skill levels of the users. Although the presence of so much old hardware is cause
for concern (because it will have to be replaced soon), everyone can be productive
with what they have. The bigger concerns have to do with where the company is going
and what the expectations will be with respect to 3D software usage and budget levels
for hardware. I’ll draw some conclusions:
Upgrade options are limited With so much older hardware (remember, most machines
in the example are three years old), not much can be done to upgrade the machines.
Even if a new video adapter or more memory is installed, the architecture of the
machine limits its capabilities. These older machines will never be 3D workstations no
matter what is done to tune them up. Does management understand this?
Hardware should match 3D software To make a long story short, your hardware
should be at least as new as the 3D software you propose to run on it, in order for that
software to run optimally. If you propose to start using the latest version of a 3D build-
ing modeler or mechanical design software package, you should be using hardware that
is essentially new to get the best results.
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Figure 2.4 Even the best users with all the right software will struggle if their hardware isn’t up to the task.Harmonizing
your software and hardware gives you the best cost/performance ratio—and happy users, too.
Manufacturer’s guidelines When in doubt about hardware guidelines, why not use the
software developer’s recommendations as a starting point? It’s hard for anyone to argue
with the correctness of the documented hardware configuration provided by a software
company.

Don’t assume that IT understands CAD hardware Your IT department may be more
focused on general office applications or web browser–based applications and not
understand the unique computing and data-bandwidth requirements of CAD. Most IT
departments don’t worry about harmonizing hardware to software, so it’s your task to
do so for your department and make all parties aware of its importance.
Budgeting Wake-Up Call
How did your software tools line up with the hardware you have? If you find that your hardware is
woefully outdated,then you need to budget for new hardware sooner rather than later.And if you
have outdated hardware along with aggressive ambitions to move to more complex software, you
may have a budgeting problem on your hands.
If you’re in the position of having to budget for a lot of new hardware, you should inform manage-
ment immediately.The keys to formatting the bad budgeting news for management are as follows:
• Write down the hardware inventory information in a brief format.
• Write down the software you use and what machines it will run well on.
• Write a brief explanation of each machine’s life expectancy, how soon you need to replace it,
and why.
Now that all the information is in writing, have a budgeting conversation with management, and
at least plant the seeds of your new budget requirements.Your management may not like the
costs,but they need to know about them. And you need to be prepared for a longer timeframes
than you hoped for, to get budget dollars. Having the conversation early makes things easier for
you and management.
Hardware must
match software
for optimum
efficiency of output
Task Assigned Task Assigned
Knowledge
Captured in
Software
Hardware

Runs
Software
CAD User(s)
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IT Assessments
In addition to the other assessments performed, you must consider the available state
of your network and IT resources. Users run software on computers and peripherals
that are hooked together by networks, so understanding those networks becomes
important to the CAD manager. And because networks utilize username and password–
level encryption, network security is another area you must consider. CAD managers
are expected to manage things like active files, archives, and backups, so network
security is a concern that the CAD manager must be aware of.
Unless you’re an IT expert, it will be to your advantage to form a working part-
nership with your firm’s IT department. The good news is that most companies have
some sort of IT infrastructure, and that staff typically welcomes CAD manager involve-
ment. In many cases, IT departments have little idea of how to deal with CAD applica-
tions, so an informed CAD manager is an asset they can take advantage of. If you find
yourself in this win-win scenario, count yourself lucky.
Network Changes
Although you probably won’t be responsible for the care and feeding of the corporate
network, it helps to have an idea of the networking variables that can affect you. The
key aspects to consider are how the network will change over time and how those
changes influence you.
Figure 2.5 Networks connect computers (and therefore users) to each other in a digital community. Assessing your network’s
state of health,now and into the future, lets you know how well your user community will function.
In order to assess the situation, I recommend asking your IT department the
following questions:
• How much server space and capacity do we have today, and is it adequate?

Network Server
CAD Workstation
CAD Workstation
CAD Workstation
CAD Workstation
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• How fast are the data connections between various offices in our company
(assuming you have this issue)? Will these connections undergo change in the
next year?
• Will we outgrow our network in the next year? The year after?
• Will we be revamping our telecommunications, Internet, or branch office net-
working strategies?
The answers to these questions allow you to draw powerful conclusions about
the stability (or instability) of your network environment’s physical infrastructure. The
more you hear about things changing, the more nervous you should be about possible
work interruptions due to network outages or technical glitches. If you have any
doubts about how network changes may affect your CAD users, ask your IT staff for
guidance.
If your assessment determines that branch-office connections will be changing or
that branch offices will be added, you should be concerned about how the changes can
impact you. If you have work teams split among various branch offices, the problems
associated with sharing files can become glaring, particularly when connection speeds
are slow. Again, if you have doubts, press your IT department for guidance.
File Sharing/Security
Now that you have an idea of how your network is configured and how it will evolve
in the near future, it’s time to assess how file sharing will be accomplished. To perform
this assessment, you need to ask your IT department some additional questions:
• Will we share files via shared servers even between remote offices?

• Will we utilize Internet-based file sharing like FTP sites or web storage tools?
• Will customers/vendors be able to access our files? If so, what methods will
they use?
• What types of security mechanisms will be used to keep all the files safe?
Note: Fast data connections make users feel close to each other regardless of distance.Conversely,slow
data connections can make users in the same building feel far apart.The savvy CAD manager takes the speed
of data connections into account when planning work environments/teams.
Note: Networks behave a lot like software in that they’re most likely to experience problems while
they’re being modified.
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Again, you’re looking for a glimpse into the mind of the IT department and
where they’re taking the network. My experience has shown that the only stupid IT
question is the question you forget to ask—take the time to have the conversation.
If you don’t understand the answer to any question, re-phrase/re-ask until you do.
The Working Relationship
If you’re spending time working with your IT department to assess the situation, why
not turn the experience into an excellent working relationship? I’ve frequently observed
CAD managers not working closely with IT, which makes no sense considering the fol-
lowing metrics:
• IT determines how well your users can do their job, because IT controls all the
machinery used to run CAD.
• IT, if not managed properly, can slow user productivity via poor allocation of
resources.
• IT can make file sharing easy or hard, safe or perilous, depending on the types
of technology and security they implement.
With all these parameters at stake, why wouldn’t you want to work well with
IT? Here are a few things you can do to build the relationship while doing your IT
assessment at the same time:

Learn all you can about IT while doing your assessment The IT staff will appreciate
your attentiveness and respect your growing base of knowledge in the future.
Try to walk a mile in IT’s shoes By understanding the issues revolving around file and
network security, servers, hardware, and Internet technology that IT manages, you’ll
gain new respect for what they do. You’ll also find that you’ll be able to predict IT
trends in the future using your new-found expertise.
Teach IT about CAD when you can There’s no reason why the information exchange
shouldn’t be bidirectional. And when you emphasize the complexity of what you do, IT
will better accommodate you in the future and have more respect for the technology
you manage.
Stress file management Make it clear to the IT department that CAD files tend to be
huge compared to other computer files and that CAD users therefore are much more
critical of network speed and file-sharing methods. Driving home these points goes a
long way toward making IT understand that CAD users aren’t cranky: They just work
with really big file sets.
I can’t stress highly enough that in order to be an effective CAD manager, you
must have a positive, constructive working relationship with your IT staff. If your rela-
tionship with IT is adversarial, you’ll inadvertently miss network events that can affect
you, and your users will suffer as a result. Go out of your way and do whatever it
takes to forge that relationship using the network assessment as a conversation starter.
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Finding Red Flags in Your Assessment
As you interact with your IT department and assess the various aspects of your networks
and security, it’s possible that you may not like what you hear. Being able to see the
red-flag problems will help you identify any issues that may become big problems later.
Here are the common problems I’ve encountered along with the danger signs that usu-
ally accompany them:
Undercapitalized branch offices Poor connectivity may exist between branch offices,

and/or there may be insufficient budgets to do anything about the problem. Manage-
ment teams expect branch offices to communicate and are usually intolerant of net-
works being a barrier to that communication. If no funding is budgeted to make the
situation work, you can be sure you’ll have problems.
Frequent user complaints If your users are complaining to you about the status of the
network, then you have a problem, even if it’s only one of perception. When networks
aren’t up to the current set of tasks, you know the situation will only get worse in the
future.
Dismissive IT attitudes If, despite all your efforts, you can’t forge a working relation-
ship with IT, then you should be worried. IT departments that pay no attention to
CAD managers invariably make mistakes that could have been prevented. If you find
yourself in this scenario, you should consider elevating the issue to management in
hopes of rectifying the lack of communication.
Conclusions Drawn
If you follow the recommendations laid out for the IT assessment, you should have
a good idea of where you stand today and how the future looks. More important,
you’ll know what, if anything, may be a problem, so you know what to avoid. React
accordingly.
Budgetary Assessment
If you followed along with me so far, you now have a pretty good understanding of
where your users stand, where your software stands, what your hardware situation is
like, and what sort of network and IT infrastructure ties it all together. Chances are,
you’ve already started to formulate some ideas about things you might change. And
constantly thinking about adapting your environment based on assessments is exactly
what a CAD manager should be doing! Now it’s time for a severe reality check: your
budget.
You can request new software, new hardware, and new networks, but if you
can’t get the dollars to purchase them, nothing will ever materialize. In a real sense,
until you understand your budgetary limitations, both long and short term, you won’t
be able to determine what to do with your department.

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Making the Assessment
The first thing to realize is that understanding your budget means talking with the people
who set your budget: your management. Now is the time to set up a meeting with your
management team to talk over your budget options. Whether you’re experienced with
budgets or not, having this meeting sets a professional tone and demonstrates your
understanding of the process.
When you attend your budget meeting, use the following points to keep the con-
versation moving along. Try to use the order I’ve suggested so you can draw conclu-
sions as you go. I’ll present some conclusions after each question so you can understand
what to concentrate on. I’ll also qualify why I’ve asked the questions in this order and
what types of information I’m looking for from each. Be aware that you sometimes
have to read between the lines to get the answer!
1: How does the budget look over the next several years? By asking an open-ended
question about budgets, you get management’s gut reaction. You may not like what
you hear, but at least you’re getting the unvarnished version of what management
believes to be true. If you want clarification about actual amounts of money, you can
ask clarifying questions until you’re confident that you understand management’s
starting position.
2 and 3: Will the company be growing, acquiring branch offices, buying other firms?
Should I plan for more CAD users in the next few years, fewer, the same number? By
asking questions that focus on company growth in terms of both users and office loca-
tions, you start to see management’s vision for the company’s growth. Watch out
during this stage, because aggressive growth plans may not be reflected in the budget
starting point outlined in question 1. As you understand the growth plans for the com-
pany, you’ll know what to plan for and whether management knows what they’re get-
ting into.
4: Will we work more collaboratively with vendors/customers via the Internet? By ask-

ing about far-away collaboration, typically via the Internet, you can see if management
has grand visions for remote work teams, home-based employees, customers tapping
into drawing systems, and so on. Frequently, management underestimates the costs of
these types of undertaking, thinking that they require only another CAD equipped
machine rather than another machine plus Internet bandwidth, control software, addi-
tional security devices, and more. You get the point.
5: Will we be doing more 3D, less, none? By asking about 3D usage, you can see if
management has visions of radically new work processes which will require large vol-
umes of training, higher power computers, and new expertise on your part as CAD
manager. Frequently, management focuses on the results they want and underestimates
the steps and costs it will take to get those results. Plan accordingly.
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6: Do you see any cost saving opportunities we could be pursuing that I haven’t
thought of? By asking whether you can save money anywhere, you send a great mes-
sage about your desire to help control costs. More important, you give management
the green light to talk with you about things they’ve probably been thinking but didn’t
know how to bring up.
Figure 2.6 Budgets drive everything you need to do.Whether it’s user training, software, hardware, or networking you can’t
change the current situation without funds to make it happen.
Find the Disconnects
When you emerge from the budget meetings and reflect on the results, does anything
bother you? Do you see any item that requires clarification or follow-up on your part?
If so, then quick action is required to rectify the problems before everyone forgets
about the issues. You can use the following example case as a template for communi-
cating budget problems to management:
Example scenario You emerge from a budget meeting where you learned that your
company plans to acquire several more branch offices. Upon further review, it becomes
clear that management expects these branches to work together in teams with person-

nel in other offices. When you pressed for clarification about budgeting for networks
and telecommunications to connect the offices, you learned that management feels the
existing IT budget will be sufficient.
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The disconnects What jumps out about this scenario is the lack of understanding that
branch offices need to be connected to other offices via fast data lines if teams are to
collaborate over distances. It seems clear that management doesn’t understand that
poor network connections will make wide area work teams very difficult to implement.
Technically, yes, users will be connected—but they will hate working in such a slow
network environment.
Take action Now is the time to tactfully write up the scenario and request a follow-up
meeting to discuss the issue. Consider bringing in staff from your IT department or
users from other branch offices (via phone call) to support your points and lend you
credibility. Remember that you’re teaching management about the problem, so don’t be
confrontational, just tactfully informative.
Drawing Conclusions
Don’t expect to come out of the budget-assessment phase with millions of dollars in
your back pocket. But do expect to emerge with a much better working relationship
with senior management, for the following reasons:
• They will understand that you’re a good steward of their money.
• They will understand that you want to get good results.
• They will see your diligence and respect your willingness to learn.
• They will see that you understand the big picture and can tie it all together into
a comprehensive budget.
• They will see that you’re more than a CAD operator: You’re a real manager.
Throughout the budget-assessment process, keep a positive, learning attitude and
engage your management team in the discussion. Above all, show that you respect the
company’s money as if it were your own, and strive to get great results out of every

dollar you budget. Believe me, senior management appreciates anybody who under-
stands that there are only so many dollars to go around.
Standards/Process Assessments
Most CAD managers are responsible for CAD standards, but did you know that makes
you a process manager as well? I contend that having a standard is merely a way of stan-
dardizing a work process. The process is what’s important; the standard is simply the
way to achieve the process. However, many CAD managers report having troubles with
their standards and work processes, principally due to difficulty of enforcement. If you’ve
had those frustrations, you aren’t alone: 85 to 90 percent of CAD managers in my annual
CAD-management surveys have indicated having problems with CAD standards.
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