Notes on Design Processes and Methodologies

by Dan Frey

1 Design Processes
Design has been defined in many, slightly different ways by many different people. One
good definition is given by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology 1
(ABET) which defines design as The process of devising a system, component, or
process to meet desired needs. This definition is simple yet covers the essentials of
design in all its various forms including mechanical design, software, architecture, and
even less technical fields such as fashion design.
ABET elaborates further describing design as a decision-making process (often
iterative) in which the basic sciences, mathematics, and engineering sciences are applied
to convert resources optimally to meet a stated objective. This elaboration is useful in
the sense that it adds elements important to modern engineering design. But these
additional statements ought not to be part of the definition of design. For example,
design cannot be called a decision-making process since it must also include generation
of alternatives as well as selection among them. It would be more accurate to say design
includes decision making processes within it as opposed to saying it is a decision making
process. This will be discussed more in the section
on Pugh Controlled Convergence. In addition, the ABET defines design as
application of sciences and the explicit use of The process of devising a
optimization may not always be present in every system, component, or
design activity. This will be explored further in the process to meet desired
needs.
section on historical context.

1.1 Motivation
1.1.1 Historical Context
As defined by ABET, design has an extremely long history. The earliest stone tools are
believed to have been crafted over one million years ago. The shapes of early stone tools
appear to have been devised for very specific purposes some for chopping wood, some
for grinding grains, some for the tips of spears used to hunt animals. It can fairly be said
that these tools must have been designed. The humanoids who fashioned these earliest
stone tools had brains far smaller than those of modern humans, they did not have
1

ABET is the body that accredits MITs engineering degrees and therefore is the same people who require
that you to take design courses like 2.007

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language (maybe they had a proto-language), and they apparently couldnt draw pictures.
The design process used to define the shapes of early stone tools surely wasnt very
sophisticated. Their design probably involved a lot of trial and error over generations of
individuals who slowly evolved the designs. Over time, shapes that worked well were
passed on. Small changes were made and, for the most part, only changes that led to
improvements were retained.
Consider by contrast the design of a spear thrower depicted in Figure 1 (sometimes called
and atlatl) which apparently dates to 14,000 BCE. Scientists argue that humans at the
time this design first appeared were essentially as intelligent people are today. They
could learn languages and draw pictures. However, there was no civilization at that time
and surely no science as we know it today. Yet looking at the spear thrower, there
appears to be some fairly sophisticated thought required to understand the physical
effects involved. To throw a spear farther by hand, it helps to move your hand faster.
But physical limits prevent even the most athletic people 2 from moving their hand more
than about 100 mph (45 m/s). Given that constraint and assuming low drag and an
approximately no lift, a simple ballistics model suggests the range of a spear could be as
much as 200 meters, but in practice its more like 100 meters3. But extending the point
of contact with the spear and involving the wrist in the throwing motion could extend the
time for applying force and increase the initial velocity of the spear increasing both the
range of the throw and the force with which it penetrates. Studies of this type of
throwing device suggest the device can roughly double the release speed and that an
atlatl dart can travel as far as 260 meters4. Exercise: Explain, in a
Enabling this kind of performance improvement, manner that a bright high
many details had to be worked out. Maintaining school student would
contact between the throwing device and the back of understand, why doubling
the spear places some demands on the shape of the the initial velocity of a
contact point. It is essential to apply force but also
projectile will quadruple its
allow the two bodies to freely rotate with respect to range assuming zero drag
one another. Proper release of the spear at the end of and zero lift and fixed
the throwing motion places further requirements on initial launch angle.
the shape at the contact area.

Figure 1. A Spear Thrower.

The spear thrower in Figure 1 seemed to require some sophisticated design thinking. We
can be sure no proper model of the multi-body dynamics could have been used in this
design process since it didnt exist at the time the thrower was designed. It is possible
that the physical effects were understood by the designers in some intuitive sense. It is
2

The fastest clocked baseball pitch in history was 104.8mph. It was thrown by Joel Zumaya of the Detroit
Tigers while playing in the American League Championship in 2006.
3
The world record in the javelin throw is 98.48 mters set in 1996 by Jan Zelezny of the Czech Republic.
4
The record distance is 258.64m by Dave Engvall in 1995
www.worldatlatl.org/Articles/Atlatl%20Experiments.pdf

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likely that much of the design was worked out by trial and error. In any case, a design
employing some complex physical effects can proceed first, and the underlying science
apparently can be developed later. This pattern also applied to many other developments.
Watts steam engine appeared in 1850 and the basic developments of thermodynamics by
Kelvin, Carnot, and others came at least three decades later. This pattern is changing
quickly in the modern engineering context with increasing dependence of design on a
science base.

1.1.2 Modern Context

As the previous section explains, historically, many advances first emerge through design
and later find an explanation in science. However, design in a modern context must rely
on the vast base of existing science. To the extent that a science base begins to become
available in any particular area, the best organizations will use that science to advance
their designs. To be commercially competitive, other firms seek to employ the science
base as effectively or even more so then other companies making similar products.
Design today is carried out by individuals, small firms, large companies, and government
organizations. They develop products of mind boggling complexity and staggering levels
of performance and reliability. For example, consider a modern jet engine such as the
GE90. It can generate about 75 MW -- as much power as about 6,000 US citizens
consume on average by driving, running appliances, and so on. The GE90 weighs just
about 8 tons, so each ton of engine is producing about 10MW. Thats about 2000 times
an athletic humans power-to-weight ratio. Whole fleets of GE90 engines operate on the
wing of a modern aircraft and have so far accumulated 20 million flight-hours with about
one in-flight-shutdown per 4 million hours on average and logging an engine departure
reliability of about 99.96 percent. So this is a machine that accomplishes a stunning
technical feat with nearly complete regularity under all sorts of demanding conditions.
This is just one example to help you appreciate the remarkable capability and
sophistication of engineering design today.
Despite all the knowledge about engineering design that apparently resides in people and
organizations, it is hard to find a single coherent picture of design process that fits the
whole range of activity. Each company typically describes it design process using some
diagrams, charts, and text. Pratt and Whiney develops jet engines. It describes its design
process in a carefully defined process of standard work5. A simple description of their
engine design process is shown in Figure 2. The Pratt standard work depicts the design
process as a set of stages of increasing detail and completeness which is sometimes
described as a waterfall.

Sullivan, John P., 1999, The relationship between organizational architecture, product architecture, and
product complexity, Thesis, MIT System Design and Management Program.

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Figure 2. A design process at a major company (in this case, Pratt and Whitney) might
be represented as a waterfall with a series of phases of increasing detail and
completeness ending in a complete plan for production.

Figure 3. A design process at a major company (in this case, Ford Motor
Company) might be represented as a V with requirements coming in one
end, flowing down to parts at the bottom, and with complete system designs.
emerging at the end.
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By contrast, Ford Motor Company describes its process as a V (see Fig 3) with
requirements being subdivided from vehicles to subsystems to components on one side.
Components are designed in the middle phase represented by the bottom of the V.
Then, on the ascending side of the V, the parts are composed into subsystems and then
subsystems are integrated into vehicles and all along tests are employed to verify the
design.
Pratt and Ford are just two examples. There is much more variety we could show across
successful companies. Some software companies describe their design process as a spiral
with requirements at the core leading to simple prototypes which are used to further
explicate the requirements in another layer of the spiral. Other companies describe their
design process as a funnel with many design concepts being considered in parallel with
refinement and selection to a smaller number of options over time.
Many of these differences among design process descriptions arise from the different
demands imposed by the nature of the artifact being designed, the rate of technical
change in the field, or the nature of the customers being served. Other differences have
more to do with the individual style of the people and the companies involved. For
example, the design processes used by the three largest jet engine manufacturers (General
Electric, Pratt and Whitney, and Rolls Royce) are vastly different even for products
where all three companies make engines that are performing essentially identical
functions. In some cases, three different engine designs can literally be bolted onto the
same aircraft and offered as different options for the airlines to choose, yet they are all
designed by quite different processes.
To summarize, the modern context of engineering design is characterized by tremendous
sophistication and broad variety. It is interesting to consider the implications for your
professional education. To add something valuable to the existing system, you will need
lots of knowledge, skill, and creativity. Those capacities can be developed through study
and practice which begins in school. To fit usefully into a broader engineering design
effort in a modern organization, you will need to adapt to a design process we cant teach
you while youre at a University, because we cant predict which process your company
will use. Being a designer in a modern context seems to require life-long learning. Each
design project you undertake will pose challenges -- many becoming familiar as you
accumulate experience, but always some new ones to master. This is something to
celebrate if you enjoy having a variety of life experiences.

1.2 Design Methods

Despite the fact that there is no one design process used uniformly across successful
companies, there is value in learning some of the most common design methods and
tools. This section will review the basics of a small sample of tools and methods used
across the design process, starting with ones typically used early in the process and
progressing chronologically.
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1.2.1 Requirements Definition

Before a design project can begin in earnest, a significant amount of front end work
should be undertaken to prepare the designer or the design team for what lies ahead. One
of the key outcomes of this work is a document alternately called a requirements
definition document, product design specification, or design brief. This document must
describe the design opportunity clearly, but without unintentionally locking in design
decisions. Failure to spend adequate time and energy at this stage can doom a project to
poor outcomes.
One important piece of advice for designers at this stage is to express the requirements
for the design in solution neutral language. For example, if you plan to create a new
product to compete with existing snow throwers, rather that stating that you want a
system for throwing snow from a driveway, it is preferable to describe the requirement
as removing snow. This phrasing leaves open many more possibilities such as plowing
the snow, conveying it on a belt, or even melting it. The key point is that, in the early
phases of a design we want to describe WHAT is to be done without unnecessarily
constraining HOW it can be done.
Another key guideline for this stage is to express the requirements for the design in
measurable engineering terminology. For example, in defining the requirement for
removing snow, you may need to constrain the amount of snow to some extent or the
surfaces from which it will be removed. In that case, the requirement might be modified
to be removing snow of up to one meter depth from asphalt and concrete driveways.
There may also be constraints on the system set by its context or interfaces. For the snow
removal device, that might include noise or power. These should be made specific such
as emitting no more than 20dB of noise in any direction as measured one meter from the
device or employing either unleaded gasoline or no more than 10 Amps of 120VAC
power at 60Hz.
Exercise: Evaluate the following problem statements and suggest
improvements if possible:
Because damp clothing severely impacts back country enjoyment and can contribute
to hypothermia, hikers require a means to dry their clothing.
Bicycle riders need a lightweight (<1kg) pump capable of inflating both the front and
rear tire of a typical adult sized road bike to 60 psi gauge pressure.

1.2.2 Concept Generation

After a good description of the requirements is ready, a period of initial concept
generation should proceed. There are many techniques that have been proposed for
increasing the creative output of individuals and teams. These include brainstorming, use
of analogies, morphological analysis, Altschullers TRIZ, and deBonos processes for
Lateral Thinking. Meta-studies suggest there are no silver bullets for concept
generation, but that most any form of training regarding creativity will tend to improve
outputs perhaps just by increasing the awareness of the people involved in the need for or
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desirability of creativity. This subsection reviews the essence of just two methods,
brainstorming and TRIZ.
Brainstorming is an activity in which a group of people quickly work to develop a
large number of solutions to a design challenge. It takes just about an hour to do, so there
is not much risk in giving it a try on any given project. The approach involves setting up
a room with plenty of paper, writing implements, and other props and inviting a diverse
set of people to participate. A typical goal is to develop 100 ideas in an hour. A
recommended group size is 5 to 7 as this provides enough variety of input. Larger groups
would tend to create too much production blocking wherein participants spend too
much time listening passively to others ideas and not enough time producing ideas of
their own. A key aspect of the method is adherence to the standard five rules of the
brainstorm:
Defer judgment
Build upon the ideas of others
One conversation at a time
Stay focused on the topic
Encourage wild ideas
Another widely known approach to generating ideas is known as the Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving, known most often as TRIZ (its acronym in Russian). The
approach was based on study of a large set of patents. Common solutions were
categorized in terms of the ways that inventions had resolved technical contradictions.
Technical contradictions are cases wherein the action to improve some feature
simultaneously appears to reduce some other needed property which sets up a conflict
among the two needs. Writing the conflict in this form provides a means to access a
database that is supposed to help access patents that are likely to inspire some useful
ideas that might be adapted to the given situation.
An example serves to illustrate the approach. To study the effects of acids on metal
alloys, specimens are placed into a hermetically sealed chamber filled with acid. The
acid reacts not only with the specimen but also the walls. The challenge is to invent a
system that avoids the adverse effects of the chamber walls on the testing procedure.
First the problem is re-stated as a contradiction, in this case, that the walls must be
present to contain the acid, but in a sense, the walls must be absent to avoid participating
in the reaction. The proposed solution from TRIZ is to make the wall out of the specimen
material itself. This sort of system simplification is frequently a feature of TRIZ
solutions as they promote evolution toward ideality.
The actual set of TRIZ methods are complex and the effectiveness of the approach in
practice shows at best mixed results. I would suggest taking away the key idea that
knowledge of lots of inventions is helpful in developing more inventions. Rather than
studying any specific creativity methodology, I would suggest you invest the same time
in another activity. Specifically, I suggest you find time every week to read some patents
from your field of engineering and some very good patents from other fields, this will be
a long term strategy for increasing your inventive capacity.

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1.2.3 Pugh Controlled Convergence

After engaging in a process of concept generation, there will be more ideas available than
one can reasonably pursue. There must be some reasonable process for culling down the
set to a smaller number that can be developed in greater detail.
Many design decision making processes have been proposed. Most of them are fairly
complex and rigid. Very few formal methods are used widely in industry. Surveys
indicate that practitioners describe their concept selection methods most often as "concept
review meetings", "intuitive selection" or "expert assessment". These labels suggest
essentially no structure. The process suggested in this chapter adds just a little formality
because, without that structure, experience shows that individuals and teams tend to
fixate on a single design concept too early a serious misstep that is common in practice,
especially for inexperienced designers. Another key benefit to a modicum of structure is
that it creates a space for team discussion and prompts the more reserved participants to
speak up. In a complete lack of structure, the most brash people on the team tend to
dominate the decision, even if they dont have all the relevant facts at their disposal.
The process we advocate in this section was developed through field work by a noted
design researcher, Stuart Pugh [1990]. He described an approach aimed at 1) 'controlled
convergence' on a strong concept that has promise of out-competing the current market
leader; and 2) a shared understanding of the reasons for the choice. In this section, we
refer to this as Pugh Controlled Convergence or PuCC.
A prominent aspect of PuCC is presentation and discussion of information in the
form of a matrix. The columns of the Pugh matrix are labeled with a description, in
drawings and text, of design concepts. The rows of the matrix are labeled with concise
statements of the criteria by which the design concepts can be judged. The method
requires selection of a datum, preferably a design concept that is both well understood
and known to be generally strong. Often the initial datum concept is currently the leader
in the market. Evaluations are developed and entered into the matrix through a facilitated
discussion among the experts. Each cell in the matrix contains symbols +, -, or S
indicating that the design concept related to that column is clearly better than, clearly
worse than, or roughly the same as the datum concept as judged according to the criterion
of that row.

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Figure 4. A neatly formatted representation of a Pugh

Concept Selection Matrix intended for use in a textbook.

Figure 5. An actual example of a Pugh Concept Selection Matrix

from industry practice.

Textooks and papers on Pughs method usually present neatly formatted tables to
explain the Pugh matrix, such as the one shown in Figure 4. This may contribute to a
misunderstanding of what is actually done. In practice, Pugh matrices are messy collages
of drawings and notes (such as the Pugh matrix from a software development team shown
in Figure 5). This is a reflection of the nature of early-stage design. The PuCC process is
simple and coarse-grained as it should be for use in early stage design. By contrast,
alternatives to Pugh's method often require greater resolution of the scale (suggesting five
or ten levels rather than just three) and often require numerical weighting factors. Pugh
found by experience that this sort of precision is not well suited to concept design.
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It is common practice to place summary scores along the bottom of the matrix. The
number of +, -, or S scores for each concept are counted and presented as a rough
measure of the characteristics of each alternative. This raises an important potential for
misunderstanding. These scores should NOT be interpreted as a means by which to
choose the single winning design. Although a single run of an evaluation matrix can help
reduce the number of design concepts under consideration, but is not meant to choose a
single alternative. A single matrix run can result in at least four kinds of decisions (not
mutually exclusive) including decisions to: 1) eliminate certain weak concepts from
consideration, 2) invest in further development of some concepts, 3) invest in information
gathering, and 4) develop additional concepts based on what has been revealed through
the matrix and the discussions it catalyzed.
Figure 6 illustrates how iterated uses of
Pugh matrices can lead to convergence. The
key feature to note is that controlled
convergence generally includes periods of
divergence of the set of concepts.
Experience shows that studying the relative
merits of design concepts is a good way to
prepare ones mind for concept generation.
Seeing the ways that one concept attains a
strength where another is weak may suggest
a means to bring the positives of one concept
on board to another concept.
When this
occurs, decision making is greatly facilitated
because trade-off is no longer necessary
between the involved criteria.

Figure 6. A graphical depiction of the Pugh

Controlled Convergence process.

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1.2.4 Experimentation in Design

During your process of convergence, it is essential that you advance your design adding
more detail and working out the critical parameters, components, and geometric
proportions. Some of this design work can be carried forward primarily through
Computer Aided Design supported by engineering calculations. However, experience
tells us that almost all designs also require a thoughtful process of experimental work.
Experiments fill in the needed information that analysis and CAD cant provide. These
gaps can be small (and few in number) for some well-established design concepts or there
can be many, large gaps we need to fill in when executing highly innovative designs.
This section presents some advice and methodology for effective experimentation as part
of the electromechanical design process.
A careful study of industry design practice led Stephan Thomke 6 to suggest the
following advice for using experiments in design:
Organize for rapid experimentation When it comes to experimentation, some
people and some organizations are much faster than others. Experimentation can
be greatly accelerated by having the right instrumentation, computer tools, and
know-how in place. Some of that preparation falls on the organization of 2.007
itself. Most of it, however, is up to you. Lets work together to make it possible
for you to do the right experiments quickly. One aspect of rapid experimentation
is statistical planning and analysis of experiments. When experimental error is
large compared to the effects being estimated, these techniques are essential. I
would need an entire chapter on this topic here, but 2.007 experiments can be
generally made with relatively low pure error. For the exceptional cases, there is
an excellent paper by George E. P. Box that is directly relevant to the method and
style of experimentation for use in refinement of electromechanical designs. 7
Fail early and often, but avoid mistakes Design requires a major change in the
mind-set regarding failure. Most of the time, we work hard to avoid failure and
feel a sense of frustration and even shame when we experience failure. In design,
innovation makes some degree of failure essential as a means to learn what works
and what doesnt. The key is to push the failures up to the early stages of the
design process. Also, since failure is expensive, recognize that some failures can
be avoided by application of good engineering knowledge. The point is not really
to fail a lot, but to use failure to learn those things we cant learn in other ways.
Anticipate and exploit early information A key to effective experimentation is to
get information into the process early. In some cases, the best way to get that
information is through virtual experiments such as in CAD. If you can detect an
interference in a Solidworks Model, that may save a week of re-design and rebuilding later. If CAD is not convenient for the task at hand, perhaps a foam core
mockup will do the job. How to decide which approach is best? IDEO suggests
you think about the three Rs your experiment should be rough, rapid, and
6

Thomke, Stephan, 2001, Enlightened Experimentation: The New Imperative for Innovation, Harvard
Business Review, Feb, pg. 67-75.
7
Box, G. E. P. and P. T. Y. Liu, 1999, Statistics as a Catalyst to Learning by Scientific Method, Journal
of Quality Technology 31 (1): 1-29.

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right. Dont build a fancy prototype early if a simpler one would answer the
question.
Combine new and traditional technologies New technologies (well, relatively
new) at your disposal include CAD, 3D printing, and water-jet cutting. Thomkes
advice is that new technologies like this have the biggest payoff when used early
in the design process. This is especially true in 2.007 where some of these
technologies become over-tasked late in the term when everyone is clamoring for
access at the same time.

1.2.5 Robust Design

There is a huge difference between the two following objectives:

Making a machine that can function properly when every possible factor is at its
ideal value, such as when the machine is demonstrated under carefully controlled
laboratory conditions
Making a machine that can function properly under the full range of conditions it
is likely to experience in authentic field use

The distinction above is a key to having customers who are delighted by your product
and loyal to the brand. The alternative is to have former customers who are frustrated by
the constant breakdowns, recalls, warrantee service, and never-ending calls to tech help
lines.
In the context of commercial product development, robustness is not optional. Most
companies know that. A select few also have the set of tools and willingness to invest in
the steps needed to follow through on implementing robust design.
In the context of 2.007, it is easy to drift into the mindset that the first objective is
sufficient. Many students get some good results in the last weeks of the class. These
good outcomes appear when the machine exhibits no wear or distortion, when the battery
is at peak charge, when the radios are in mint condition, and when the opposing player is
not there to create other adverse conditions. Unless there has been adequate attention to
robust design, when any one of several factors drifts off the ideal state, the outcome is
poor.
Implementing robust design is conceptually simple.
1) You have to deliberately expose your design to a broad set adverse conditions.
2) You must do this early enough that you can repeat the process for multiple design
alternatives so that you can choose the options that perform better.

1.2.6 Failure Modes and Effects Analysis

Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) is an engineering technique aimed at identifying
and classifying potential failure modes, their effects on the system, and defining
countermeasures -- actions to avoid the failures previously identified. FMEA may be

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performed at either the system or piece-part level. Ideally, it should begin as early as possible
in design and be used continually throughout the whole product life cycle in order to
structure information flow in the organization. The feature of FMEA is classification of the
effects of potential failure modes by severity, occurrence, and detection. FMEA can also be
used to prioritize the countermeasures. This may be done by calculating the risk priority
numbers (RPN) for each failure mode.
As an early step in conducting an FMEA, a list of potential failure modes must be compiled.
While it is not possible to anticipate every possible failure mode, it is very important to do
the search as thorough as possible. It is necessary for the FMEA to be conducted by a team of
experts with various views of the product. The designer of the product is essential, but as he
or she often lacks the necessary critical view of the product, so experts from other fields or
even the customer should be part of the team. Subsequent steps vary among practitioners,
but a good baseline process is:
a. Define the ideal function (or functions) of the design.
b. Determine all of the potential failure modes associated with each function
c. Write down the effects of these failure modes on each type of customer
d. Determine the failure mechanisms (sometimes called root causes) that can cause the
failure modes to occur
e. Identify a detection event (e.g. a set of design rules & standards, analytical methods, or
physical testing) that can discover and excite the failure mode via the determined
mechanism.
f. Determine the action that constitutes a countermeasure to the failure mode occurring
(either eliminate the cause, or mitigate the effect of the cause with appropriate design
modifications).
g. Verify the effectiveness of the failure mode avoidance action in f, and determine if
better detection events and/or more countermeasures might be required.
The output of the analysis is a FMEA Table (such as Table 1 below) which lists all the failure
modes together with possible effects on the system and other issues that may be important in
dealing with the failure. It is generally important to consider possible detection events. A
failure that cannot be detected clearly and early enough will often prove to have more serious
consequences. There is no universally accepted layout for the FMEA (although certain
standards exist within industries, for example automotive), but loosely they all follow the
sequence of information flow listed below, laid out on a landscape document reading
from left to right.

A major concern with FMEA is that it can devolve into a bureaucratic exercise That fills
up paper and takes up time, but doesnt really improve the design. To make FMEA
useful, you need to move beyond analysis, into avoidance of the failure mode through the
deployment of an effective counter measure. Tim Davis has proposed that we rethink
FMEA and rename it Failure Mode Avoidance to emphasize the changed mind-set. This
will require some further development to explain how FMEA, when practiced well, can
influence the design process and structure information flow among designers.

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Table 1. Example FMEA Worksheet

S
Failure
Function
Effects (severity
mode
rating)

Fill tub

High
Liquid
level
spills on
sensor
customer
never
floor
trips

RPN
O
D
Current
CRIT (critical (risk
Cause(s) (occurrence
(detection
controls
charactertics) priority
rating)
rating)
number)
Fill
timeout
level sensor
based on
failed
2
time to
5
N
80
level sensor
fill to low
disconnected
level
sensor

Recommended
actions
Perform cost
analysis of adding
additional sensor
halfway between
low and high level
sensors

Responsibility
and target Action
completion taken
date

Jane Doe
10-Oct-2010

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Summary
Design is a process that has been around a long time. No doubt, our ancestors
survived substantially because of their skill in developing solutions to problems
they faced with the materials and technology that was available to them. They have
passed this skill onto you and I expect youll find you have natural ability to design.
Your natural ability can be improved by practice and by reflection on what makes
design processes work effectively. Some of the key lessons from scholars who have
studied design carefully include:

Develop many concepts, not just one.

Select concepts based on evaluation against multiple criteria.
Develop your designs using the best available scientific and empirical
knowledge of relevant phenomena.
Expose your design to difficult conditions early in the process.
Evolve your design through iterative improvement based on modelling,
simulation, and experimentation.
Document your design process as well as your final design results.

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