Refine Your Solution

This is the step where the EDP achieves greatness. Anyone can methodically run through the EDP once and get an okay result, but to get a properly-engineered solution, you really need to run through the EDP multiple times.

Think of your first prototype as a rough draft. You actually want it to fail. Because engineers rely on prototype failures to provide them with the information they need to produce a solution that is both effective and efficient!

And we shouldn't neglect the "share" aspect that is the central component of every engineering step. In defining the problem, you must convince consumers to share their needs with you and your team. In researching the problem, you must rely on other engineers to have shared their findings so that you don't end up reinventing the wheel. When brainstorming, it is essential that a group of innovative thinkers freely share their ideas without criticism. When choosing the best option, you must discuss amongst your peers all the options so that you can be sure that you have selected the one that best positions you for success against the problem you have defined. When implementing that choice, you need to keep steady communication between managment and peer engineers, so that everyone is moving in the same direction - toward successful project completion. Failure to communicate at this stage causes delays and defects and puts the entire team at risk of missing critical requirements. When evaluating your prototype it is also important to communicate your findings to other engineers who might be working on similar problems so that they can learn from your discoveries. If we don't share what we do, it is as if we have done nothing with our time. Do NOT overlook the hub of the EDP!