Building Speed: Inside Goddard’s Design Challenge

“But can you get it done today?”

It’s a problem every engineer of every discipline has faced. A client or stakeholder needs something done and needs it done yesterday. Goddard Technologies prides itself on speed and efficiency, working internally to ensure that we meet those standards. Enter – the design challenge. Design challenges are presented to engineers of all ages and all education levels and are a STEM curriculum classic. Drew Zdeblick, SRME Manager/Principal in Mechanical Engineering at Goddard, challenged his team to flex their design muscles with a speed design challenge.

Drew gave his team of mechanical engineers and designers this challenge: Design and build a device that can hold a quarter against the underside of the table as far from the edge as possible. Why this particular challenge? “It was designed to force them to set their own goals based on the resources and time allowed,” explained Drew, “They had to evaluate their own skill sets and choose a path that they felt would be most effective. It also forced them to iterate on the fly and quickly find solutions to problems as they come up.”

The challenge took place in three parts. The first were two 30-minute design sessions in which a kit of materials and instructions were presented to the team, but no building was allowed. In the latter, the CAD designs were presented to Drew by his team, and any parts that needed to be 3D-printed were given to Drew to create. The last session was competition day. After an hour, the designers received their design materials and 3D-printed components and started to build.

Did all of them work? No. Did most of them? Yes. That’s the norm in engineering.

Drew encourages his team to have a “fail-fast” mentality. “You learn a lot from making things that don’t work,” said Drew, “Often, engineers can get stuck seeking perfection before moving to the next step in design. This exercise forced them to test out ideas early, assess results, and quickly iterate to solve problems. Goddard, as a company, focuses on providing value to our clients. One of the ways we do that is by prototyping and testing ideas early in the design process so we can better spot any future issues or pitfalls. This allows us to very quickly gain confidence in ideas or change directions before too much time has been invested in a particular path.”

The engineers and designers also found it beneficial—and just plain fun! Gordon, a mechanical designer specializing in MedTech and robotics, said of the challenge, “It’s a fun, fast–paced project that promotes out-of-the-box thinking and friendly competition. Seeing a bunch of different solutions to the same problem also offers insight on new processes and design techniques to learn.”

Robby, a mechanical design engineer specializing in robotics, agreed, adding that it was “particularly fascinating to observe the diverse range of concepts each team member developed. Even though we all aimed for the same goal and faced the same constraints, our varied approaches underscored the value of collaborative brainstorming and problem-solving. [It] sharpened our design skills by leveraging individual creativity to navigate a unique set of constraints.”

Goddard consciously and thoughtfully hires engineers and designers with diverse experience, backgrounds, and education. Each engineer will solve a problem differently based on their experience, as evidenced by this design challenge. Learn more about how Goddard can take your design idea from concept to reality here.

Want to try your hand at the challenge? Download a copy here. Be sure to send us a recap or tag us in your photos to let us know how you did!