Development of an activity analysis method for concurrent engineering projects

Concurrent Engineering (CE) projects for the development of complex products and for the design of the appertaining production process are often influenced by unexpected interferences. Crossfunctional teams which were recruited from different departments work on the arising parallel tasks. This paper presents a method which allows to analyse the communication, co-operation and co-ordination in CE-tcams (C3-CET). The appearance of certain attributes allows the drawing of conclusions regarding planning efficiency and management of the CE-projects. The results of ten case studies conducted in the automotive industry show the applicability of the method mentioned.