USING CROWDS IN ENGINEERING DESIGN – TOWARDS A HOLISTIC FRAMEWORK
Year: 2015
Editor: Christian Weber, Stephan Husung, Gaetano Cascini, Marco CantaMESsa, Dorian Marjanovic, Francesca Montagna
Author: Panchal, Jitesh H
Series: ICED
Institution: Purdue University, United States of America
Section: Innovation and Creativity
Page(s): 041-050
ISBN: 978-1-904670-71-1
ISSN: 2220-4334
Abstract
Product development organizations are increasingly using crowdsourcing for design-related activities such as idea generation and evaluation, and solving difficult problems. In order to effectively use crowdsourcing within engineering systems design, it is important to systematically design these initiatives by considering conflicting goals such as maximizing participation and the quality of outcoMES within cost constraints. There is currently a lack of holistic frameworks that help design engineers in designing crowd-based initiatives, specifically, framing problems, choosing the right type of crowdsourcing mechanisms, and designing incentives. This paper is an attempt towards such a holistic framework which consists of three phases. The first phase involves selecting from the four classes of crowdsourcing initiatives. The second phase involves making structural, problem-related and evaluation decisions about the crowdsourcing initiative. The third phase involves designing appropriate reward structures. An analytical modeling framework based on the theory of contests is presented, followed by a discussion of specific issues related to engineering systems design.
Keywords: Crowdsourcing And Funding, Decision Making, Open Innovation, Participatory Design