Draw the mess before prescribing a fix.
Our six-person team used a rich picture and stakeholder analysis to map physical returns, technical findings reports, the Material Review Board, repair work, and supplier interfaces.
2Systems modeled: repair and supply chain
12Boundary questions used in the analysis
6People on the consulting team
Start with the
actual problem.
Customer acceptance testing was surfacing battery-pack failures that internal validation had missed. Returned packs and technical reports passed among service, repair, quality, engineering, and suppliers, but information and accountability did not always follow. A faster fix required understanding the organizational system, not only the defective part.
The work behind
the outcome.
Compare the intended system with the real one.
We modeled repair and maintenance alongside supply chain, used soft systems methodology and critical systems heuristics, then compared conceptual activities against the organization’s reported practice.
Make the recommendations operational.
The final proposal included a searchable repair-case knowledge base, more complete RMA intake, issue classification and MRB metrics, plus supplier scorecards and recurring cross-functional review.
How the pieces connect.
01Customer failure
02RMA + repair
03MRB + engineering
04Supplier feedback
05Shared knowledge
Explanatory system view · reconstructed from the project
Hands on.
People with me.
I worked as a systems consultant on the six-person Purdue team. Together we mapped stakeholders and handoffs, analyzed gaps between intended and observed processes, and presented recommendations to the American Battery Solutions sponsor.
Soft systems methodologyRich pictureCATWOECritical systems heuristicsStakeholder mappingRecommendations
What came out of it.
The team delivered a structured diagnosis and a prioritized set of repair and supply-chain recommendations. The work clarified where knowledge transfer, ownership, and feedback loops were breaking down.
CONTEXT & LIMITS
This was a sponsored academic consulting project. Recommendations are proposed changes, not confirmed implementations or measured reductions in failures, repair time, or cost. The deck attributes the work to the full team.
Recall
Be here. Remember later.