Understanding how the information requests of aerospace engineering designers influence information-seeking behaviour

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Engineering design activities rely heavily on the richness of knowledge and information available. In order to progress their tasks, designers undertake numerous searches to answer their information requests. A review of the literature on information seeking (IS) found that the role of the types of information request on source selection has been little investigated compared with that of the source itself, the seeker, the seeker–source relationship and the work context. This paper describes the empirical research that was carried out in collaboration with the aerospace group of a major power systems company to understand the relationship between information searches and information requests raised by designers involved in individual design tasks. The empirical part of the research consisted of participating in a design activity undertaken within the collaborating company and in conducting analytical studies with its designers. Two large data sets were gathered using a diary study and observations with shadowing. Based on the literature review and empirical research, a framework to describe how engineering designers access information was developed. The context of an information request, the request itself and the associated search were characterised through three groups of categories. Designers were found to raise requests to acquire information and to process information. The main sources used to answer these requests were colleagues, databases and drawings. In examining how sources are used, the research confirmed that designers generally prefer to source knowledge and information through informal interactions with their colleagues and demonstrated that colleagues are more often consulted to answer the requests to process information and documentary sources to answer the requests to acquire information. The results on the use of the media to communicate with colleagues indicated that face-to-face interactions are preferred to answer the requests to process information and phone calls to answer the requests to acquire information. Overall, the research emphasises the importance of unplanned face-to-face interactions in answering complex requests. Interpersonal communication emerges as a key resource for progressing design problems in a practical way, learning how to design and establishing social networks. For researchers, this study extends the existing knowledge by proposing to analyse and interpret engineering designers’ IS behaviour based on their information needs. Practitioners from current manufacturing organisations can use these findings to evaluate existing knowledge management efforts and subsequently undertake new interventions to improve the management of their knowledge and information.