A Study Focused on Design Outsourcing in the Turkish Economy: Factors Affecting the Success of Design Projects

摘要

Today, although supply and demand in design are increasing notably and design consultancies are holding key supplier positions, previous studies note that a noticeable number of outsourced design projects end up with unexpected costs, latencies and unachieved manufacturability. In this research, failures of design outsourcing are taken as the main focus. A consultant firm in Ankara, Turkey has been selected as a case study, and 19 of its customers participated in the research. Feasibility and design stages have been observed and factors affecting success measured. Qualitative research complemented the quantitative findings in a partially convergent parallel mixed method. A number of managers failed to set manufacturing budgets, sales price and volume. One-third of the projects could not be completed, two-thirds did not proceed to production, and one-third did not stick to the schedule. The observed relevance of target-setting ability and success measurements was significant, as well as the prototype quantity and project completion rate.