Learning from Design Failures

Learn from past mistakes to avoid repeating them in the future: more easily said than done. Especially in Japan, where keeping face has great social value, failures tend to be hidden and left unexplained. Yotaro Hatamura and 40 others who studied in his laboratory put together this eye-opening book that analyzes more than 100 cases of failures, with the information arranged so that readers can easily understand what happened, why, and how not to repeat the mistakes. The cases covered here range from those from the writers own experience to catastrophes well known worldwide. The book lays the foundation for what is now called Shippaigaku, the way to research accidents, scandals, and other failures to uncover the root cause, reveal the scenario that led to the unwanted event, describe what happened so readers can clearly repeat the steps in their mind, and propose ways to avoid those mistakes in the future. Engineering designers and managers will shape their knowledge into real skills by learning from others failures.