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Whilst Product Development is the basis of engineering, increasingly complex products have a tendency to also increase the complexity of the Product Development process, and in many cases the process is not truly understood. There are many tools that have been developed for managing complexity, but few that are specific to Product Development and fewer still that provide pragmatic analyzes that can be used by decision-makers. This paper develops a methodology to apply a Network-of-Networks approach to data collected from a Product Development organization and provides an accompanying pragmatic analytical framework that can be used by decision-makers on all levels. It then uses an Agent-Based modelling approach to represent the knowledge diffusion within Product Development. This allows a microscopic analysis to complement the macroscopic analysis of the Network-ofNetworks approach. This will allow an organization to analyze its current practices on both macro and micro scales, model dynamic changes to the structure of the organization and understand its internal dynamics, with respect to development teams and the design process. This will illuminate the complex system dynamics in Product Development that would otherwise be viewed of as unexpected consequences to a system intervention. This understanding will give greater ability to make suitable, risk-mitigating decisions.

Over the past few decades there has been increasing dialogue around transdisciplinary (TD) research. However, within engineering it has received less attention and there remains a lack of consensus over both the definition, and the methods through which to conduct transdisciplinary engineering (TE). Within this paper we describe and outline the salient points of TD and the Design Research Methodology (DRM) and create a proposal to combine the two. A case study of National Grid Electric Transmissions (NGET) demonstrates application. The case study shows that through TE DRM a conceptual process for managing decision support tool (DST) performance is created. This process integrates academic and non-academic perspectives. Evaluation, by NGET subject matter experts found the process to be logical and useable within NGET, with approval given to proceed to implementation. Conclusions find that application of TE DRM increases the possibility of industry uptake and the potential impact of academic research.

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