Meet the People Behind JIMICQ

If you have ever visited our office, you may have noticed something interesting.

JIMICQ has a 5S requirement. We like things to be clean, organized, and easy to find.

But then there are the project managers.

Their desks are sometimes... a little different.

A sample here.
A small component there.
A PCBA.
A cable.
A few parts that look like they have been sitting there for quite a while.

Technically, it could be tidier.

But ask the project manager to throw something away, and you may get a very quick answer:

“We still need that.”

And usually, they really do.

One small part may belong to a sample that is being tested. Another may be needed for the next modification. Something else may be waiting for an engineer to check.

To a visitor, it may look like a slightly messy desk.

To the project manager, it is basically a project map.

Of course, when things calm down, they clean everything up and put it back where it belongs.

Until the next project comes along.

A Project Manager's Day Is Rarely Just One Project

The reason their desks get busy is quite simple.

Project managers are usually following several things at the same time.

One project may be waiting for a sample.

Another may have a hardware question.

A third may need software changes.

And somewhere in between, there is usually a customer asking, “How is this going?”

So you will often see project managers moving between sales, R&D, testing, and the production side of the project.

Sometimes they are checking a sample.

Sometimes they are looking for an engineer.

Sometimes they are sitting in a meeting room because there is a problem that nobody has quite solved yet.

And sometimes, they are just standing beside someone's desk, looking at a small part and asking:

“Can we try it this way?”

Not Every Discussion Is Easy

There are definitely moments when sales and project managers have different opinions.

Sales may be thinking about what the customer wants.

The project team may be thinking about what can actually be done.

Neither side is necessarily wrong.

So they talk.

And sometimes the conversation gets longer than expected.

A difficult project may bring sales, project managers, and hardware or software engineers into the same meeting room.

Someone suggests an approach.

Someone else points out a problem.

Another idea comes up.

Let's try it.

It doesn't work quite right.

Try something else.

Test it again.

Change a small detail.

Check it again.

This is probably one of the most ordinary scenes around our office.

There is no dramatic moment when everything suddenly becomes perfect.

It is usually just a lot of people sitting around a table, looking at a product, discussing a problem, and trying one more way.

Eventually, the difficult part gets solved.

Then everyone moves on to the next thing.

Sometimes, “Follow the Project” Means Going to the Factory

Our project managers do not always stay in the office.

For some projects, they need to spend time at the factory and follow the work more closely.

We sometimes joke about this inside the company:

“X is stationed at the factory again.”

It is a joke, but it happens.

When a project needs someone there, the project manager may stay close to the production line, communicate with the factory team, check the progress, and deal with problems as they come up.

There have been projects that were a little harder to handle than usual, and the project manager stayed at the factory for an extended period of time.

Not because it was part of some special plan.

The project simply needed someone there.

So they went.

There Are a Lot of Small Things to Follow

A product rarely changes because of one big decision.

More often, it is a collection of small decisions.

A component needs to be changed.

A software function needs another round of testing.

A sample does not fit quite the way it should.

A customer has a new comment.

An engineer has another idea.

A detail needs to be confirmed one more time.

Project managers are often the people making sure all of these little things meet in the right place.

They talk to hardware engineers.

They talk to software engineers.

They talk to sales.

They talk to customers.

They check samples.

They follow production.

And then they go back and do it all again when the next change comes in.

Behind the Desk, There Is a Project

So yes, sometimes our project managers' desks are not as neat as the 5S checklist would like.

But there is usually a reason.

That small piece of plastic may belong to a sample.

That PCBA may be waiting for a test.

That cable may be needed for tomorrow's debugging.

And that stack of documents may belong to three different projects.

It is not always the prettiest desk in the office.

But it is often a pretty good picture of what is happening behind the products we make.

There are people discussing, testing, changing, checking, communicating, and sometimes disagreeing.

Then they try again.

And when the difficult parts finally come together, the project moves forward.

That is what our project managers do every day.

Not from a distance.

Right in the middle of it.

A lot of their work happens quietly.

It happens around a desk covered with samples and small parts, in a meeting room where people are trying to solve a difficult problem, on the production floor, or in another conversation with a customer.

These are the people behind our projects.

For JIMICQ, they are one of the strongest teams behind every product we deliver.