ABSTRACT
Measuring critical team interaction variables can lead to interventions that will improve design performance. The identification and definition of these variables begins with a search for underlying patterns of design conversations that adequately describe the observed behaviours. In this chapter we present an analysis of the DTRS7 data from the first engineer meeting, E1, which revealed two distinct patterns of conversation: one corresponded to a linear approach to problem solving, and the second was similar to a pattern of conversation previously described as spider webbing. We discuss a design behavior, termed resumption, which describes the second pattern and we suggest an analogous relationship between the outcome of resumption and the geometry of spider webs. Specifically, the arcs and sectors in a spider web-like representation serve as a proxy for the solutions and the requirements that are discussed in the design conversation. The relationship was considered as a potential intervention tool for sensitising designers to the structure of design conversations and increasing their design performance.
