Why In-Person Engineering Reviews Still Matter

In today’s digital-first workplace, collaboration often happens through screens and videocalls. While these tools are convenient, something vital is lost along the way. In the electronic frenzy, elements of collaboration, group learning, and in person communication subtlety disappear. This is particularly apparent when completing a markup of an engineering drawing deliverable.

By placing comments on a PDF and sending them back to the design engineer for correction, engineering teams miss a spectacular teaching and learning opportunity. Completing drawing markups on paper and in person with the people who drew them, facilitates a sense of teamwork and creates powerful learning and development opportunities that engineering teams must harness.

The Limitations of PDF-Only Reviews

Receiving a PDF via email that is covered in comments and corrections with no explanation can be disheartening. It is easy to understand why. You may have spent 30 hours working on a deliverable only to receive silent corrections to all your “mistakes”. Without context or conversation, this process has the potential to create feelings of resentment and discontent.

When that same review is completed in person and on a piece of paper, the tone of the feedback is completely different. Sitting down with the design engineer or the whole project team to review a drawing set creates an atmosphere of learning and improvement. Corrections that need to be made are explained and discussed. Instead of one-sided direction, it is an open back and forth discussion resulting in a deep understanding of why something needs to be changed, instead of just what the change is.

The result of a meeting like this is a corrected drawing deliverable, an understanding of why items need to be changed, and a sense of comradery, that we, as an engineering team, work together to produce quality work.

Why In-Person Reviews Lead to Better Outcomes

Research supports what many engineering leaders already know. A recent study at Stanford Graduate School of Business recorded that an in-person meeting generates between 15% and 20% more ideas than a similar group who meets over video conference. 15-20% more ideas is a huge quantity with respect to an engineering deliverable.

This number of additional ideas is bound to result in a materially better product being delivered to the customer.

A Hallam-ICS Example: The Value of Being in the Same Room

At Hallam-ICS, we regularly share project work across our offices. Internally, we refer to these interoffice relationships as being “very long hallways”. Recently, our Massachusetts and Connecticut offices were working on a months-long design project for a pharmaceutical client. We elected to complete this review together in a conference room in the Massachusetts office despite the necessity of some interoffice travel.

Despite the travel, the value of this decision was immediately clear. We had a productive day reviewing and discussing the design and after, we sat down together and ate lunch.

The next day, our engineering service line leader Jamie Spalding said to me (the project manager) “the team really benefited from this review, everyone left the meeting feeling excited about completing the discussed changes, I’m glad we put in the effort to complete it in person”.

Everyone involved came away better from this in person review. The engineering project team, senior leadership, and our client all benefited from this in person and on paper deliverable review.

Remote Work Still Has Its Strengths

Remote work offers flexibility and efficiency. An experienced team can run highly efficiently in a remote work environment.

However, particularly for a less experienced and developing team, deliverable review sessions completed in person and on paper have a profoundly positive impact on the quality of the work being reviewed, the quality of future work, and on the relationship between the executing engineers and the quality control reviewers.

Why Engineering Leaders Should Protect This Practice

In-person deliverable reviews take time, coordination, and sometimes travel. Yet the return on this investment is consistently clear:

• Better understanding of design intent
• Higher quality deliverables
• Faster development of junior engineers
• Stronger team cohesion
• Fewer revision cycles and misunderstandings

Engineering team leaders must champion in person reviews to ensure high quality deliverables and to foster a strong culture of continuous learning and development.

Final Thoughts

Digital tools are powerful, but they cannot fully replace the value of sitting together, reviewing drawings on paper, and learning through real-time discussion. As engineering work becomes more distributed and remote, protecting this practice becomes even more important.

In-person, on-paper reviews are not just about correcting drawings. They are about developing people, strengthening relationships, and delivering better work for our clients. Those benefits should never be lost to convenience.