How to help

From a recent FDA press release:

The FDA is helping advance the development of an artificial pancreas system...

I think they should be more clear.  What they are really doing is releasing a new guidance document which "will help provide clarity for manufacturers, investigators and reviewers in the development of the artificial pancreas system. It proposes safety and effectiveness goals that the FDA may require researchers and industry to meet when developing a type of artificial pancreas system".  Some other things are listed (like a workshop...), but they aren't actually advancing the science.

It is quite a stretch to say this actually helps to advance the development of anything, it just sets expectations, which is great, but lets call it like it is.  To advance the development, you need to be working on the device itself, not what you may require as the regulatory pathway. This is probably oversimplifying, but if we were to say all cars must get 50 mpg meeting a defined criteria, I don't anyone would claim that we were helping to advance the development of high mileage cars.  (I have some FDA praise slated for a future post, so don't feel bad for them)

Not that this is limited to government.  This is a fairly common response when a project team runs into an issue.  The project manager calls a meeting to help resolve the issue and the theory is we all pitch in and solve it.  In reality there is one guy doing 90% of the work on this problem and it takes too long to really bring another person up to speed on all the required details and anyway they have their own stuff to do.  The meeting (or workshop...) just serves to piss the person doing all the work off by either suggesting common sense things he's already done or doing, giving him unnecessary work, or suggesting unnecessary work that he has to fend off.  If he is your subject matter expert, trust him, who else is going to solve the problem, the Sr. Director?

If you're the project manager- one on one the guy doing the work, figure out what he wants.  Also know his weaknesses and compensate.  If he's great at solving the problem, but can't write a report or presentation that passes management muster, then get your ace report writer primed and ready to take over. If he doesn't have the attention span to stand around in the lab for 14 hours straight and supervise testing, make sure the lab guys know what is expected and fill in to keep them running.

I've seen projects delayed for months because everyone was too busy solving the problem with meetings (Why don't we look at this... How about a build that does this.... Did you write that PO yet...) to get hands on time to actually solve the problem.  If you're not working on the device, on the manufacturing floor, in the test lab, you're not advancing the development of the device.

Update 1: If you'd like to read more on the FDA and company responses on the artificial pancreas, try here or here.