Member profile: Dan Holzer, mechanical engineer

Dan Holzer is a mechanical engineer and informal member with a unique interdisciplinary background in electro-mechanical engineering. Based in the fast-growing Boston hardware community, Dan has a diverse range of technical skills that he uses to help startups bring their technologies to life. 

He’s received a product innovation certification at MIT, built composite products for a company acquired by 3M, and led rapid prototyping & engineering design projects at Shell Techworks. 

Read on to hear Dan talk about how his expertise allows him to conceptualize and implement strategic engineering solutions for clients of all shapes and sizes.

Hey there Dan! You’ve clearly covered a lot of ground in the engineering world across several product categories over the last 10+ years. Can you share a bit about the path you’ve carved for yourself and how it helped create the career you have today?

For sure! Although I’m an electro-mechanical engineer by training, I’ve always worked as a mechanical engineer. I started out working in composites on ballistic helmets and structural carbon fiber parts for robotics clients.

Then, I moved to a high temperature battery startup, which was a SkunkWorks effort for Shell. From there I went on to lead engineering for a startup that used silk fibroin to create sustainable chemicals for industry.

All of this combined experience prepared me to become a generalist engineer and product/technology developer. I’ve been freelancing for the past 4 years, been loving it, and haven’t looked back!

If you had to pick one engineering skill set that you’d call your professional superpower, what would it be and why?

Great question. I’d have to say it’d be design for manufacturing (DFM) for functional prototypes. There is a skill in building something for the first time and having it actually work. That’s primarily what I help most of my clients do, essentially starting with their whiteboard sketches or rough CAD files, then iterating from there.

With multiple projects on your plate consistently, what’s the best way you like to relax?

Outside of work, you can usually find me making sourdough pizzas using my outdoor pizza oven; seeking to perfect my Neapolitan style pie. I also really enjoy fly-fishing, trying new restaurants with my wife, Ilana, and going on relaxing nature walks with our dog, Smokey. 

As an engineer, you probably have your own opinions about the products you regularly use throughout your daily life. What’s your favorite product and why?

It would definitely have to be the outdoor pizza oven. It’s a brand called Ooni and I’m a bit obsessed with them right now. They somehow figured out how to get restaurant style brick oven quality pizza down to a form factor and cost that allows consumers to cook a pizza at home in 90 seconds at 900 degrees.

Over the last decade, there’s been many new and exciting industries that have been created, and it seems like people are always making unexpected career changes. What keeps you excited about working in hardware?

I just love the thrill of taking something from concept to reality. Working in hardware forces you to take risks and make decisions that you cannot correct with the ‘backspace button’. This is an exciting and rewarding process for me.

In my first engineering job, I was manufacturing ballistic helmets for the military and police. I worked on new product development, where projects started on the whiteboard, then went to CAD. I do enjoy concepting and detailed design, but the most exciting part for me was doing ‘wet layups’ to create prototypes that we later tested at a ballistics lab.

Another exciting time for me was working with a battery startup to create a battery module the size of a shipping container. There’s something about the size of that project that makes it hard to forget. One challenge with that project was coming to terms with the fact that for shipping containers +/- ½” is a tight tolerance 😉

You brought up a really great point there. No matter how skilled or talented you are as an engineer, the potential for mistakes is everywhere around us and we need to be super diligent to ensure our work is accurate at all times. What’s the greatest lesson you’ve learned that came as a result of making a mistake?

When I’m pressed to deliver early and it’s not possible to hit all product requirements I’ve learned to always prioritize safety related features and requirements above all else. I learned this lesson second hand from an engineering leader I worked with at the battery startup I mentioned.

When we were getting pushed to work faster and deliver sooner, he managed the process of reducing scope and eliminating requirements, but still holding on to everything related to safety. I’m guessing he learned this lesson the hard way, because he really drilled the importance of this into the team.

Many different freelancers tend to have their own process for how they work with clients. What have you found to be the best way to have a successful and seamless project with a client?

During initial conversations, I always recap what the client wants towards the end of the meeting. I also jot down detailed ‘scope of work’ bullets right away while the info is fresh in my mind.

Once I’m working on a project, frequent communication helps us to stay on the same page. This is done when everything is going well, and even more importantly when it isn’t. Decisions should be made together.

My main goal when working with a new client is to build trust first and foremost. I aim to do this by explaining what I am going to do and how long it will take, then delivering on my word!

There are many clients we work with every day who are brand new to hardware and are working on their very first product. What are a few critical things they should consider before immediately starting to design and build something?

I highly recommend interviewing a handful of people about your product idea to get honest, unbiased feedback. Ask them what they genuinely like about the product and why. What other features could help the product become even better?

Make sure to consider all of the different stakeholders for your product. For example, is the end user also the buyer? You can use this insight to create a feature list and eventually a product requirements document (PRD). This document will help set the framework of your design process.

By definition, a requirement is a desired product feature or function that is cohesive, complete, consistent, traceable, unambiguous, and verifiable. Verifiable is key because this tells us when each requirement has been met. Requirements work can be a bit grueling, but it will pay dividends later on.

I took an online course in design thinking that helped to shape the way I kick off new projects.  Many clients I work with end up getting a quick lesson on requirements before I even start doing any design work for their product.

We’re always looking for engineers, designers, brand strategists, and writers to join our team. If you’ve got a skill that you think we need, let us know! We’d love to chat. And of course, if you’ve got a hardware product or product idea you want to bring to market, we have just the experts to help! Fill out this quick form and we’ll be in touch!.