Getting Users On Board With Sheet Set Manager (SSM)

[y_chang]

Hi,

We're a small/med sized cabinet shop that makes custom cabinets and millwork for businesses and institutions. We have three full-time draftspersons/engineers that are responsible for editing and releasing drawings for production.

Traditionally, any job -- big or small -- is drawn in one AutoCAD model and separated out in the same drawing in their respective sheets (paperspace viewports) for printing. We regularly do larger jobs where we have multiple floors/phases of so-and-so school or hospital so needless to say, our drawings can get large. Typically on these large jobs, we will copy the original drawing and rename them for each floor/phase and remove the parts that aren't used in that part of the job. So we will end up with Floor1.dwg, Floor2.dwg, etc. This is how it's been done here from before I came aboard. 

I am not a long-time user of AutoCAD so I never questioned this drawing format until we had a drafting contractor submit drawings using Sheet Set Manager. Since we don't use SSM, this led to some confusion and then copying and pasting all the models into one large model. I've been researching SSM and have used the drawings submitted by our contractor as a test to get a feel for SSM and see if it something that would benefit our company. So far, I can say it's different and will require some re-wiring of our brains so to speak. For instance, to create PDF files of our shop drawings, we simply turn on Auto Publish and save the file so AutoCAD generates a complete set of drawings. We can do this since our entire drawing is one file. With SSM, it's different. 

To me, however, the benefits are worth the transition. Sheet numbering, consistency, the ability to have different parts of the same overall drawing open at the same time, streamlining the overall drawing by not copying/pasting the same parts of a drawing over and over (such as sections that are typical in different phases), the fact that the latter should cut down on errors in drawings, and who knows what else. 

I've voiced my desire to transition over to SSM for at least our larger drawings, but I am getting some resistance so I'd like to see how others have handled this resistance and what it took to convince others to come on board. 

[JTBWorld]

I suggest to not try to use all SSM features right away, some you might not find useful and others you can start using later on. Then to further improve the SSM usage we have several apps like for example SSMPropEditor. 

[s.borello]

Sounds like you should be the office "champion" and test this out.  Show the benefits of saved time, labor and cost... management will have a hard time saying no to something that makes your team more productive and saves time and money. 

[y_chang]

I am currently testing the functionality and have been playing with the plotting functions to see what it takes to get the results we want. Different for sure. My plan is to be comfortable with the functions that we would use regularly and then if I get a green light, help transition the other drafters into SSM. 

Management is always on board with whatever helps the company; it's getting other users out of their comfort zone that's a challenge. 

[Bob_Zurunkle]

I also work on "large projects" for mostly healthcare, but have not really found the SSM to be all that beneficial over multiple tabs. Perhaps you need to consider such things as who are the "customers" that will need to see all or part of the drawing set and why. What are their various needs, and how will the SSM help you to meet those needs?

For a lot of our "large project" workflows we have switched to Revit. Revit has a lot of the same or similar features for maintaining internal sheet organization automatically, and it also allows multiple drafters to work on one large project at the same time. The ability to produce 3D models and to participate in BIM coordination are more big pluses.

I am not sure if I would recommend just going ahead and producing your own work in SSM. What if you were sidelined and someone else had to take over? I'd get the approval of your manager and the buy-in of at least one more person so you could tag team and learn together. Whatever path you choose, good luck!