Professor Stephen Evans

Professor Steve Evans, Cranfield University

Professor of Life Cycle Engineering
Location: Building 50, Cranfield campus
E: steve.evans@cranfield.ac.uk
T: +44 (0)1234 750111 x5610
Manufacturing


Current activities

  • Principal Investigator on leading Product-Service Systems project
  • Principal Investigator on EPSRC sustainable engineering project
  • Special Adviser to the House of Lords inquiry into waste reduction
  • Member of the Board of the Centre for Sustainable Engineering
  • Supervising six PhDs/EngDs.

Clients

  • Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
  • Technology Strategy Board
  • Jaguar/Land Rover
  • Morgan Motor Company
  • Nissan Technology Centre – Europe.

Background

Professor Stephen Evans spent over 12 years working in industry after graduating from the University of Bath.  His initial industrial experience was in a variety of manufacturing engineering roles leading to an emphasis on improving engineering performance. All excellent grounding for tackling complex, real-life problems. Stephen’s last industrial post was Engineering Systems Manager at Martin-Baker Engineering Limited, the world leading manufacturer of ejection seats.

Stephen is fascinated by why common sense is not common. He researches and conducts projects with organisations on improving their performance in various dimensions – 1. designing more sustainable products and making them in more sustainable ways, 2. designing, making and serving more efficiently and effectively. These always include aspects of creative and joined up thinking that is a challenge to implement.

Stephen has a long track record of helping organisations to better understand these complex situations and to improve their performance. He has worked in the aerospace, automotive, food, construction and other sectors, observing that each sector (and each company in it) is indeed unique, but only in the particular details which holds it back from better performance. The common issues – including lack of innovation, limited collaboration, poor performance management – can benefit from structured responses. Steve has helped organisations create and implement such structured responses to a variety of problems – Nissan in Europe improving its co-development performance with its 350 suppliers; Nissan, Ford and others better understanding their customers through empathic design; Electrolux, GE, Philips Design, Morgan Motors and others improve sustainability of their products.

Stephen has lead or co-lead the first UK EPSRC research projects in the fields of: Concurrent Engineering, Co-development, and Eco-design, plus leading EU projects in Innovation Measurement, Product-Service Systems and Quality Management. Steve has supervised over 100 Masters and 18 PhDs, and enjoyed most of them. Steve is currently Special Adviser to the House of Lords inquiry into Waste Reduction.

Selected publications

  • Burns A. and Evans S. (2007). An investigation of customer delight during product evaluation: implications for the development of desirable products. Proceeding of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B, Journal of Engineering Manufacture. In press for - November 2007.
  • Evans S , Partidario,P and Lambert,J. (2007).Industrialization as a key element of sustainable product-service solutions. International Journal of Production Research, v45, n18, September 2007, pp4225-4246.
  • Partidario,P, Lambert,J. and Evans S. (2007).  Building more sustainable solutions in production-consumption systems: the case of food for people with reduced access. Journal of Cleaner Production, v15 (2007), pp513-524.
  • Baines, T;  Lightfoot, H;  Evans, S;  Neely, A;  Greenough, R;  Peppard, J;  Roy, R; Shehab, E;  Braganza, A;  Tiwari, A;  Alcock, J;  Angus, J;  Bastl, M;  Cousens, A; Irving, P;  Johnson, M;  Kingston, J;  Lockett, H;  Martinez, V;  Micheli, P;  Tranfield, D;  Walton, I;   and  Wilson, H, (2007). State-of-the-art in Product Service-Systems. Proceeding of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part B, Journal of Engineering Manufacture. October 2007.
  • Dayan R., Evans S. (2006) ‘KM your way to CMMI’ Journal of Knowledge Management, v10, n1, 2006.
  • Manzini E., Collina L. and Evans S. (2006). ‘Solution Oriented Partnership’, Cranfield University Press.
  • Evans, S. (2002). Cogent – implementing a successful vehicle manufacturer/supplier co-development initiative, Journal of Materials and Manufacturing (SAE Transactions), v111, p 204.
  • Payne K, Deasley P, Morris AJ, Evans S, Fielding J, Guenov M and Syamsudin H. (2002). A distributed process for the aerospace industry, Journal of Engineering Design, v13, n3, September 2002 , pp. 253-260(8).
  • Burns, A. and Evans, S. (2002), Empathic Design  - a new approach for understanding and delighting customers. International Journal of New Product Development and Innovation Management, v3 n4, Dec/Jan 2002, pp. 313-327.
  • Evans S, Burns A, Barrett R, (2002). ‘Empathic Design Tutor’, Cranfield University Press.
  • Evans, S., Jukes, S., (2001) "Improving co-development through process alignment", International Journal of Operations and Production Management, v20, n8, 2000. pp979-988.

Further publications