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Research indicates that the design process is poorly understood and difficult to describe or teach. Design is a process that occurs as a result of knowledge and experience within the influence of personal, corporate, and other environment. This research project has been initiated as a qualitative study that will study design teams, design team members, and the interaction within and between these groups. The study will include an understanding of the framework within which these teams make their design decisions. The project is attempting to identify the many steps in the design process and which of these steps have the greatest impact on the success of a design project. A qualitative format is being used to encompass the human behaviour influence. This paper will describe the research protocol and report on the preliminary findings. This is a PhD thesis entitled Understanding the Engineering Design Process in Biosystems Engineering under the direction of the NSERC Design Chair at the University of Manitoba.