This book deals with World Class Operations Management (WCOM), detailing its principles, methods and organisation, and the results that this approach can bring about. Utilising real-world case studies illustrated by companies that have adopted this model (interviews with Saint-Gobain, L'Oreal, Tetra Pak, Bemis, and Bel Executives), it describes common patterns drawn from decades of hands-on experience, so as to present a theoretical approach together with the concrete application of its principles. WCOM, adopted by several multinational companies, is one of the more innovative management practises, as it integrates the best Continuous Improvement approaches (Lean, Total Productive Management, World Class Manufacturing) as well as the most innovative approaches in human dynamics like Change Leadership, Performance Behavior, Shingo Model, to name a few. Every book's chapter has been authored by an expert in these different fields, thus revealing the synergy among the different practices, which is one of the distinguishing and successful aspects of WCOM Maximising reader insights into the successful implementation of such an approach, and explaining not only its potentialities, but also its implementation dynamics, the critical points and the ways it can be integrated into different situations, this book is also about how to create a culture of excellence that is sustainable over a long period of time and delivers consistent (or ever-improving) results.

This book considers a broad range of areas from decision making methods applied in the contexts of Risk, Reliability and Maintenance (RRM). Intended primarily as an update of the 2015 book Multicriteria and Multiobjective Models for Risk, Reliability and Maintenance Decision Analysis, this edited work provides an integration of applied probability and decision making. Within applied probability, it primarily includes decision analysis and reliability theory, amongst other topics closely related to risk analysis and maintenance. In decision making, it includes multicriteria decision making/aiding (MCDM/A) methods and optimization models. Within MCDM, in addition to decision analysis, some of the topics related to mathematical programming areas are considered, such as multiobjective linear programming, multiobjective nonlinear programming, game theory and negotiations, and multiobjective optimization. Methods related to these topics have been applied to the context of RRM. In MCDA, several other methods are considered, such as outranking methods, rough sets and constructive approaches. The book addresses an innovative treatment of decision making in RRM, improving the integration of fundamental concepts from both areas of RRM and decision making. This is accomplished by presenting current research developments in decision making on RRM. Some pitfalls of decision models on practical applications on RRM are discussed and new approaches for overcoming those drawbacks are presented.

This volume presents techniques and theories drawn from mathematics, statistics, computer science, and information science to analyze problems in business, economics, finance, insurance, and related fields. The authors present proposals for solutions to common problems in related fields. To this end, they are showing the use of mathematical, statistical, and actuarial modeling, and concepts from data science to construct and apply appropriate models with real-life data, and employ the design and implementation of computer algorithms to evaluate decision-making processes. This book is unique as it associates data science - data-scientists coming from different backgrounds - with some basic and advanced concepts and tools used in econometrics, operational research, and actuarial sciences. It, therefore, is a must-read for scholars, students, and practitioners interested in a better understanding of the techniques and theories of these fields.

The development of U.S. urban transportation policy over the past half-century illustrates the changing relationships among federal, state, and local governments. This comprehensive text examines the evolution of urban transportation planning from early developments in highway planning in the 1930s to today's concerns over sustainable development, security, and pollution control. Highlighting major national events, the book examines the influence of legislation, regulations, conferences, federal programs, and advances in planning procedures and technology. The volume provides in-depth coverage of the most significant event in transportation planning, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1962, which created a federal mandate for a comprehensive urban transportation planning process, carried out cooperatively by states and local governments with federal funding. Claiming that urban transportation planning is more sophisticated, costly, and complex than its highway and transit planning predecessors, the book demonstrates how urban transportation planning evolved in response to changes in such factors as the environment, energy, development patterns, intergovernmental coordination, and federal transit programs. This updated, revised, and expanded edition features two new chapters on global climate change and managing under conditions of constrained resources, and covers the impact of the most recent legislation, 50 years after the Highway Act of 1962, emphasizing such timely issues as security, oil dependence, performance measurement, and public-private sector collaboration.

Scheduling is a resource allocation problem which exists in virtually every type of organization. Scheduling problems have produced roughly 40 years of research primarily within the OR community. This community has traditionally emphasized mathematical modeling techniques which seek exact solutions to well formulated optimization problems. While this approach produced important results, many contemporary scheduling problems are particularly difficult. Hence, over the last ten years operations researchers interested in scheduling have turned increasingly to more computer intensive and heuristic approaches. At roughly the same time, researchers in AI began to focus their methods on industrial and management science applications. The result of this confluence of fields has been a period of remarkable growth and excitement in scheduling research. Intelligent Scheduling Systems captures the results of a new wave of research at the forefront of scheduling research, of interest to researchers and practitioners alike. Presented are an array of the latest contemporary tools -- math modeling to tabu search to genetic algorithms -- that can assist in operational scheduling and solve difficult scheduling problems. The book presents the most recent research results from both operations research (OR) and artificial intelligence (AI) focusing their efforts on real scheduling problems.

This book offers a concise introduction to the field of financial economics and presents, for the first time, recent behavioral finance research findings that help us to understand many puzzles in traditional finance. Tailor-made for master's and PhD students, it includes tests and exercises that enable students to keep track of their progress. Parts of the book can also be used at the bachelor level.

Location, scheduling and design problems are assignment type problems with quadratic cost functions and occur in many contexts stretching from spatial economics via plant and office layout planning to VLSI design and similar prob lems in high-technology production settings. The presence of nonlinear inter action terms in the objective function makes these, otherwise simple, problems NP hard. In the first two chapters of this monograph we provide a survey of models of this type and give a common framework for them as Boolean quadratic problems with special ordered sets (BQPSs). Special ordered sets associated with these BQPSs are of equal cardinality and either are disjoint as in clique partitioning problems, graph partitioning problems, class-room scheduling problems, operations-scheduling problems, multi-processor assign ment problems and VLSI circuit layout design problems or have intersections with well defined joins as in asymmetric and symmetric Koopmans-Beckmann problems and quadratic assignment problems. Applications of these problems abound in diverse disciplines, such as anthropology, archeology, architecture, chemistry, computer science, economics, electronics, ergonomics, marketing, operations management, political science, statistical physics, zoology, etc. We then give a survey of the traditional solution approaches to BQPSs. It is an unfortunate fact that even after years of investigation into these problems, the state of algorithmic development is nowhere close to solving large-scale real life problems exactly. In the main part of this book we follow the polyhedral approach to combinatorial problem solving because of the dramatic algorith mic successes of researchers who have pursued this approach."

This edited volume highlights recent research advances in humanitarian relief logistics. The contributed chapters span the spectrum of key issues and activities from preparedness to mitigation operations (response), planning and execution. The volume also presents state-of-the-art methods and systems through current case studies.

Significant issues in planning and execution of humanitarian relief logistics discussed in this volume include the following:

Approaches that tackle realistic relief distribution networks. In addition to large-scale computing issues, heuristics may handle the complexity and particularities of humanitarian supply chains
Methods that integrate real-time information while effectively coping with time pressure and uncertainty, both of which are inherent to a disaster scene
Judicious recourse strategies that allow a quick and effective restoration of pre-planned solutions whenever an unpredictable event occurs
Coordination of multiple parties that are often involved in managing a disaster, including NGOs, local, state and federal agencies.

This volume provides robust evidence that research in humanitarian logistics may lead to substantial improvements in effectiveness and efficiency of disaster relief operations. This is quite encouraging, since the unique characteristics of disaster scenes provide significant opportunities for researchers to investigate novel approaches contributing to logistics research while offering a significant service to society.

This book presents various concepts and applications related to risk-conscious operations management. It also provides an overview of the risk-based engineering - fundamental to the concept of risk-conscious operations management. It presents the reliability concept to support Dependency Modelling, which includes hardware systems structures and components for reliability improvement and risk reduction. The book further develops and builds attributes and model for risk-conscious culture - critical to characterize operational approach to risk and presents human factor modelling, where it works on developing an approach for human error precursor analysis. This book will be useful for students, researchers, academicians and professionals working on identifying risk and reliability issues in complex safety and mission critical systems. It will also be beneficial for industry risk-and-reliability experts and operational safety staff working in the complex engineering systems.

The Feature-Driven Method for Structural Optimization details a novel structural optimization method within a CAD framework, integrating structural optimization and feature-based design. The book presents cutting-edge research on advanced structures and introduces the feature-driven structural optimization method by regarding engineering features as basic design primitives. Consequently, it presents a method that allows structural optimization and feature design to be done simultaneously so that feature attributes are preserved throughout the design process. The book illustrates and supports the effectiveness of the method described, showing potential applications through numerical modeling techniques and programming. This volume presents a high-performance optimization method adapted to engineering structures-a novel perspective that will help engineers in the computation, modeling and design of advanced structures.

This volume is the third (III) of four under the main themes of Digitizing Agriculture and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). The four volumes cover rapidly developing processes including Sensors (I), Data (II), Decision (III), and Actions (IV). Volumes are related to 'digital transformation" within agricultural production and provision systems, and in the context of Smart Farming Technology and Knowledge-based Agriculture. Content spans broadly from data mining and visualization to big data analytics and decision making, alongside with the sustainability aspects stemming from the digital transformation of farming. The four volumes comprise the outcome of the 12th EFITA Congress, also incorporating chapters that originated from select presentations of the Congress. The focus of this book (III) is on the transformation of collected information into valuable decisions and aims to shed light on how best to use digital technologies to reduce cost, inputs, and time, toward becoming more efficient and transparent. Fourteen chapters are grouped into 3 Sections. The first section of is dedicated to decisions in the value chain of agricultural products. The next section, titled Primary Production, elaborates on decision making for the improvement of processes taking place with the farm under the implementation of ICT. The last section is devoted to the development of innovative decision applications that also consider the protection of the environment, recognizing its importance in the preservation and considerate use of resources, as well as the mitigation of adverse impacts that are related to agricultural production. Planning and modeling the assessment of agricultural practices can provide farmers with valuable information prior to the execution of any task. This book provides a valuable reference for them as well as for those directly involved with decision making in planning and assessment of agricultural production. Specific advances covered in the volume: Modelling and Simulation of ICT-based agricultural systems Farm Management Information Systems (FMIS) Planning for unmanned aerial systems Agri-robotics awareness and planning Smart livestock farming Sustainable strategic planning in agri-production Food business information systems

Primarily an introduction to the theory of stochastic processes at the undergraduate or beginning graduate level, the primary objective of this book is to initiate students in the art of stochastic modelling. However it is motivated by significant applications and progressively brings the student to the borders of contemporary research. Examples are from a wide range of domains, including operations research and electrical engineering. Researchers and students in these areas as well as in physics, biology and the social sciences will find this book of interest.

The book offers a comprehensive survey of interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy sets. It reports on cutting-edge research carried out by the founder of the intuitionistic fuzzy sets, Prof. Krassimir Atanassov, giving a special emphasis to the practical applications of this extension. A few interesting case studies, such as in the area of data mining, decision making and pattern recognition, among others, are discussed in detail. The book offers the first comprehensive guide on interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy sets. By providing the readers with a thorough survey and important practical details, it is expected to support them in carrying out applied research and to encourage them to test the theory behind the sets for new advanced applications. The book is a valuable reference resource for graduate students and researchers alike.

This book has resulted from the activities of IFAC TC 5.2 "Manufacturing Modelling for Management and Control". The book offers an introduction and advanced techniques of scheduling applications to cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0 systems for larger audience. This book uncovers fundamental principles and recent developments in the theory and application of scheduling methodology to cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0. The purpose of this book is to present recent developments in scheduling in cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0 and to systemize these developments in new taxonomies and methodological principles to shape this new research domain. This book addresses the needs of both researchers and practitioners to uncover the challenges and opportunities of scheduling techniques' applications to cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0. For the first time, it comprehensively conceptualizes scheduling in cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0 systems as a new research domain. The chapters of the book are written by the leading international experts and utilize methods of operations research, industrial engineering and computer science. Such a multi-disciplinary combination is unique and comprehensively deciphers major problem taxonomies, methodologies, and applications to scheduling in cloud manufacturing and Industry 4.0.

Computational Optimization: A Tribute to Olvi Mangasarian serves as an excellent reference, providing insight into some of the most challenging research issues in the field. This collection of papers covers a wide spectrum of computational optimization topics, representing a blend of familiar nonlinear programming topics and such novel paradigms as semidefinite programming and complementarity-constrained nonlinear programs. Many new results are presented in these papers which are bound to inspire further research and generate new avenues for applications. An informal categorization of the papers includes: Algorithmic advances for special classes of constrained optimization problems Analysis of linear and nonlinear programs Algorithmic advances B- stationary points of mathematical programs with equilibrium constraints Applications of optimization Some mathematical topics Systems of nonlinear equations.

30th European Symposium on Computer Aided Chemical Engineering, Volume 47 contains the papers presented at the 30th European Symposium of Computer Aided Process Engineering (ESCAPE) event held in Milan, Italy, May 24-27, 2020. It is a valuable resource for chemical engineers, chemical process engineers, researchers in industry and academia, students, and consultants for chemical industries.

Balk argues that most professionals in government agencies are underutilized. He proposes an operational approach, called public agency democracy, that should help reduce costly and disconcerting errors. The book will interest those who wish to better understand the frustrations of public service and how to turn these to motivate change.

Well over two million very qualified individuals mediate between high-level managers and other members of public agencies. These grossly underutilized intermediary professionals must become more empowered to reduce waste, malfeasance and other costly errors. Balk proposes an applied theory of public agency democracy designed to liberate the potential of its highly trained experts.

The book begins by discussing professionals as power intermediaries and their necessary tensions with authority around matters of reform. Recognized dilemmas in the field of public administration are reviewed to demonstrate the need to resolve issues concerning public agency democracy. A model is then developed to incorporate democratic action with responses ranging from routine to whistle-blowing activities. The second part of the book shows why existing management orientations are not receptive to the need for agency democracy. Conventional orientations reject the paradoxical realities of government environments; therefore, ingrained beliefs about effectiveness and management authority are at times inappropriate. Management approaches to public service motivation lack sophistication. Four final chapters are devoted to techniques and approaches on the part of professionals to initiate change. These involve techniques to assess organizational predicaments, design resolutions and become constructively involved in processes of agency reform. Ways are proposed for professionals and others to institutionalize public agency democracy in government environments.

This book combines, for the first time, the operations management and operations research concepts in lean and agile supply chain management (SCM) for achieving decreased uncertainty, increased productivity, and sustainability through the use of quality engineering techniques (QETs). The book serves as a beneficial supplementary read for supply chain management and logistics courses in operations management/operations research for industrial engineering or management departments as the book uses practical examples of QET applications in SCM in a variety of industries, such as manufacturing, international shipping, and services. By reading this book, a wide range of audiences from general readers to students in industrial engineering or management fields will learn practical skills that can be utilized in the application of quality engineering techniques in lean and agile SCM.

The second edition of Leadership offers a unique, highly-applied academic treatise on leadership, uniquely blending a chronological analysis of the last 100 years of leadership theory with exclusive CEO interviews. The case studies, expert insights and other teaching aids are timely and hard hitting, making this textbook relevant, insightful and informative, while a research chapter empowers the reader to competently question the leaders that shape our world. The world has turned on its political and corporate axis since the first edition of Leadership was published, and it became necessary to produce a second edition that fully encapsulated, respected and observed these changes. Numerous new case studies, discussion starters and examples subsequently reflect today's volatile technological, political, financial and social shifts, while exclusive interviews with successful CEOs powerfully blend theory with practice. Readers will learn the importance of navigating leadership in the most testing of times. A new chapter, 'Researching leadership', offers the reader the opportunity to develop significantly as a leadership researcher and to ably question reality in a post-truth world. A self-leadership chapter equips the reader to develop their own leadership capabilities, while retaining the ability to avoid destructive leadership. Ultimately, readers will become empowered to appreciate the complex, intersectional nature of leadership and to learn what it takes to lead in today's politically, technologically and socially tumultuous world. This book will be particularly engaging for students and educators at secondary school, college, undergraduate and postgraduate level, and for leadership/management consultants. While the book's primary role remains as a core text for leadership, management and business modules, it will also be of interest to students on many other courses (e.g. psychology, politics, sociology). Packed with teaching resources which educators will find particularly useful, Leadership is the only textbook of its kind to offer such an applied view of this subject via the inclusion of 12 (mostly CEO) expert insights. The first edition was an "Amazon Hot New Release", so this second edition might also hold interest for a general readership.

Operations research tools are ideally suited to providing solutions and insights for the many problems health policy-maker's face. Indeed, a growing body of literature on health policy analysis, based on operations research methods, has emerged to address the problems mentioned above and several others. The research in this field is often multi-disciplinary, being conducted by teams that include not only operations researchers but also clinicians, economists and policy analysts. The research is also often very applied, focusing on a specific question driven by a decision-maker and many times yielding a tool to assist in future decisions. The goal of this volume was to bring together a group of papers by leading experts that could showcase the current state of the field of operations research applied to health-care policy. There are 18 chapters that illustrate the breadth of this field. The chapters use a variety of techniques, including classical operations research tools, such as optimization, queuing theory, and discrete event simulation, as well as statistics, epidemic models and decision-analytic models. The book spans the field and includes work that ranges from highly conceptual to highly applied. An example of the former is the chapter by Kimmel and Schackman on building policy models, and an example of the latter is the chapter by Coyle and colleagues on developing a Markov model for use by an organization in Ontario that makes recommendations about the funding of new drugs. The book also includes a mix of review chapters, such as the chapter by Hutton on public health response to influenza outbreaks, and original research, such as the paper by Blake and colleagues analyzing a decision by Canadian Blood Services to consolidate services. This volume could provide an excellent introduction to the field of operations research applied to health-care policy, and it could also serve as an introduction to new areas for researchers already familiar with the topic. The book is divided into six sections. The first section contains two chapters that describe several different applications of operations research in health policy and provide an excellent overview of the field. Sections 2 to 4 present policy models in three focused areas. Section 5 contains two chapters on conceptualizing and building policy models. The book concludes in Section 6 with two chapters describing work that was done with policy-makers and presenting insights gained from working directly with policy-makers.

The authors contend that current knowledge management efforts in organizations need to be re-focused so that they can be better poised for success. Topics discussed include: missing capabilities of knowledge management, knowledge management in strategic alliances, customer knowledge management, knowledge markets, and knowledge management systems, among others. The authors take a pragmatic approach to knowledge management and present the material in a jargon free and accessible way.

Cognition-driven decision support system (DSS) has been recognized as a paradigm in the research and development of business intelligence (BI). Cognitive decision support aims to help managers in their decision making from human cognitive aspects, such as thinking, sensing, understanding and predicting, and fully reuse their experience. Among these cognitive aspects, decision makers situation awareness (SA) and mental models are considered to be two important prerequisites for decision making, particularly in ill-structured and dynamic decision situations with uncertainties, time pressure and high personal stake. In today s business domain, decision making is becoming increasingly complex. To make a successful decision, managers SA about their business environments becomes a critical factor.

This book presents theoretical models as well practical techniques of cognitiondriven DSS. It first introduces some important concepts of cognition orientation in decision making process and some techniques in related research areas including DSS, data warehouse and BI, offering readers a preliminary for moving forward in this book. It then proposes a cognition-driven decision process (CDDP) model which incorporates SA and experience (mental models) as its central components. The goal of the CDDP model is to facilitate cognitive decision support to managers on the basis of BI systems. It also presents relevant techniques developed to support the implementation of the CDDP model in a BI environment. Key issues addressed of a typical business decision cycle in the CDDP model include: natural language interface for a manager s SA input, extraction of SA semantics, construction of data warehouse queries based on the manger s SA and experience, situation information retrieval from data warehouse, how the manager perceives situation information and update SA, how the manager s SA leads to a final decision. Finally, a cognition-driven DSS, FACETS, and two illustrative applications of this system are discussed."

The book offers a comprehensive, practice-oriented introduction to the field of fuzzy mathematical programming (FMP) as key topic of modern analytics. FMP plays a fundamental role in dealing with a varied range of problems, such as those concerning smart cities, sustainability, and renewable energies. This book includes an introduction to the basic concepts, together with extensive information on the computational-intelligence-based optimization models and techniques that have been used to date. Special emphasis is given to fuzzy transportation problems. The book is a valuable resource for researchers, data scientists and practitioners dealing with computational-intelligence-based optimization models for analytics.

This book demonstrates that innovative ideas are systematically constructed in the creative space spanned by the dimensions of systems thinking and knowledge management. Readers will be introduced to this proposition in the final chapter, after learning about the key innovation theories, design thinking, systems thinking, and idea creation methods in systems science and knowledge science. The content provided throughout the book supports knowledge creation in various fields, the management of research and business projects, and the creation of promotion stories for products and services. Practitioners who are seeking to create innovative ideas can systematically learn the minimum theories and methods required, while graduate students will be equipped to link their research to innovation by learning the essence of systems science and knowledge science and considering selected issues. Lastly, the book includes suggestions for future research directions in knowledge science.

This book presents essential information on modern location science - in a word, all you need to know about location. The second edition of this handbook has been fully revised throughout, with numerous updates and chapters added, to offer an even more comprehensive overview of methods and applications. The book is divided into three parts: basic concepts, advanced concepts and applications. Written by the most respected specialists in the field and thoroughly reviewed by the editors, it first lays out the fundamental problems in location science and provides readers with basic background information on location theory. Part II covers advanced models and concepts, broadening and expanding on the content presented in Part I. It also discusses important tools to help readers grasp and solve real-world location problems. Part III focuses on the links between location science and other areas like GIS, telecommunications, healthcare, rapid transit networks, districting problems and disaster events, and presents a wide range of applications to allow readers to understand the role of facility location in such areas and learn how to handle real-world location problems. The book is intended for researchers working on theory and applications involving location problems and models. It is also suitable as a textbook for graduate courses on facility location.