There has been growing interest on business models among academics and practitioners in recent years, as business model describes how an organization creates, distributes and captures value and, therefore, can be considered the DNA of the organization. Recently, factors related to digital transformation, the vital role of sustainability and social aspects, along with an increasing globalization, have pushed towards radical transformations in business models. This book aims to further our knowledge on business model innovation in new contexts of analysis and with new perspectives of investigation. Insights from business model innovation are presented from studies focusing on start-ups, small businesses and large businesses to provide a bigger picture on new dynamics connected to digital transformation, sustainability, new global relationships. As such, the scope is on new ways to create value, new components and dynamics (such as digitalization and sustainability) concerning the key elements of the business model (value creation, value configuration and value capture), and new relationships between actors that may foster business model innovation. It represents a valuable resource for practitioners willing to innovate business models, academics aiming at finding new research lines, and students keen to learn more about business models.

Analyzing maintenance as an integrated system with objectives, strategies and processes that need to be planned, designed, engineered, and controlled using statistical and optimization techniques, the theme of this book is the strategic holistic system approach for maintenance. This approach enables maintenance decision makers to view maintenance as a provider of a competitive edge not a necessary evil. Encompassing maintenance systems; maintenance strategic and capacity planning, planned and preventive maintenance, work measurements and standards, material (spares) control, maintenance operations and control, planning and scheduling, maintenance quality, training, and others, this book gives readers an understanding of the relevant methodology and how to apply it to real-world problems in industry. Each chapter includes a number exercises and is suitable as a textbook or a reference for a professionals and practitioners whilst being of interest to industrial engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, and industrial management students. It can also be used as a textbook for short courses on maintenance in industry. This text is the second edition of the book, which has four new chapters added and three chapters are revised substantially to reflect development in maintenance since the publication of the first edition. The new chapters cover reliability centered maintenance, total productive maintenance, e-maintenance and maintenance performance, productivity and continuous improvement.

A roadmap to consistent, high-quality service for any organization
A service is typically something created to serve a paying customer, whether internal or external. Some services consist of several processes linked together while others consist of a single process.
This book introduces Design for Six Sigma (DFSS), an easy-to-master, yet highly effective data-driven method that prevents defects in any type of service process. The particular focus of this publication is service DFSS, which leads to what the authors term "a whole quality business," one that takes a proactive stance and gets things right the first time. Not only does the whole quality business produce a high-quality product and offer high-quality services, but it also operates at lower cost and higher efficiency, throughout the entire life cycle, than its competitors because all the links in the supply chain are optimized.
Following a detailed overview that sets forth the basic premise and key concepts of service DFSS, the authors offer all the information and tools needed to take advantage of service DFSS within their own organizations, including:
* Clear and in-depth coverage of the philosophical, organizational, and technical aspects of service DFSS
* Step-by-step roadmap of the entire service DFSS deployment and execution process
* Full discussions of all the key methods involved in service DFSS, including axiomatic design, design for X, the theory of inventive problem solving (TRIZ), transfer function, design scorecards, and Taguchi's method
* Practical, illustrative examples that demonstrate how the theory is put into practice
* Assistance in developing the necessary skills in applying DFSS in organizational settings
Problems and their solutions are provided at the end of each chapter to help readers grasp the key concepts they need to move forward in the text. Acclaro DFSS Light(r), a Java-based software package that implements axiomatic design processes discussed in Chapter Eight, is available for download from an accompanying Wiley ftp site. Acclaro DFSS Light(r) is a software product of Axiomatic Design Solutions, Inc.
This book is ideal as a reference to service DFSS for corporate executives, quality control managers, and process engineers, or as a complete training manual for DFSS teams. It is also a superior textbook for graduate students in management, operations, and quality assurance.

This book comprises a set of stories about being an engineer for many decades and the lessons the author learned from research and practice. These lessons focus on people and organizations, often enabled by technology. The settings range from airplanes, power plants, and communication networks to ecosystems that enable education, healthcare, and transportation. All of these settings are laced with behavioral and social phenomena that need to be understood and influenced. The author's work in these domains has often led to the question: "Well, why does it work like that?" He invariably sought to understand the bigger picture to find the sources of requirements, constraints, norms, and values. He wanted to understand what could be changed, albeit often with much effort to overcome resistance. He found that higher levels of an ecosystem often provide the resources and dictate the constraints imposed on lower levels. These prescriptions are not just commands. They also reflect values and cultural norms. Thus, the answers to the question were not just technical and economic. Often, the answers reflected eons of social and political priorities. The endeavors related in the book frequently involved addressing emerging realities rather than just the status quo. This book is an ongoing discovery of these bigger pictures. The stories and the lessons related in this book provide useful perspectives on change. The understanding of people and organizations that emerges from these lessons can help to enable transformative change. Fundamental change is an intensely human-centric endeavor, not just for the people and organizations aspiring to change, but also for the people helping them. You will meet many of these people in this book as the stories unfold. The genesis of this book originated in a decision made early in the author's career. He had developed a habit of asking at the end of each day, "What did I really accomplish today?" This was sometimes frustrating as he was not sure the day had yielded any significant accomplishments. One day it dawned on him that this was the wrong question - He needed to ask, "What did I learn today?" It is always possible to learn, most recently about public health and climate change. In planning this book, the author first thought in terms of accomplishments such as projects conducted, systems built, and articles and books published. He could not imagine this being interesting to readers. Then, it struck him - It is much more interesting to report on what he learned about people and organizations, including how he helped them accomplish their goals. This is a book of stories about how these lessons emerged. In planning this book, the author first thought in terms of accomplishments such as projects conducted, systems built, and articles and books published. He could not imagine this being interesting to readers. Then, it struck him - It is much more interesting to report on what he learned about people and organizations, including how he helped them accomplish their goals. This is a book of stories about how these lessons emerged.

Quality is the major topic in international industry today and its importance should increase in the 1990s. This book presents a step-by-step approach for implementing a quality improvement process in any type of organization. "Making Quality Happen" utilizes "quality" as the strategic weapon that should help an organization achieve its overall objective by improving the organization's customer impact, reducing its cost structure, increasing its competative market share and maximizing its employee productivity. The quality improvement process detailed by NcNealy should make quality and integral part of any organization, and not an added or extraneous feature. "Making Quality Happen" is targeted at a broad and deep audience of managers in all types or organizations around the world. The concepts and recommended actions expounded are directly applicable and have been implemented successfully in large and small organizations in the public, private and non-profit sectors. hsi is a "hands-on", action-oriented, how-to guide ot implementing a quality improvement effort. It is not a theoretical, overly technical or academic treatise. Rather, it is a recipe for winning the quality revolution. Examples are used throughout the text to illustrate its key points and anecdotes from actual implementations are used to clarify, augment and illustrate the recommended action plans.

Laser-Based Additive Manufacturing (LBAM) technologies, hailed by some as the "third industrial revolution," can increase product performance, while reducing time-to-market and manufacturing costs. This book is a comprehensive look at new technologies in LBAM of metal parts, covering topics such as mechanical properties, microstructural features, thermal behavior and solidification, process parameters, optimization and control, uncertainty quantification, and more. The book is aimed at addressing the needs of a diverse cross-section of engineers and professionals.

The inspection process is one of the most important steps in manufacturing industries because it safeguards high quality products and customer satisfaction. Manual inspection may not provide the desired accuracy. This book introduces and implements a new methodology and develops the supporting technologies for automated inspection planning based on Computer Aided Design (CAD) models. It also provides and implements an efficient link for automated operation based on Coordinate Measuring Machine (CMM). The link's output is a DMIS code programming file based on the inspection planning table that is executed on CMM.

This book offers a detailed theoretical analysis of the fields of learning and management in the digital age. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, it opens a dialogue between agile management theory and agile learning theory. The book argues that there is a tension between participative and action-orientated approaches on the one hand and neoliberal enclosure of the actor on the other hand. It takes this as an opportunity for interdisciplinary dialogue between learning theories and management concepts. With contributions from a range of international experts, chapters discuss the need for suitable theoretical, epistemological, and ethical foundations as well as practice-orientated methods for learning and management to implement appropriate strategies and meet educational challenges. This highly topical book will be of great interest to academics, postgraduate students, and researchers in the fields of digital learning, educational theory, management theory, and communication studies.

This book offers a detailed theoretical analysis of the fields of learning and management in the digital age. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, it opens a dialogue between agile management theory and agile learning theory. The book argues that there is a tension between participative and action-orientated approaches on the one hand and neoliberal enclosure of the actor on the other hand. It takes this as an opportunity for interdisciplinary dialogue between learning theories and management concepts. With contributions from a range of international experts, chapters discuss the need for suitable theoretical, epistemological, and ethical foundations as well as practice-orientated methods for learning and management to implement appropriate strategies and meet educational challenges. This highly topical book will be of great interest to academics, postgraduate students, and researchers in the fields of digital learning, educational theory, management theory, and communication studies.

Over the past 50 years the global labour market is transforming from reliable employment to low-wage and unstable informal and precarious jobs. This ineluctable shift is a consequence of the concentrated application of neoliberalism since the 1980s, as capitalism is converting standardised labour markets in the developed Global North into contingent and informal labour. Platform Labour and Global Logistics: A Research Companion examines the most important developments and features of global logistics and the emergence of the platform economy through historical comparative chapters and case studies. Part I surveys the logistics revolution and its impact on labour in key sectors of the global economy and probes the viability of the platform as a generator of economic and financial growth and innovation. The chapters of Part 1 offer a fulsome analysis and critique of the economic and technical reconfiguration brought on by neoliberal capitalism and the diffusion of the platform and logistics as a feasible model into the future. Part II examines labour restructuring from standardized to informal work through the platform and information technology, and the political and environmental challenges to labour. Part III provides global case studies on the informal economy through case studies of crucial economies where the platform has become dominant, and Part IV examines how the platform has contributed to geographic mobility and labour migration, and the consequences on workers. Platform Labour and Global Logistics: A Research Companion presents a unique contribution to the political economy literature through highlighting the significance of the impact of the platform and logistics on the working class and potential challenges from labour across the world. This book is intended for academics, researchers and students studying technological innovation, global supply chains, labour restructuring, and worker resistance.

This book provides a powerful insight into strategic portfolio management and its central role in the delivery of organisational strategy, maximisation of value creation, and efficient allocation of resources and capabilities to achieve organisational strategic objectives. The book makes a valuable contribution to the development of thinking on the translation of strategy into actionable work. Whether you are a senior manager building a high-performing strategic portfolio for your organisation or an academic searching for new perspectives on strategy execution through portfolio management, you will find great significance in this book. Twenty-eight chapters in four sections provide multiple perspectives on the topic, with in-depth guidance on organisational design for strategic portfolio management and covering all process, capability, and leadership aspects of strategic portfolio management. The book includes several detailed case studies for the effective deployment of strategic portfolios, bringing together theory and practice for strategic portfolio management. This book is particularly valuable for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students of project and portfolio management, strategic management, and leadership who are looking to expand their knowledge within the multi-project environment. Highly practical and logical in its structure, it also shows project management professionals how to effectively manage their business portfolios and align this with their business strategy.

Product design is becoming increasingly challenging as product complexity increases dramatically with the advent of autonomous control and the need to achieve zero emissions. Companies continue to have poor product launches with significant numbers of recall campaigns and high after-sales warranties. It is important that potential product failures are identified and fixed during the design of a product. Failure modes found late after the design has matured are normally easy to find with some being identified by the customer but are often difficult and expensive to fix since modifying one part will often have a knock-on effect on other parts causing other problems. Discovering failure modes early in the design process is often difficult requiring rigorous and comprehensive analysis but once found such failure modes are usually easy and cheap to fix. This book presents an approach to product design based on Failure Mode Avoidance that utilizes a series of strongly interrelated engineering tools and interpersonal skills that can be used to discover failure modes early in the design process. The tools can be used across engineering disciplines. Despite engineering being largely a team activity, it is often the case that little attention is paid to the team process after the team membership has been identified, with membership normally being based on technical expertise. In addition to technical expertise, an effective engineering team requires individual engineers to work together efficiently. Good leadership is also required with the leader able to both manage change and encourage individual team members to work to the best of their ability. The book interweaves technical skills, team skills, and team leadership in a way that reflects their real-life interrelationship. The book tells the fictional story of a small engineering team and its leader as they implement the skills introduced in the book and follows their experiences reflecting individual difficulties, enthusiasm, humor, and skepticism in applying the methodologies and tools for the first time. In addition, the story tells of team members' interactions with their management and peers within a company that, having been very successful, finds itself in financial difficulties. It promotes constructivist learning through the reader empathizing with the characters in the book. These characters ask questions that are typical of those that learners will ask about the subject matter. Learning reinforcement is also integrated into the storyline as a natural and unobtrusive feature. The book is intended to be read like a novel from cover to cover with a storyline that motivates the reader to read on. While including in-depth technical examples the book is not intended as a seminal text on Failure Mode Avoidance or team skills but is intended to give the reader an understanding such that they are motivated to learn more. Having read the book, it can be treated more typically as a textbook by returning to some of the technical detail or looking to further reading such as that identified in the book.

This book enables enterprise business leaders - from CEOs to supervisors - to understand what "Continuous Improvement" is, why it is probably the best answer to improved business performance in years, and how to put it to work in the unique environment of a specific organization. The book examines what is at the core of "Continuous Improvement" and delves deeper into the elements and constituents necessary to take an organization to the next level to ensure its continued, long-term existence. It provides guidance to enterprise management and to professionals engaged in the implementation of a "Continuous Improvement" initiative and enables them to structure and manage its implementation successfully. It also provides tools to quickly assess where an enterprise business stands in terms of strategic management and "Continuous Improvement".

by Bob Camp The business improvement topic and quality tool called benchmarking is becoming widely understood and broadly applied. There are now applica firms that tions in almost all segments of the economy including industrial either produce a product or a service, non-profit organizations such as healthcare, government and education. The approach is starting to spread around the globe with initiatives in Europe, Asia Pacific and South America. This is commendable and reassuring and must show that there is significant interest in the approach and that it works. What is missing, however, are books and reference material that are not solely prepared in the US where benchmarking started. Theses would include examples of applications relevant to the local area and industries. They would include references to articles written about benchmarking appearing in local publications. In this fashion those interested would have near hand case histories of the use of benchmarking and therefore become encouraged to use the technique. Zairi and Leonard have done the benchmarking community a real service by documenting the European view and application of benchmark ing to a wide range of examples. But they have not stopped there. Their text includes treatment of a number of related facets of benchmarking that makes this a fairly thorough text."

The book is a synthesis of the state-of-the-art in project management concepts and techniques. The author places particular emphasis on precedence diagramming (PDM), at present the most widely used schedulingmethod. New theoretical improvements of PDM are presented, several for the first time in a book, such as: maximal type of precedence relationships, calculating the minimal and maximal available project durations, levelingresources when maximal relationships are used, and precedence diagramming time-cost trade-off. Discussions of computer implementation are included throughout the book. A PC-based software package called ProjectDirector', containing the theoretical improvements described in the book, is available from the author. Audience: Researchers, and undergraduate and graduate students in civil engineering, industrial engineering and operationsresearch, as well as practitioners, managers, and contractors interested in project management.

Typically entrenched and systemic, healthcare problems require the sort of comprehensive solutions that can only be addressed by a change in culture and a shift in thinking. Organizations around the world are using Lean to redesign care and improve processes in a way that achieves and sustains meaningful results for patients, staff, physicians, and health systems. This book demonstrates how honest appraisal, intelligent planning, and vigilant follow-up have led to dramatic improvements in a variety of healthcare settings across the world. It teaches us how innovative organizations can find sustainable solutions to seemingly intractable problems by following a path guided by Lean Thinking. Lean methods may not solve every healthcare problem, but as these cases prove, changing a culture rather than personnel results in more effective sustainable change. This multi-authored book provides expert descriptions of Lean methods and their application in healthcare, written by the people who developed and tested the methods in healthcare settings. Each chapter brings together a description of the technique or approach, with examples of application in practice from the author's own practice. Authors use an engaging approach to their narrative, with examples from their personal experience or engagement being described to illustrate the practical application of theoretic approaches. In painting a picture of the environment in which these tools and techniques have been applied, readers will understand the transferability to their own workplace environment. This will be an opportunity to tell real stories of the application of Lean in healthcare and give readers the opportunity to learn from people from across the world, on subjects on which they are acknowledged topic experts, based on day-to-day Lean practice.

Tightly written integration of recent scholarship, proven theories, and practice-based examples Increased use of world-wide contexts and examples, reflecting continuing development and dissemination of applications, and need for international appeal and awareness Two new chapters on innovation and bringing performance to governance

Sustainable Self-Governance in Businesses and Society offers a sound introduction to Stafford Beer's Viable System Model (VSM) and clarifies its relevance to support organisational sustainability and self-governance. While the VSM has been known since the early 1980s, it hasn't been always easy to understand and to apply. It explains the self-transformation methodology to analyse the way organisations manage (or not) their complexity and govern themselves. The work is supported by multiple examples of application in organisations of all scales - from small to multi-national corporations and from organised social networks to communities and national organisations. It clarifies the relevance of Beer's theory to support systemic learning and change in organisations, and to coach them to self-organise and self-govern. Readers interested in further understanding insights from complex systems and cybernetics theories for designing and transforming organisations will benefit from this book, as it works to offer very detailed insights on how to put the VSM theory into practice. It clarifies how it improves adaptive capabilities, agile and self-regulated structures, more capable of fully implementing corporate sustainability strategies and self-governing themselves. The chapters provide key reading for managers, consultants, practitioners, and post-graduate students working in organisational transformation, governance, and sustainability.

* Presents the first quantitative index to measure construction project management performance

This book examines the dramatic increase in automotive assembly plants in the former Socialist Central European (CE) nations of Czechia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia from 1989 onwards. Enticed by relatively lower-wage labour and significant government incentives, the world's largest automakers have launched more than 20 passenger car assembly complexes in CE nations, with production accelerating dramatically since 2001. As a result, the annual passenger car production in Western Europe declined by more than 20% between 2001 and 2015, and alternatively in the CEE it increased by nearly 170% during this period. Drawing on case studies of 25 current and former foreign-run assembly plants, the author presents a rare historical account of automotive foreign assembly plants in the CE following this dramatic geographic shift. This book will expand the knowledge of policy-makers in Europe in relation to their pursuits of FDI and will be of great interest to scholars and students of business, economic history, political science, and development.

The market and demand for Halal goods and services is ever increasing and, with it, the importance of supply chain integrity. Integrity from the perspective of Halal logistics service providers is a prerequisite of Halal compliance. This book provides a unique overview of Halal supply chain integrity (HSCI) using examples from Malaysia. The book carefully addresses and simplifies the issue of integrity in Halal logistics and supply chain. It gathers findings from a Halal supply chain integrity study from the leading country in Halal, Malaysia, to shed light of current issues, developments and future trends on the theory and practice of Halal in the logistics sector. In particular, the book discusses factors such as Halal quality assurance, trust and commitment, and halal assets specificity. This will be a useful reference for researchers, scholars and upper-level students who wish to understand Halal logistics and supply chain management and the importance of protecting integrity of Halal services and products.

Technology Innovation discusses the fundamental aspects of processes and structures of technology innovation. It offers a new perspective concerning fundamentals aspects not directly involved in the complex relations existing between technology and the socio-economic system. By considering technology and its innovation from a scientific point of view, the book presents a novel definition of technology as a set of physical, chemical, and biological phenomena, producing an effect exploitable for human purposes. Expanding on the general model of technology innovation by linking the model of technology, based on a structure of technological operations, with the models of the structures for technology innovation, based on organization of fluxes of knowledge and capitals, the book considers various technological processes and the stages of the innovation process. Offers a perspective on the evolution of technology in the frame of an industrial platform network Explains a novel definition of technology as a set of physical, chemical, and biological phenomena producing an effect exploitable for human purposes Discusses technology innovation as result of structures organizing fluxes of knowledge and capitals Provides a technology model simulating the functioning of technology with its optimization Presents a technology innovation model explaining the territorial technology innovation process The book is intended for academics, graduate students, technology developers who are involved in operations management and research, innovation, and technology development.

Kevin Maromonte, a specialist in corporate performance improvement, maintains that the next logical necessary step in the evolution of quality management is no less than the abolition of all company quality departments, including the Quality Assurance and Total Quality Management (TQM) departments, and their specialized functions. Instead, he argues persuasively that the responsibility for quality improvement should be dispersed throughout the organization, resulting in what he calls the Invisible Quality corporation. Only in this way can responsibility for the continuing creation and maintenance of quality in the production of goods and services be shared by management and employees. Why this is so and how it can be accomplished with little or no disruption to the organization is discussed reasonably and in compelling detail. More than just a guide, Maromonte's book offers a provocative new way to think about the organization and to help it achieve its highest potential. Essential reading for people at all corporate levels, and a challenging presentation for their colleagues in the academic business community.

Maromonte points out that as industry has evolved over the past century, the responsibility for corporate quality improvement has been increasingly decentralized, yet quality departments continue to exist in organizations. As a result, people in organizations now tend to look to others -- specifically quality professionals -- for quality improvement rather than to themselves. To rectify this, he argues that such compartmentalized responsibilities continuing to be absorbed by quality departments must be transferred to other departments throughout the corporation. If this is done, Maromonte states that not only will corporate performance be dramatically improved, but operating expenses will be drastically reduced, and he shows clearly how to do it. His approach is rational, methodical, and mindful of the hazards of attempting to impose drastic changes on any organization. The Invisible Quality concept must first be thoroughly understood and the reason for it accepted throughout the top levels of management. He shows how to accomplish this, how to instill a commitment to Invisible Quality in others, and then how to quantify and measure the results it achieves.

Under and post COVID-19 conditions, companies are adapting to smart ways of operating and managing logistics processes to counteract the negative implications of the pandemic. This book offers an analysis and guidance on how to manage these processes, including transport, inventory, operations and waste management, to meet the complex need of enterprises. This edited collection presents selected and key aspects of the implementation of logistics processes in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic, enriched with empirical analyses and international examples. The book is a contribution to the considerations on the role and importance of logistics processes in the management of organisations in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as reducing its negative socio-economic and technological effects. With contributions from global scholars, the book demonstrates the direction in which logistics processes should change so that they can take the form of "smart". Logistics, Transport and the COVID-19 Crisis will be directly relevant for researchers and academics across logistics, supply chain management, and transport management as well as risk management and related fields.