Improvement of overall performance of micro/small scale industries (MSSI) using multi-criteria decision making (MCDM)

Abstract

In the present economic conditions, it is vital that the industry is performing at its maximum level in all aspects. Otherwise it is very difficult for an industry to survive in a long-term perspective even though it can survive in short term, especially a micro and small-scale industry. There are number of ways to improve the present state of an industry. During these improvement/upgradation process in numerous occasion the decision has to be made. The decision made will immensely affect the end result as there are innumerable critical factors involved. One of the commonly used method to make effective decisions is expert system. Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) based expert system is one of effective method which is applied in various sectors to make effective decision making. MCDM is applied in the various fields for all kinds of evaluations like supplier selection, project evaluation, sensory evaluation, information retrieval, situation assessment, risk assessment, manufacturing flexibility evaluation. For MCDM, until now different tools are applied like Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), Fuzzy logic, TOPSIS, Weighted sum model, Goal Programming. In this paper, how the performance of a small and micro scale industry can be improved is analyzed and explained through a real-time case study. In this case study, MCDM is applied in two stages in order to obtain a high priority area which is in need of improvement. Finally, a suitable technical solution is provided to tackle the problematic area which in turn improves the performance of a micro and small-scale industry.