Development Of Performance Indicators Research Articles

Global product development projects: measuring performance and monitoring the risks

This article investigates the development and application of key performance indicators for global product development. Two in-depth, longitudinal case studies with multinational Danish manufacturing companies were conducted, and highlight how key performance indicators, typically used for collocated, cross-functional product development, do not provide the predictive insight required to avoid the additional risks encountered in the global product development environment. Grounded in the case study results and building on established methodologies in performance measurement literature, a framework was developed and validated in two additional Danish companies to support project managers to develop: preventive indicators, which support the avoidance of identified risks, and outcome indicators, which support the measurement towards the attainment of project objectives. The study is unique as it is one of the very few longitudinal studies of engineering design activities in a global context, providing the in-depth contextual understanding towards key risks and their influence on performance; an important step to support researchers and practitioners with the development of preventive measures.

Using principal component analysis to develop performance indicators in professional rugby league

ABSTRACTPrevious research on performance indicators in rugby league has suggested that dimension reduction techniques should be utilised when analysing sporting data sets with a large number of variables. Forty-five rugby league team performance indicators, from all 27 rounds of the 2012, 2013 and 2014 European Super League seasons, collected by Opta, were reduced to 10 orthogonal principal components with standardised team scores produced for each component. Forced-entry logistic (match outcome) and linear (point’s difference) regression models were used alongside exhaustive chi-square automatic interaction detection decision trees to determine how well each principle component predicted success. The 10 principal components explained 81.8% of the variance in point’s difference and classified match outcome correctly ~90% of the time. Results suggested that if a team increased “amount of possession” and “making quick ground” component scores, they were more likely to win (β = 15.6, OR = 10.1 and β = 7.8, OR = 13.3) respectively. Decision trees revealed that “making quick ground” was an important predictor of match outcome followed by “quick play” and “amount of possession”. The use of PCA provided a useful guide on how teams can increase their chances of success by improving performances on a collection of variables, instead of analysing variables in isolation.

Prioritising performance indicators for sustainable construction and development of university campuses using an integrated assessment approach

Sustainability assessment tools are considered to play a vital role in strategies to reorient universities towards sustainability in a systematic way. However, strategic selections of the main existing assessment tools may be inappropriate from economic, environmental and social perspectives. In addition, there may be geographical differences in indicators and weight determinations. Therefore, this paper proposes a new approach that uses a qualitative scoring method (QSM) and an analytical hierarchical process (AHP) for determining and prioritising the key sustainability indicators for local university campuses. Based on QSM, this approach allows evaluation of the extent to which local higher education institutions value each sustainability criterion. The quantified extents are then converted into a prioritisation matrix through AHP. The sustainability indicators are first selected through a literature review and categorised into three hierarchies based on their characteristics. Current official sustainability publications of the Australian universities in the state of Victoria are chosen as the data sources. The results reveal that the issues of culture and energy are considered important sustainability sub-criteria, and this strongly suggests including the indicators ‘research on sustainability’ and ‘renewable energy use’ in local sustainability assessment systems. The proposed approach constitutes a flexible tool for decision-making in relation to the sustainable construction and development of university campuses for policymakers in government and higher education institutions.

Key performance indicators for developing environmentally sustainable and energy efficient ports: Evidence from Italy

In the last three decades, scholars and operators have paid increasing attention to the environmental sustainability and energy efficiency of seaports. To achieve high competitiveness in seaports in response to environmental and energy regulation, port authorities (PAs), policymakers, port users and local communities have to invest considerable resources. This paper investigates the role of the managerial instruments in the decision-making processes of PAs for reducing and preventing negative environmental and energy effects from ports. This research consists of a two-step study. First, we conduct a literature review to analyse the academic views by systematically reading the reports to investigate practitioners’ views on the performance indicators for environmental sustainability and energy efficiency in the port industry. Second, we provide, through a qualitative method, a portrait of the Italian seaports and a multiple case study to confirm the developed conceptual managerial key performance indicators (KPIs). Specifically, applying the Balanced Scorecard model, this paper provides managerial KPIs to support PAs in their decision-making processes within the inter-organizational relationships with shipping lines for developing environmentally sustainable and energy efficient ports.

FUNCTIONAL PERFORMANCE INDICATORS DURING SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT TO PROTECT INFORMATION FROM UNAUTHORISED ACCESS

Objectives. In order to investigate the property of the operational effectiveness of automated systems for protecting information from unauthorised access, it is necessary to analyse the normative documents (both international and Russian) and scientific materials devoted to the evaluation of software quality. The aim of the study consists in the analysis of the existing deficiencies in systems for protecting information from unauthorised access, on the basis of which analysis it is possible to develop performance indicators, substantiate and develop the criteria for assessing the operational effectiveness of the information protection systems from unauthorised access in automated information systems and develop an algorithm for the integrated evaluation of the operational effectiveness of information protection systems on the basis of the established criteria and indicators. Methods . One of the methods for solving the set goals consists in the main provisions of efficiency and systems theories, which in turn became the theoretical basis for solving problems involved in the creation of criteria and assessment of performance indicators of information protection systems. Results. The criteria and performance indicators for the creation of automated information systems are developed on the basis of the analysis of open literature sources and existing shortcomings in the real use of systems for protecting information from unauthorised access. An algorithm for the integrated evaluation of the operational effectiveness of the information protection systems is developed. Conclusion. In the article, based on the analysis of normative documents (both international and Russian), as well as on the scientific materials devoted to the quality (function efficiency) of complex software systems, to which the information protection systems can be related, a system of performance indicators was developed. These can be indicators can be classified as partial (static, practically independent of time, the evaluation of which is based on expert estimates) and integral (dynamic, time-dependent, the evaluation of which is based on mathematical modeling).

Challenges for sustainable development strategies in oil and gas industries

Abstract The oil and gas industries remain an important drive for the world economy. On one hand, global demand for fossil fuels is still rising, and on the other hand, companies face complex investment challenges due to the harsh operational environment of exploration and production activities. Workforce regulations aim to provide a safe and secured working environment. However, exploration and production activities still cause local and global environmental risks such as groundwater contamination, or climate change in broader scale. Analyzing and reporting mechanisms are key performance indicators of sustainable development at the level of oil and gas companies. Obtaining and analyzing required data, nevertheless, seem to be a persistent challenge as to what degree these findings can affect the routine and strategic decisions of the oil and gas companies. In order to enable oil and gas companies to measure and control risks and manage incidents, artificial intelligent technologies in extended monitoring and supervising E&P operations is known to be an efficient prevention strategy. Such tools not only aid in profitability of the oil and gas companies, but also increase awareness of environment and climate change to act more responsibly. In this study, the significances of environmental policies were investigated through interviews with executives and stakeholders, revealing that the implementation of environmental protection policies is affected by the financial stability of the companies, and under severe economic situations, companies seem less enthusiastic in strictly implementing those policies. This paper provides a comprehensive review of emerging technologies in addressing existing and foreseen challenges in sustainable development in oil and gas industries, with the aim of suggesting prime solutions for strategic planning attempts.

EQUIVALENT RELATIONS BETWEEN INDICATORS OF UNDERGROUND DEVELOPMENT OF ORE DEPOSITS

In connection with development of underground mining method and the need to combine the principles of resource saving and natural environment protection, the indicators of the cost/environmentally-effective ore mining techniques need to be understood. It becomes necessary to rank the development indicators for a particular deposit. The mining effectiveness criterion in terms of completeness of subsoil resource use becomes the research objective, with ranking indicators of underground mining effectiveness. The problem solution includes modeling of a method parameters using mathematical programming methods with target functions to find a compromise optimum of mining performance indicators in the framework of a dynamic model for managing production processes. The experimentally obtained dependences of profit on dilution, operating costs, and ore losses at all mining stages are given. The quantitative indicators of ore losses and dilution by hosting rocks, rocks inside an ore body, a stoping worker labor productivity, a block productivity, and labor productivity of a worker in mining shop are given. The results of economic and mathematical modeling of development method options with different proportions of technological void backfilling are presented. An assessment of the development options for specific metal deposit is given by comparing the optimum values of the target functions. Compensation of dilution in the ore beneficiation stage has been proven to have the most significant effect on costs. It is concluded that the main condition for increasing ore deposit development efficiency is reducing losses and dilution of ores, including through optimization based on mathematical modeling with balancing quantitative and qualitative performance indicators of a deposit development.

A new perspective in the road asset management with the use of advanced monitoring system & BIM

The present paper reports different applications which have a common data source: Automatic Road Analyzer (ARAN) of the Transport Infrastructure Laboratory of the University of Catania. Data surveyed with ARAN were used to develop performance indicators of the road asset. A BIM model makes possible to improve the flexibility in information access and to merge data with the aim to allow a complete Road Asset Management (RAM) application in the same environment Data Collected and stored with high efficiency equipment allows to get high quality and detailed information of the road asset and offers the chance to create georeferenced database which can be used both for safety assessment and for the other RAM related applications. BIM provides a comprehensive approach involving the generation and management of transport infrastructure assets using 3D digital representations of their physical and functional characteristics allowing to produce ad hoc output for investigate in the same environment different parts of the RAM.

A step-wise approach to developing indicators to compare the performance of maternity units using hospital administrative data.

Hospital administrative data are attractive for comparing performance of maternity units because of their often large sample sizes, lack of selection bias and the relatively low costs of accessing these data compared with conducting primary data collection. However, using administrative data to develop indicators can also present challenges including varying data quality, the limited detail on clinical risk factors and a lack of structural and user experience measures. This review illustrates how to develop performance indicators for maternity units using hospital administrative data, including methods to address the challenges that administrative data pose.Tweetable abstractHow to develop maternity indicators from administrative data.

PARAMETER DETERMINATION OF NATURAL FRACTURING FOR CARBONATE ARTIAN DEPOSITS IN THE ORENBURGSCKOE FIELD EASTERN PART

A significant part of the recently opened hydrocarbon fields in the world and in Russia, limited to the carbonateand fissured reservoirs.Naturally, the directions of further resource base development, oil and gas extraction technology and methodological sup-port of the geology and development in many companies associated with reservoirs of this type.While it is well known that carbonate reservoir can be very different. So if the similarity of main geological-geophysical parameters is given in the form 6GR layers may differ substantially on prevailing type capacity - pore or fracture, permeability, compressibility and other parameters that have a significant impact on key performance indicators of field development. The East part of Orenburg oil and gas field main production zone is artin deposits lying on the absolute elevations of 1500 - 1700 m. For the analysis of parameters carbonate fractured-porous collectors the East part of Orenburg oil and gas fieldartin depositsall features inherent in productive layers of this kind are characteristic - uncertainty at the description of internal structure and a flowed fluids in them; existence the stylolite seam, dense rocks, the bitumens exerting impact on the stream directions of fluids. In such conditions, besides the parameters characterizing a matrix, one of the main are the parameters describing systems: fissuries, cavities and channels, stylolities and dense rocks. Results of the specified systems analysis according to a core, interpretations of data of the electric microscanner are given in this article, the typical types of networks of fissuries characterizing them - simple geometrical schemes are defined. With use of geometrical schemes for each site oilfield, variation interval of the following parameters are estab-lished: block size, average openness of fractures, fractures porosity.

PlatEMO: A MATLAB Platform for Evolutionary Multi-Objective Optimization [Educational Forum

Over the last three decades, a large number of evolutionary algorithms have been developed for solving multi-objective optimization problems. However, there lacks an upto-date and comprehensive software platform for researchers to properly benchmark existing algorithms and for practitioners to apply selected algorithms to solve their real-world problems. The demand of such a common tool becomes even more urgent, when the source code of many proposed algorithms has not been made publicly available. To address these issues, we have developed a MATLAB platform for evolutionary multi-objective optimization in this paper, called PlatEMO, which includes more than 50 multiobjective evolutionary algorithms and more than 100 multi-objective test problems, along with several widely used performance indicators. With a user-friendly graphical user interface, PlatEMO enables users to easily compare several evolutionary algorithms at one time and collect statistical results in Excel or LaTeX files. More importantly, PlatEMO is completely open source, such that users are able to develop new algorithms on the basis of it. This paper introduces the main features of PlatEMO and illustrates how to use it for performing comparative experiments, embedding new algorithms, creating new test problems, and developing performance indicators. Source code of PlatEMO is now available at: http://bimk.ahu.edu.cn/index.php?s=/Index/Software/index.html.

Obesity and Nutrition Epidemiology: A Study of Cause and Effect

Obesity has become a matter of quality to health care administrators. Today there are more obese people in the U.S. than ever before. A diet high in fat combined with a sedentary lifestyle has led many Americans to increase their weight to shocking proportions. The Centers for Disease Control report that 34.2% of Americans over 20 are overweight, 33.8% are obese, and 5.7% are extremely obese. Administrators and health care leaders need to care about these numbers as health care dollars spent on treating the complications associated with obesity rise every year and contribute to lost dollars in terms of repeated admissions for complications associated with obesity. The National Guideline Clearinghouse has developed performance indicators for obesity education upon discharge from inpatient settings. By coming up with innovative strategies for combatting obesity, administrators can contribute to the decrease of a world-wide epidemic.

Indicators of inappropriate tumour marker use through the mining of electronic health records.

Although the issue of monitoring appropriateness of tumour markers (TMs) request in outpatients remains crucial, proper indicators are still demanding. The present study developed and explored indicators of inappropriate TM ordering in outpatients through the data mining of electronic health records (EHRs). Carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), alfa-fetoprotein (AFP), carbohydrate antigen (CA)125, CA15.3, CA19.9, and prostate-specific antigen (PSA) ordered in outpatients during a year were examined by mining EHRs of a Local Health Authority in Italy. Evidence-based criteria were used to develop performance indicators. Demographic and clinical information associated with TM orders were examined. A total of 80813 TMs were ordered in 52536 outpatients (1.54 markers/patient). Indicators related to disease codes, gender, age, and TM repetitions were developed, and their application showed that (1) CA15.3 and CEA are prevalently requested in patients with cancer (79.2% and 65.6%) whereas the other TMs are largely requested also in patients without cancer; (2) requests of PSA in women and of CA125 or CA15.3 in men are negligible; (3) although requests in people older than 80years are relevant (16.4% of total), the highest rate of request of all markers occurs in patients aged 40 to 79years; (4) CA15.3 and CEA are mainly requested in cancer cases between 50 and 79years and AFP, CA19.9, and CA125 in those between 60 and 69years; (5) <50% of PSA orders are associated with cancer code for all age intervals; and (6) multiple repetitions of AFP, CA125, CA15.3, CA19.9, and CEA are prevalent in cancer patients or benign diseases to which TMs are appropriate, whereas PSA repetitions occur mainly in patients without cancer. The developed indicators resulted suitable to monitor TM overordering in outpatients through the mining of EHRs. The present study is a first approach towards the use of big-data mining for TM appropriateness evaluation purposes.

Structural Disadvantage: Evidence of Gender Disparities in the Norwegian Pension System

Norway is a world leader in gender equality according to sustainable development performance indicators. This study goes beyond these indicators to investigate systemic economic disadvantages for women, focusing specifically on the Norwegian pension system. System dynamics modeling is used to understand how gender disparity is built into social systems. A significant contributor to the gender inequality in pensions is the difference in lifetime working hours due to childbearing/rearing. There are childcare policies in place to equalize lifetime working hours between the genders; however, these policies require women to conform to the pension system structure and outsource their childcare. The system dynamics modeling illustrates how social investment strategy requires women to conform to a masculine pension system if they want equivalent financial security when they reach retirement.

Integration of importance-performance analysis into the strategy of hospitals

Research question/issue: Based on the work of Ellangovan et al.7, this paper seeks to evaluate and explore the suitability of the importance-performance analysis (IPA) by using physicians’ perspectives regarding performance dimensions of hospitals and posits integration of the IPA tool into the strategy of hospitals.Research findings/insights: Physicians are service providers and/or managers responsible for delivery of healthcare services to the patients. The IPA has mostly been used to understand and interpret the perspectives of the users of services/products or patients in healthcare. The attributes used by the IPA tool should be synchronised or linked to the organisational strategy. A unique combination of business activities can be used to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Appropriateness of the IPA should be explained and justified in each instance of its use.Theoretical/academic implications: Juxtaposition of business strategy and IPA attributes would advance the knowledge by integrating the underpinnings of one or more theories of strategic management. Enrichment of the existing IPA methodology could be explored by academic researchers by developing performance indicators based on hospital strategy.Practitioner/policy implications: Management practitioners can use the IPA tool to grasp the views of patients and/or service providers to improve the quality and cost of services by linking business strategy to attributes of the IPA tool in order to improve performance and bolster goal congruence.

Process-related key performance indicators for measuring sustainability performance of ecodesign implementation into product development

Developing products with improved environmental performance is regarded as a crucial component of companies' commitment towards sustainable development. The potential benefits derived from ecodesign are constantly highlighted in the literature, and go beyond the pure environmental dimension. However, the primary focus has been positioned on evaluating those benefits in terms of product-related environmental performance, which leaves an open potential for capturing performance from a broader managerial perspective. Consequently, the major challenges tackled by this paper relate to the limited focus on process-oriented perspectives that cover all dimensions of the triple bottom line and offer a systematized view on ecodesign performance measurement. Therefore, this paper presents a comprehensive set of process-related key performance indicators for product development, based on a three-step systematic literature review, followed by systematization of indicators and a critical analysis. A total of 787 indicators were identified and classified according to the sustainability dimensions, product development phases and units of measurement. The results point to a relevant asymmetry in the number of indicators proposed for each sustainability dimension, with large dominance of economic indicators. A critical analysis is presented and discussed in terms of the main organizational functions addressed, emphasizing a potential growth trend towards multi-dimensional indicators in recent years. The paper indicates that product development performance is still being mainly discussed in terms of product physical characteristics, along with a broad assortment of topics - from very specific document-related measures to high-level strategic dimensions - without focusing on environmental aspects, which is mainly due to the intangible and uncertain nature of product development processes.

Developing Emergency Room Key Performance Indicators: What to Measure and Why Should We Measure It?

Emergency Room (ER) performance has been a timely topic for both healthcare practitioners and researchers. King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center, Saudi Arabia worked on developing a comprehensive set of KPIs to monitor, evaluate and improve the performance of the ER. A combined approach using quantitative and qualitative methods was used to collect and analyze the data. 34 KPIs were developed and sorted into the three components of the ER patient flow model; input, throughput and output. Input indicators included number and acuity of ER patients, patients leaving without being seen and revisit rates. Throughput indicators included number of active ER beds, ratio of ER patients to ER staff and the length of stay including waiting time and treatment time. The turnaround time of supportive services, such as lab, radiology and medications, were also included. Output indicators include boarding time and available hospital beds, ICU beds and patients waiting for admission.

Parametric analysis for performance enhancement of phase change materials in naturally ventilated buildings

This paper presents a design optimization related to the application of phase change materials within buildings, which aims to maximize the utilization of latent heat capacity to improve indoor thermal comfort during summer season. Two performance indicators are developed: efficiency coefficient (a representation of the effective utilization of latent heat storage capacity) and effectiveness coefficient (a representation of improvement of indoor thermal comfort). A series of parameters which influence the efficiency coefficient and effectiveness coefficient are identified and then formulated to quantify those coefficients for optimal design. With the performance indicators defined, a case study is performed in a typical standard Australian residential house to derive the optimized design of PCM refurbishment utilizing the developed performance indicators. Results reveal that the performance indicators are effective in the selection of optimum PCM configurations so that the resultant PCM storage efficiency and indoor thermal comfort are optimized. This is particularly demonstrated by the significant enhancement of storage efficiency and effectiveness of optimized PCM compared to non-optimized cases for each climate conditions. Furthermore, an optimized PCM condition is found to be more cost-effective than the non-optimized conditions.

Development of an Evidence-based Geotechnical Asset Management Policy for Network Rail, Great Britain

Network Rail (NR) is the owner, operator and asset manager of the majority of the rail network of Great Britain, an infrastructure network totalling approximately 32,000 kilometers of track. The challenge faced by Network Rail's earthworks asset managers is the aging infrastructure. Failures within the portfolio of nearly 200,000 earthwork assets that NR manage are relatively common, particularly in periods of adverse or extreme weather.As a regulated industry, NR are constantly challenged to demonstrate continuous improvement to their management processes through each of their five year Control Periods (CPs). For the current CP5 (2014-2019), NR undertook a series of activities to develop an evidence-based asset management policy, the key steps of which are summarised in this paper, including:•The development of a risk-based prioritisation matrix for all earthwork assets and determination of quantitative likelihood of earthwork failure•The determination of quantitative consequences of earthwork failure•The development of a series of earthwork intervention types, and the determination of the impact of these on the likelihood of earthwork failure•The development and use of a strategic Whole Life Cost Decision Support Tool (DST) to model and optimise the CP5 earthworks policy and determination of key inputs to the DST, such as the assessed rate of asset portfolio deterioration. DST outputs were used to inform work bank development and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure the progress of the asset management policy through CP5The paper briefly describes these activities and their results, and outlines how the policy has been embedded into the NR business. It describes how the policy has been used to secure funding for CP5, and how the work banks prepared against this funding have undergone assurance to determine alignment to the policy. Finally, the paper touches on future developments.

Образовательная политика вуза как инструмент модернизации образовательной деятельности

The article describes the UrFU experience of introducing educational policy aimed at transferring to individual learning trajectory and teaching programs management. The article presents the description of the target model of university educational activities and tasks related to it. The authors look into different organizational solutions for step by step implementation of educational policy, introduction of teaching program heads, changes in educational programs construction, teaching process organization. The article describes steps taken by the university and the roadmap for future activities. It covers informatization aspect, described key changes in information systems providing teaching process implementation. Authors analyze possible variants for teaching programs change management, present the model of program development performance indicators and describe development areas identified as priority areas for the university. Two options for teaching program administrative management are given: one preserving the institute as the owner of teaching programs portfolio and the other where teaching program is autonomous. The authors look into the aspects of changed responsibility balance in the area of program implementation, the role of chairs and other university structures. Evaluation of risks related to educational policy implementation is provided. The article contains the description of a set of managerial practices on modernization of teaching activities interesting for university administrators.