Seamless Operations Research Articles

An analysis of managerial factors affecting the implementation and use of overall equipment effectiveness

To ensure manufacturing organisations remain competitive, most of them are turning to total productive maintenance (TPM) and lean manufacturing to ensure seamless operations. Overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) is the foundation of these two business improvement strategies as it tackles the underlying losses that impede equipment efficiency. This study presents the prevalence of managerial issues related to the implementation and use of OEE in the manufacturing industry. To do this, five hypotheses and four research questions were formulated and tested using a combination of descriptive statistics and cross-tabulation, chi-square, analysis of variance, Tukey’s pairwise comparison, Z-test and correlation tests. Data were collected through a survey questionnaire responded by 139 manufacturing organisations worldwide. The results establish, among other ‘soft’ aspects, the linkage of the OEE implementation with that of TPM and lean manufacturing, and the drivers, most critical factors, barriers and the role of management in its implementation. The study also identifies how manufacturing organisations employ the information provided by OEE and how the data for its computation are collected. This study supports the very limited empirical research on the implementation and use of OEE. Thus, this research provides organisations, and their managers, with a better understanding of different factors that affect the successful deployment and management of this highly used measure in industry.

Below 100-fs Timing Jitter Seamless Operations in 10-GSample/s 3-bit Photonic Analog-to-Digital Conversion

We experimentally realize seamless operations with below 100-fs timing jitter in a 10-GSample/s 3-bit photonic analog-to-digital converter (ADC) with an input 2.5-GHz sinusoidal electrical signal. To address the energy efficiency, it is necessary to explore some serial approaches to get most operations in a photonic ADC done before serial-to-parallel conversion to save the number of devices. To press forward with the work on subsequent operations after optical sampling in a photonic ADC, we have investigated optical quantization and coding and demonstrated their performances. The experimental results successfully demonstrated seamless operations in a photonic ADC, i.e., sampling, quantization, and coding, while keeping its parallel-configuration-free characteristics and low timing jitter below 100 fs. This demonstration could address the energy efficiency by reduction of the number of devices, including electrical ADCs for subsequent operations after optical sampling in existing high-performance photonic ADCs.

Daily Leader Safety Brief: The Power of an Interdisciplinary Team

<h2>Professional Issues Paper Presentation</h2><h3>Purpose for the Program</h3> The increasing acuity and complexity of obstetric patients underscores the importance of communication and well‐functioning teams, as recommended by The Institute of Medicine (1999) as components of a culture of safety. When communication and teamwork are ineffective, the risk of maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality increases. Communication failures were identified by The Joint Commission as the root cause of nearly 80% of the sentinel events reviewed, and are a leading cause of preventable adverse events in healthcare settings. Effective team communication is equally important among interdisciplinary leaders at an organizational level, to ensure quality, patient safety, and seamless operations. Emerging as a best practice, conducting daily leader safety briefs may facilitate such communication. <h3>Proposed Change</h3> To provide an overview of the purpose and goals of conducting daily leader safety briefs. <h3>Implementation, Outcomes, and Evaluation</h3> The process that the leadership team used to begin conducting daily leader safety briefs in the Pavilion for Women at Texas Children's Hospital will be reviewed, and practical tips for implementing them at other obstetric facilities will be provided. This presentation is appropriate for all disciplines, all leaders, and the content may be applied to any healthcare setting. Daily leader safety briefs provide a venue to identify and discuss quality, safety, and operational events or concerns that occurred during the previous 24 hours, and facilitate the identification of concerns or threats to patient safety that may occur over the next 12 to 24 hours. To reinforce accountability, leaders are assigned to address and resolve the identified threats and work together as a team to mitigate risks. Leaders report back the next day about how the issue was resolved or what action plan is in place to resolve and sustain the correction. <h3>Implications for Nursing Practice</h3> Daily leader safety briefs can help to maintain situational awareness; promote and model transparency; foster organizational trust; as well as improve interdisciplinary communication, collaboration, and cooperation. By being present together as a leadership team and talking with one another in a proactive manner, leaders can work more effectively together to avoid or resolve problems.

Enhancements to FPMIPv6 for improved seamless vertical handover between LTE and heterogeneous access networks

Fast handovers for proxy mobile IPv6 (FPMIPv6) was created to reduce packet-delay that occurs during proxy mobile IPv6 (PMIPv6) handover. Based on vertical handover (VHO) experiments conducted between Long Term Evolution (LTE) and heterogeneous accesses over the evolved packet core (EPC) using FPMIPv6, it was recognized that consistently reliable seamless VHO operations were difficult to accomplish due to limitations in FPMIPv6. Noticeably, VHO performance degradation resulted from the serving network (SN) lacking information of the target network (TN) when the TN is a heterogeneous protocol domain, packet congestion and loss problems occurring on specific network gateway interfaces, and also from using long packet-forwarding paths. In this article, an enhanced FPMIPv6 technique is proposed to solve these problems and improve the VHO operation by using shorter data-paths and improved coordination of buffered packet-forwarding and TN switching, which results in a significantly reduced packet-delay.

An Experimental Data Handling System for Ensemble Numerical Weather Predictions Using a Web-Based Data Server and Analysis Tool “Gfdnavi”

Gfdnavi is a web-based data and knowledge server program for geophysical fluid data that constructs databases, provides analysis and visualization tools, and shares knowledge documents. A new Gfdnavi user interface for analyzing and visualizing data on web browsers is developed to improve the user experience by providing seamless analysis and visualization operations, multiple diagram editing, a layer function, and so on. An experimental data handling system for ensemble numerical weather prediction data is constructed using Gfdnavi to address such issues as data processing and transfer between weather centers and decision makers in various sectors, including that of disaster management. Special tools to analyze and visualize ensemble numerical weather prediction data are implemented as user-defined Gfdnavi plug-ins. An interactive document that provides basic ideas of how to utilize probabilistic ensemble data information is written with the Gfdnavi knowledge documentation system, in which hyperlinks enable users to edit diagrams in the document.

Arcs of supply chain integration

Integration is posited by many authors as a supply chain utopia. Indeed, it is claimed as being synonymous with supply chain management excellence. The primary aim of this research is to verify the link between supply chain integration and competitive performance. Detailed information collected via an 8-year international field study of 50 products and their associated supply chains subjected to an extensive statistical analysis provides rigorous insight into supply chain integration in practice. The breadth of supply chain integration significantly correlates with increased performance, yet in practice, the majority of supply chains are not well integrated. However, most supply chains seem to follow a popular route when seeking to enable seamless operations. This starts with enhanced internal effectiveness followed by upstream streamlining and then finally downstream integration. If practitioners are still struggling with supply chain integration, this research confirms that they are not unique in their predicament. Indifferent practice is indeed the norm. Fortunately, practitioners can follow the popular route established herein when seeking to improve integrative capability.

The Business of Palliative Medicine—Part 6: Clinical Operations in a Comprehensive Integrated Program

The medical care of individuals with advanced disease is complex and has historically been fragmented and suboptimal. Palliative medicine attempts to address these needs. The Harry R. Horvitz Center for Palliative Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic is an established comprehensive integrated program. Structured and seamless clinical operations are important to ensure the best delivery of high-quality medical care and continuity for those affected by life-limiting illness.

Exploration of Operational Concepts of Interoperability for Robust Interregional Transportation System Operations

Regional transportation operations centers (TOCs) are at the core of managing and operating a complex surface transportation system. To ensure reliable transportation services, particularly during emergency situations when transportation is vital, uninterrupted operations of TOCs should be guaranteed. Achieving TOC interoperability is of great importance. Interoperability of TOCs can be understood as the ability of one TOC to access and manage some set of the resources of another (remote) TOC. TOC interoperability can allow each metropolitan area or in some cases each state to achieve more robust and seamless interregional operations. In addition, interoperability may provide each region with a better understanding of each partner's practices and thus promote more consistent and coordinated transportation systems operations. Although these benefits are compelling, TOC interoperability cannot be easily established because of the complex technical and institutional situations of existing centers. Given this background, this study explored various operational concepts and developed a methodology to achieve interregional TOC interoperability. The methodology consists of four steps: (a) develop an emergency backup plan for each TOC, (b) establish relationships among TOCs, (c) develop a communications network, and (d) establish institutional interoperability between designated TOCs. In a case study, the proposed methodology was applied to the five regional TOCs in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Operations research methods in maritime transport and freight logistics

The current decade has witnessed a remarkable growth in container transportation and vessel sizes. This has come alongside an increasing need for optimisation of both on the seaside and on the landside. As the linking nodes, container terminals are facing great challenges in handling, stacking and transferring large numbers of containers, and high productivity is the key factor in maintaining terminal competitiveness. At the same time, terminals’ major customers demand reliability and efficiency at low costs. The changes that have taken place in the liner shipping industry require terminal operators and logistics service providers to continuously improve their performance and guarantee seamless operations. In particular, the increasing integration of container supply chains and the consequent higher vulnerability of the chains to disruptions in container flows and operations, place more pressure on controlling and improving the performance of the various segments of the chain.

Chain-Type Wireless Sensor Network for Monitoring Long Range Infrastructures: Architecture and Protocols

We present in this paper an investigation of a special class of wireless sensor networks for monitoring critical infrastructures that may extend for hundreds of miles in distances. Such networks are fundamentally different from traditional sensor networks in that the sensor nodes in this class of networks are deployed along narrowly elongated geographical areas and form a chain-type topology. Based on careful analysis of existing sensor network architectures, we first demonstrate the need to develop new architecture and networking protocols to match the unique topology of chain-type sensor networks. We then propose hierarchical network architecture that consists of clusters of sensor nodes to enable the chain-type sensor networks to be scalable to cover typically long range infrastructures with tolerable delay in network-wide data collection. To maintain energy efficient operations and maximize the lifetime for such a chain-type sensor network, we devise a smart strategy for the deployment of cluster heads. Protocols for network initialization and seamless operations of the chain-type sensor networks are also developed to match the proposed hierarchical architecture and cluster head deployment strategy. Simulations have been carried out to verify the performance of the hierarchical architecture, the smart node deployment strategy, and the corresponding network initialization and operation protocols.

Enhancing integration of supply chain functions within a firm: exploring the critical factors through eleven cases

Supply chain managers recognise that seamless supply chain operations require a high level of integration within and across organisations. Existing study and management focus have dealt with how to integrate supply chain activities across different organisations. However, it is not clear how a company should integrate supply chain functions within the company. One might assume that integration of the internal supply chain is easy to accomplish because top management has control over the functional areas. Yet, many companies suffer from supply chain disruptions due to internal coordination problems. As we started to investigate this issue we realised that the level of internal supply chain integration varies significantly from company to company. This discovery motivated us to take a systematic approach to investigating how companies integrate their internal supply chain. This study reports our findings with a focus on prescribing behaviours that managers can use to guide internal integration efforts.

Interim leadership: Do you have the talent within?

Nurse leader vacancies have the potential to impact all areas of facilities operations. What plan do you have for maintaining patient flow, patient safety, recruitment, and retention during leadership changes? Will you be ready to continue seamless operations when these vacancies present in your organization? Nurse leader vacancies have the potential to impact all areas of facilities operations. What plan do you have for maintaining patient flow, patient safety, recruitment, and retention during leadership changes? Will you be ready to continue seamless operations when these vacancies present in your organization?

Personal communications networks: Competition, convergence, and cooperation

The increasing mobility of the workforce, combined with the rapid convergence of computer, communications, and consumer electronics technologies, has spurred the development of numerous new wireless communications products and services. Accelerating competition has vastly increased the number of technological options available to consumers to meet their needs for personal communications. Unfortunately, this increase in options has been accompanied by increased and undesirable complexities. Even for simple wireless voice communications, the average customer has to deal with multiple telephone numbers, roaming codes, and confusing pricing arrangement. Exacerbating the inherent difficulties in using individual wireless technologies is the lack of interoperability among these services. Existing wireline networks, with their ubiquity, seamless operations, and ease of use, have provided clear benchmarks for satisfying customers' basic personal communications needs. There are considerable potential benefits to be realized, in terms of increased investment efficiencies, reduced time to market and the ability to meet the individual needs of consumers more closely, through the increase in the level of cooperation among competing services and technologies.