Digital transformation represents an unprecedented strategic challenge for established manufacturing companies, but the theoretical understanding of its implications is still lacking. It is accordingly difficult for management to develop an adequate digital transformation strategy and decide on appropriate organisational implementation measures. The aim of this work is therefore to address the organisational management challenges related to digital transformation of manufacturing companies through strategic digital transformation programmes. It is based on the input of 39 managers with diverse backgrounds, digital and non-digital, within the manufacturing industry. This study enhances the open systems organisational theory approach and the concepts of temporary organisations. It identifies 21 different organisational management factors that are relevant for the digital transformation of a manufacturing company. Interpretive Structural Modelling (ISM) has been applied to derive an empirical model that organises those factors according to their level of influence. The factors related to organisational leadership, internal organisational structures and operational capabilities have the strongest influence on the digital transformation challenges. This includes the understanding that in the context of digital transformation, a strategic programme cannot be conceived separately to the embedding company organisation. The practical implications of the empirical model on management are derived by this study as well. It suggests that the non-linear nature of digital transformation requires management to continuously embrace and not restrict organisational and operational complexity. Instead, focus should be placed on establishing frameworks that provide operational guidance, supported by substantial management efforts to foster commitment across all organisational levels towards digital transformation goals.

This study is geared at an open systmes critique of the macro theories of development. It is highlighted in this study that we are living through the realities of the open systems, and yet much of development thought is based on closed systems philosophies, principle and ideologies. The first chapter gives an orientation into the origins of both the closed systems and open systems paradigms respectively. Included in this orientation chapter, is the literature review of the various research contributions of the major trends in development thought. The second chapter expands on the evolution of the closed systems paradigm and its influences on development thought. This chapter further explains the attendant philosophies, principles and ideologies that underlie the closed systems paradigm. The third chapter captures the open systems paradigm and its influences on contemporary development discourse. Further to the discussion on the closed systems paradigm, the chapter elaborates on the philosophies, principles and processes that underlie this paradigm. The fourth chapter is on a discussion of trends in development thinking, traced from the traditional, through the medieval to the modern, right up to the contemporary. This entails tracing the theory to its ontological background right up to its implications for social reality in contemporary development thought and experience. The fifth chapter is on the open systems critique of the trends in development thinking, while the sixth chapter revisits the open systems paradigm and its implications for development thought. In the seventh chapter is the recapitulation of the findings in the study and recommendations for both development thought and practice. / Development Studies / D.Litt. et Phil. (Development Administration)

In today's highly competitive global economy, information resources representing enterprise-wide information are essential to the survival of an organization. The development of and increase in the use of personal computers and data communication networks are supporting or, in many cases, replacing the traditional computer mainstay of corporations. The client/server model incorporates mainframe programming with desktop applications on personal computers. The aim of the research is to compile a technology model for the development of client/server software. A comprehensive overview of the individual components of the client/server system is given. The different methodologies, tools and techniques that can be used are reviewed, as well as client/server-specific design issues. The research is intended to create a road map in the form of a Technology Reference Model for Client/Server Software Development. / Computing / M. Sc. (Information Systems)

This study is geared at an open systems critique of the macro theories of development. It is highlighted in this study that we are living through the realities of the open systems, and yet much of development thought is based on closed systems philosophies, principle and ideologies. The first chapter gives an orientation into the origins of both the closed systems and open systems paradigms respectively. Included in this orientation chapter, is the literature review of the various research contributions of the major trends in development thought. The second chapter expands on the evolution of the closed systems paradigm and its influences on development thought. This chapter further explains the attendant philosophies, principles and ideologies that underlie the closed systems paradigm. The third chapter captures the open systems paradigm and its influences on contemporary development discourse. Further to the discussion on the closed systems paradigm, the chapter elaborates on the philosophies, principles and processes that underlie this paradigm. The fourth chapter is on a discussion of trends in development thinking, traced from the traditional, through the medieval to the modern, right up to the contemporary. This entails tracing the theory to its ontological background right up to its implications for social reality in contemporary development thought and experience. The fifth chapter is on the open systems critique of the trends in development thinking, while the sixth chapter revisits the open systems paradigm and its implications for development thought. In the seventh chapter is the recapitulation of the findings in the study and recommendations for both development thought and practice. / Public Administration and Management / D. Litt. et Phil. (Development Administration)

[pt] Governança trata heterogeneidade, autonomia e diversidade de interesses entre diferentes agentes em um sistema multi-agente (SMA), estabelecendo um conjunto de normas. A maioria dos mecanismos de aplicação de leis verifica a violação de normas apenas sob o aspecto da interação entre os agentes. Entretanto, em SMAs com a presença de agentes heterogêneos e independentemente projetados, existirão mensagens confidenciais, que só serão percebidas por seus remetentes e destinatários, e execução de ações que só serão observáveis pelos agentes que as executam ou por agentes que sofrem as conseqüências da execução dessas ações. Este trabalho apresenta uma abordagem que implementa um mecanismo de governança em SMA baseado em testemunhos. Agentes podem testemunhar fatos que estão relacionados à violação de normas as quais eles têm conhecimento. Este mecanismo é composto por três sub-sistemas: Reputação, julgamento e sanção. O foco deste trabalho está apenas no sub-sistema de julgamento, responsável por receber os testemunhos e prover decisões apontando se o agente realmente violou uma norma. Será mostrada a arquitetura deste sub-sistema e um processo de julgamento genérico. Finalmente, será ilustrada a utilização deste mecanismo através de um estudo de caso. / [en] Governance copes with the heterogeneity, autonomy and diversity of interests among different agents in a multi-agent system (MAS) by establishing a set of norms. Most of the governance enforcement mechanisms usually check norm violations from the point of view of interaction protocols. However, in MAS, with the presence of heterogeneous and independently designed agents, there will be private messages, that will only be perceived by their senders and receivers, and execution of actions that will only be observed by the agents that execute them or by the agents that suffers from their consequences. This work presents a governance mechanism for MAS based on testimonies. Agents can witness facts that are related to norm violations witch they are aware of. The proposed mechanism is composed by three sub-systems: Reputation, judgment and sanction. This work focuses only in the judgment sub- system, witch is responsible for receiving testimonies and providing a decision, pointing out if an agent has really violated a norm. The judgment sub-system architecture and a generic judgment process will be presented. Finally, the use of this mechanism will be exemplified by a case study.

Embora a tecnologia da informação (TI) venha sendo utilizada em aplicações de negócios desde a década de 60, foi só a partir do final da década de 80 que essas tecnologias transformaram-se em elementos essenciais para corporações de qualquer porte. Dessa forma, o perfil dos usuários de TI deixou de ser o das grandes corporações e passou a compreender também empresas de médio e pequeno porte. Atualmente, as TI são fartamente empregadas na realização e gestão de processos de negócios através de sistemas corporativos orientados para diversas finalidades como, por exemplo, ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), SCM (Supply Chain Management) e CRM (Customer Relationship Management). Na medida que um sistema corporativo cresce e incorpora novas funcionalidades, cresce sua complexidade. Atualmente, tais sistemas compreendem diversos componentes heterogêneos, geograficamente distribuídos, administrados por diferentes organizações e seu gerenciamento apresenta-se como um novo desafio. Este trabalho analisa a aplicação de padrões abertos, definidos para a modelagem de sistemas distribuídos e para o gerenciamento de redes de telecomunicações, no gerenciamento de sistemas corporativos complexos. Especificamente, será analisada a aplicação do dos padrões TMN (Telecommunication Management Network), desenvolvido para o gerenciamento de redes de telecomunicações, no gerenciamento de sistemas de CRM, que apresentam extrema complexidade por envolverem diversas tecnologias, distribuição geográfica e diversas disciplinas (bancos de dados, ferramentas de análise de informações, redes de computadores, sistemas legados e diversas mídias de contato). / Despite the fact that the information technology (IT) has been applied for business purposes since the sixties, they only became essential to business in the late eighties, when the technology started to play an essential role for corporations of any size. Therefore, the profile of the typical IT user in business has shifted from huge companies to mid-sized and even small companies. Nowadays, IT is widely applied for the management of business processes through the use of corporate systems oriented for different purposes like, for example, ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), SCM (Supply Chain Management) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management). As far as a corporate system grows and works in new features, grows its complexity as well. Nowadays, such systems usually comprise lots of different heterogeneous components, geographically distributed, administered by different organizations and, as a result, the management of such systems became a new challenge. This dissertation analyses the application of open standards, designed to allow the modeling of distributed systems and the management of telecommunication networks, to the management of complex corporate systems. More specifically, it will analyze the application of the TMN standards, developed for the management of telecommunications networks, to the management of CRM systems, where the latter presents extreme complexity due to the fact that it usually involves different technologies, geographical distribution and many disciplines (such as databases, information analysis tools, computer networks, legacy systems and various communication medias).

Heutzutage besteht ein komplexes Software-System häufig aus lose gekoppelten, interagierenden Komponenten. Eine Komponente ist ein offenes System, das unabhängig von anderen offenen Systemen entwickelt und später mit diesen komponiert wird. Die Komposition L+R zweier offener Systeme L und R kann sich jedoch inkorrekt verhalten, beispielsweise verklemmen (die Komponenten warten gegenseitig aufeinander), in eine Endlosschleife geraten oder unbeschränkten Speicherplatz erfordern. Ist L+R dagegen ein korrektes System, bezeichnet man L und R als Partner voneinander. Formale Methoden der Modellierung, Analyse und Synthese ermöglichen die systematische Konstruktion eines korrekten Systems durch Komposition von Partnern. Die Kosten, die ein offenes System L verursacht, variieren in Abhängigkeit von der konkreten Wahl eines Partners. Es ist daher wünschenswert, L nur mit solchen Partnern zu komponieren, welche die Kosten von L beschränken oder sogar minimieren. Ein Partner, der die Kosten von L minimiert, ist ein optimaler Partner von L. Ziel dieser Arbeit ist die Erarbeitung von Techniken, die garantieren, dass L nur mit optimalen Partnern komponiert wird. Dazu entwickeln wir formale Methoden zur Modellierung, Analyse und Synthese kostenbehafteter offener Systeme und ihrer optimalen Partner. Wir präsentieren einen Formalismus zur Modellierung funktionaler (d.h. Zustandsübergänge) und nicht-funktionaler Verhaltenseigenschaften (d.h. Kosten). In diesem Formalismus definieren wir Kostenbeschränktheit und Optimalität von Partnern. Darauf aufbauend entwickeln wir formale Methoden zur Entscheidung der kostenbeschränkten Bedienbarkeit (d.h. der Existenz kostenbeschränkter Partner), der Synthese optimaler Partner und der endlichen Repräsentation aller optimalen Partner. / Nowadays, a complex software system usually consists of loosely-coupled, interacting components. Such a component is an independently developed open system that one composes with other open systems. The composition L+R of two open systems L and R can be faulty: For instance, the components deadlock (i.e. mutually wait for each other) or require an unbounded amount of memory. If L+R is correct, L and R are called partners of each other. Formal methods for modeling, analysis and synthesis yield a systematic approach to constructing a correct system by means of composing partners. The costs of executing a given open system L vary based on a chosen partner. Therefore, it is desirable to choose a partner that bounds or even minimizes the costs of executing L. If a partner R minimizes the costs of executing L, then R is an optimal partner of L. Our goal is to develop techniques that guarantee the composition of L with optimal partners. To this end, we develop formal methods of modeling, analysis and synthesis of open systems incorporating costs. We present a formalism to model functional aspects (i.e. states and transitions) and non-functional aspects (costs) of behavior. We define the properties of cost boundedness and cost optimality for partners in this formalism. Based thereon, we develop formal methods to decide cost bounded controllability (i.e. the existence of cost bounded partners), to synthesize optimal partners, and to finitely represent the set of all optimal partners.

Este trabalho trata de ambientes de software para a realização de teste e caracterização de dispositivos, componentes ou circuitos eletro-eletrônicos, de forma automatizada. Ênfase especial é dada à problemática relacionada ao teste e caracterização automatizados de dispositivos e circuitos integrados. O assunto é tratado sob dois pontos de vista distintos e complementares: i) Sob o ponto de vista do engenheiro de teste e caracterização, que realiza experimentos físicos, que são as medidas e aquisições de dados, processa, visualiza e analisa dados. ii) Sob o ponto de vista do projetista de ferramentas de software, que desenvolve programas de computador para automatizar as tarefas rotineiramente realizadas durante o teste e a caracterização. Após a analise do assunto em questão, um ambiente de software (Framework), chamado SGC, é proposto e implementado. O SGC foi implementado em ambiente MS-WindowsTM através de um paradigma de orientação a objetos, e pretende atender as necessidades inerentes ao teste e caracterização automatizados, quando tratados sob os dois pontos de vista citados. O ambiente SGC é um sistema aberto, a fim de permitir o fácil acoplamento de novas facilidades, bem como mostra-se um sistema prático para suportar rotinas de teste e caracterização em laboratório. / This work deals with software environments for automatic test and characterization of electro-electronical devices, components and circuits. Special attention is paid to the features of testing and characterizing integrated devices and circuits. The subject is treated in two different and complementary views: i) The needs of the test and characterization engineer are addressed. The test engineer carries out physical experiments, which embody measurements and data acquisitions, data processing, visualization and analysis. ii) The needs of the software tools developer, who develops computer programs for the automation of the procedures that are usually carried out during test and characterization, are also addressed. After the analysis of the subject under study, a software framework, called SGC ("Sistema de Gerenciamento e Controle"), is proposed and implemented. The SGC Framework was implemented under MS-WindowsTm using a object oriented approach. The SGC framework aims to fulfill the needs inherent to the automatic test and characterization, when treated using the approaches mentioned above. The SGC Framework is a open system, supporting the easy integration of new software functions to the environment, as well as a practical system for test and characterization laboratory routines.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-22T22:10:09Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 jander.pdf: 2328685 bytes, checksum: d91a4e9c78d6af95213237712925151f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-10-18 / Companies produce goods and services through a production system that adopts a set of operating strategies. Intense competition in the business has expanded forcing companies to adopt strategies that position themselves in a situation of competitive supremacy over the competition, successful strategies provide advantage. Public Organizations have to develop a production strategy that focus on responsible management of people, technologies and processes in their operations to ensure compliance with constitutional principles and to adapt to internal and external constraints of the environment in which they operate. Enunciated in this research the mutualism between the strategies and organizations perceived as open systems. It is shown mutualism between strategy and organization through a case of study that shows the production strategies that the Electoral Court uses in the time spent counting votes in elections in the state of Amazonas. The computerization of the vote has provided flexibility and elimination of fraud in the process of completion of elections and the legitimacy of the election mandates. Despite technological advances, elections remains a complex process that involves great effort and administrative and jurisditional especially in the Amazon because of peculiarities which are reflected in restrictions. The TRE-AM has adopted a set of operating strategies for adapting the organizations to existing restrictions such as: Development of Information System, Use of Information Technology, use of permanent and temporary Human Resources and also Plans of activities and documentation. The production strategies used over the past eight years has reduced the time counting votes, demonstrating, in the case study, the relationship of mutuality between the strategy and the organization as an open system. / As empresas produzem bens e serviços através de um sistema de produção que adota um conjunto de estratégias de operação. A intensificação da concorrência no meio empresarial se ampliou forçando as empresas a adotarem estratégias que as posicionem em situação de supremacia em relação à concorrência, pois estratégias bem sucedidas permitem diferencial competitivo. Por sua vez as organizações públicas devem desenvolver estratégias de produção que priorizem a gestão competente de pessoas, tecnologias e processos em suas operações de modo a assegurar o cumprimento de princípios constitucionais e para adaptarem-se aos condicionantes internos e externos do ambiente em que atuam. Enuncia-se nesta pesquisa o mutualismo entre as estratégias e as organizações percebidas como sistemas abertos. Demonstra-se essa interação - o mutualismo - entre Estratégia e Organização através de um estudo de caso que registra um referencial teórico e as estratégias de produção que a Justiça Eleitoral utiliza para reduzir o tempo de totalização de votos nas eleições no Estado do Amazonas. A informatização do voto propiciou não só celeridade no pleito, como também as fraudes no processo apuração assegurando a legitimidade dos mandatos eletivos, emanados na vontade. Apesar dos avanços tecnológicos eleitorais havidos, realizar eleições continua sendo um processo complexo que envolve grande empenho jurisdicional e administrativo. No Estado do Amazonas, acentua-se a complexidade, em virtude das peculiaridades geográficas que se são restrições a serem constantemente superadas. Para tanto, o Tribunal Regional Eleitoral do Amazonas utiliza, há oito anos, o conjunto de seguinte de estratégias de produção: Desenvolvimento de Sistema de Informação; Uso de Tecnologia da Informação; Emprego de Recursos Humanos Temporários e Elaboração de Planos de atividades e de documentação. As estratégias de produção em uso têm permitido a redução continuada do tempo de totalização dos votos, demonstrando um fato real do relacionamento mutualístico em entre a Estratégia, a Organização e os Sistemas Abertos.

Embora a tecnologia da informação (TI) venha sendo utilizada em aplicações de negócios desde a década de 60, foi só a partir do final da década de 80 que essas tecnologias transformaram-se em elementos essenciais para corporações de qualquer porte. Dessa forma, o perfil dos usuários de TI deixou de ser o das grandes corporações e passou a compreender também empresas de médio e pequeno porte. Atualmente, as TI são fartamente empregadas na realização e gestão de processos de negócios através de sistemas corporativos orientados para diversas finalidades como, por exemplo, ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), SCM (Supply Chain Management) e CRM (Customer Relationship Management). Na medida que um sistema corporativo cresce e incorpora novas funcionalidades, cresce sua complexidade. Atualmente, tais sistemas compreendem diversos componentes heterogêneos, geograficamente distribuídos, administrados por diferentes organizações e seu gerenciamento apresenta-se como um novo desafio. Este trabalho analisa a aplicação de padrões abertos, definidos para a modelagem de sistemas distribuídos e para o gerenciamento de redes de telecomunicações, no gerenciamento de sistemas corporativos complexos. Especificamente, será analisada a aplicação do dos padrões TMN (Telecommunication Management Network), desenvolvido para o gerenciamento de redes de telecomunicações, no gerenciamento de sistemas de CRM, que apresentam extrema complexidade por envolverem diversas tecnologias, distribuição geográfica e diversas disciplinas (bancos de dados, ferramentas de análise de informações, redes de computadores, sistemas legados e diversas mídias de contato). / Despite the fact that the information technology (IT) has been applied for business purposes since the sixties, they only became essential to business in the late eighties, when the technology started to play an essential role for corporations of any size. Therefore, the profile of the typical IT user in business has shifted from huge companies to mid-sized and even small companies. Nowadays, IT is widely applied for the management of business processes through the use of corporate systems oriented for different purposes like, for example, ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), SCM (Supply Chain Management) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management). As far as a corporate system grows and works in new features, grows its complexity as well. Nowadays, such systems usually comprise lots of different heterogeneous components, geographically distributed, administered by different organizations and, as a result, the management of such systems became a new challenge. This dissertation analyses the application of open standards, designed to allow the modeling of distributed systems and the management of telecommunication networks, to the management of complex corporate systems. More specifically, it will analyze the application of the TMN standards, developed for the management of telecommunications networks, to the management of CRM systems, where the latter presents extreme complexity due to the fact that it usually involves different technologies, geographical distribution and many disciplines (such as databases, information analysis tools, computer networks, legacy systems and various communication medias).