Introduction: A trend for organisations to change from single to multiple project management has been observed over the last couple of decades. Organizations shifted their focus from single project management towards the simultaneous management of the whole set of projects as one entity – project portfolio. New multi-project settings require a new management approach and practices to successfully manage a portfolio. A common practice in organizations is to evaluate projects after they had been carried out. At that point not much can be done and it is impossible to improve performance and prevent failure. Hence, problems that occur in projects’ implementation phase remain unsolved and even unidentified. Constant control, review and monitoring of projects’ performance in the implementation phase could lead to the problematic portfolio areas being spotted and timely management decisions being made in order to improve the overall portfolio performance. Problem: How do organisations manage projects within a portfolio that perform poorly in the implementation phase? Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is: to describe to what extent and in what ways organizations control, review and monitor project performances in the implementation phase; to identify if organisations use any methods, tools or techniques in order to spot projects that perform poorly according to their expectations; and to discover what happens to the poorly performing projects in the implementation phase after they were identified. Method: An electronic qualitative questionnaire had been constructed and sent out to the 46 sampled Swedish companies currently running project portfolios. 115 most suitable respondents had been chosen to answer the survey. Frame of Reference: Theoretical framework is built on the literature within project portfolio management field, mostly concerning control, review and monitoring of projects of projects’ performance within their implementation phase; practices used to manage poorly performing projects as well as the value of organizational learning. Conclusion: The research results show that even though majority of the studied organizations are aware and striving towards efficient project portfolio control, review and monitoring, a lot of space for improvement still remains. Results reveal that organizations are trying to keep track of projects’ performance within a portfolio, however, very few poorly performing are identified. Moreover, the management practices for underperforming projects are still very limited if not non-existent.

<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>A trend for organisations to change from single to multiple project management has been observed over the last couple of decades. Organizations shifted their focus from single project management towards the simultaneous management of the whole set of projects as one entity – project portfolio. New multi-project settings require a new management approach and practices to successfully manage a portfolio. A common practice in organizations is to evaluate projects after they had been carried out. At that point not much can be done and it is impossible to improve performance and prevent failure. Hence, problems that occur in projects’ implementation phase remain unsolved and even unidentified. Constant control, review and monitoring of projects’ performance in the implementation phase could lead to the problematic portfolio areas being spotted and timely management decisions being made in order to improve the overall portfolio performance.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Problem: </strong>How do organisations manage projects within a portfolio that perform poorly in the implementation phase?</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Purpose: </strong>The purpose of this thesis is: to describe to what extent and in what ways organizations control, review and monitor project performances in the implementation phase; to identify if organisations use any methods, tools or techniques in order to spot projects that perform poorly according to their expectations; and to discover what happens to the poorly performing projects in the implementation phase after they were identified.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Method: </strong>An electronic qualitative questionnaire had been constructed and sent out to the 46 sampled Swedish companies currently running project portfolios. 115 most suitable respondents had been chosen to answer the survey.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Frame of Reference: </strong>Theoretical framework is built on the literature within project portfolio management field, mostly concerning control, review and monitoring of projects of projects’ performance within their implementation phase; practices used to manage poorly performing projects as well as the value of organizational learning.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>The research results show that even though majority of the studied organizations are aware and striving towards efficient project portfolio control, review and monitoring, a lot of space for improvement still remains. Results reveal that organizations are trying to keep track of projects’ performance within a portfolio, however, very few poorly performing are identified. Moreover, the management practices for underperforming projects are still very limited if not non-existent.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, 2005. / Typescript (photocopy).

The business organization of municipal governments allows these entities to be more efficient when performs its role, management and implementation of goods, resources and services for a given community. However, in recent months we have seen various authorities of the district and regional municipalities make use of the business structure of public agencies they belong to commit crimes against the proper functioning of public administration. / La organización empresarial de los gobiernos municipales permite que estas entidades puedan ser más eficientes al momento de cumplir con su rol prestacional de gestión y ejecución de los bienes, recursos y servicios en favor de determinada comunidad. Sin embargo, en los últimos meses hemos visto como distintas autoridades de los municipios distritales y regionales se valen de la estructura empresarial de los aparatos públicos a los que pertenecen para cometer hechos delictivos en contra del buen funcionamiento de la administración pública.

Sales market in process industry, especially for chemical, pharmaceutical and food industry, is becoming more and more volatile. Furthermore, the global availability of alternative products shortens the product life cycle. At the same time, the requested volumes depend on strong regional and temporal fluctuations, which are increasingly difficult to predict. To be able to bring product innovations successfully to market, rapid series-production readiness of the prototype is needed. However, the competition after successful approval is increasingly getting tougher. As soon as the product has been accepted by the market, the time necessary to reach sufficient product quantities with required product quality is essential for its profitability. By the end of the product life cycle, the production should be close to the largest remaining sales markets, which means that the production can be shifted accordingly. Classical production processes in process industry do not fulfil these requirements jet. Conti-systems are optimized for a certain production quantity per unit of time, which should not be changed for years, if possible. The higher flexibility of conventional batch plants is associated with unproductive times, for example during conversion. However, modularization of process plants with flexible combinatory design would allow faster turnover times and higher productivity. Individual modules realize standardized production steps and can be combined according to the requested product. Changes to the product are achieved by the exchange of modules, the production quantity can be increased by adding more of the same modules. The integration of a module into an upper classic process control system is laborious using the information models and tools available today. Various aspects of automation, such as human machine interfaces, statuses of sequences or interlocks must be added manually for the visualization and guidance of the module in an upper process control system. However, today's control systems are not prepared to provide the required flexibility of a system based on different modules. This drawback requires a modular plug-and-production methodology. Therefore, an outright modeling of information, beginning with modular and function-oriented integrated engineering is needed. On the one hand, this work considers with a selection of integration aspects, a detailed modeling of this aspects in an information carrier and the integration into the process control level. On the other hand, the concrete selection of one or more descriptive formats is analyzed. For this purpose, a uniform integration architecture and an integration process is described, this allows integration into an upper process control system level. This analysis shows that, with the available descriptive formats, a mapping of the individual integration aspects into an information carrier is possible. It is important to distinguish whether a separate mapping is chosen for each aspect, as chosen by GrapML in the second practical implementation, or whether a uniform format is used for the entire information carrier. The evaluation of the description formats suggests for the use in the information carrier AutomationML. The practical implementation and investigation with AutomationML are already in the scope of the Namur MTP developments and couldn’t therefore investigated deeply in this work. For the most important aspects, the human machine interface as well as the process management, detailed information modeling is available and was checked during implementation. Two different possibilities were presented and discussed for the selection of description formats. To allow flexible extensibility, it is advantageous to choose a description means in which the integration aspects are described separately from each other, independently of the specifically chosen format. A uniform interface within automation systems is required for the needs of the so-called industry 4.0 for the networking and consistency of all components involved throughout the entire life cycle. This work provides the first building blocks of this approach and enables application in process industry but also manufacturing industry.

<p>  </p> <p>Crystallization is a purity and particle control unit operation commonly used in industries such as pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, and energetics. Often, the active ingredient’s crystal mean size, polymorphic form, morphology, and distribution can impact the critical quality attributes of the final product. The active ingredient typically goes through a series of process development iterations to optimize and scale-up production to reach production scale. Guided by the FDA, the paradigm shift towards continuous processing and crystallization has shown benefits in introducing cheaper and greener technologies and relieving drawbacks of batch processing. To achieve successful batch scale-up or robust continuous crystallization design, process intensification of unit operations, crystallization techniques, and utilizing data driven approaches are effective in designing optimal process parameters and achieving target quality attributes. </p> <p>In this thesis, a collection or toolbox of various process intensification techniques was developed to aid in control, optimization, and digitalization of crystallization processes. The first technique involves developing a novel control algorithm to control agrochemical crystals of high aspect ratio to improve the efficiency of downstream processes (filtration, washing, and drying). The second technique involves the further improvement of the first technique through digitalization of the crystallization process to perform simulated optimization and obtain a more nominal operating profile while reducing material consumption and experimentation time. The third method involves developing a calibration procedure and framework for in-line video microscopy. After a quick calibration, the in-line video microscopy can provide accurate real-time measurements to allow for future control capabilities and improve data scarcity in crystallization processes. The last technique addresses the need for polymorphic control and process longevity for continuous tubular crystallizers. Through a sequential stirred tank and tubular crystallizer experimental setup, the control of polymorphism, particle mean size, and size distribution were characterized. Each part of this thesis highlights the importance and benefits of process intensification by creating a wholistic process intensification framework coupled with novel equipment, array of PAT tools, feedback control, and model-based digital design.</p>

Softcore processors are an attractive alternative to using expensive radiation-hardened processors for space-based applications. Since they can be implemented in the latest SRAM-based FPGA technologies, they are fast, flexible and significantly less expensive. However, unlike ASIC-based processors, the logic and routing of a softcore processor are vulnerable to the effects of single-event upsets (SEUs). To protect softcore processors from SEUs, this dissertation explores the processor design-space for the LEON3 softcore processor implemented in a commercial SRAM-based FPGA. The traditional mitigation techniques of triple modular redundancy (TMR) and duplication with compare (DWC) and checkpointing provide reliability to a softcore processor at great spatial cost. To reduce the spatial cost, terrestrial ASIC-based processor protection techniques are applied to the LEON3 processor. These techniques come at the cost of time instead of area. The software fault-tolerance techniques used to protect the logic and routing of the LEON3 softcore processor include a modified version of software implemented fault tolerance (SWIFT), consistency checks, software indications, and checkpointing. To measure the reliability of a mitigated LEON3 softcore processor, an updated hardware fault-injection model is created, and novel reliability metrics are employed. The improvement in reliabilty over an unmitigated LEON3 is measured using four metrics: architectural vulnerability factor (AVF), mean time to failure (MTTF), mean useful instructions to failure (MuITF), and reliability-area-performance (RAP). Traditional reliability techniques provide the best reliability: DWC with checkpointing improves the MTTF and MuITF by almost 35x and TMR with triplicated input and outputs improves the MTTF and MuITF by almost 6000x. Software fault-tolerance provides significant reliability for a much lower area cost. Each of these techniques provides greater processor protection than a popular state-of-the-art rad-hard processor.

This study explores the utilisation of spatial technologies as a tool to analyse and combat crime. The study deals specifically with remote sensing and its potential for being integrated with geographical information systems (GIS). The integrated spatial approach resulted in the understanding of land use class behaviour over time and its relationship to specific crime incidents per police precinct area. The incorporation of spatial technologies to test criminological theories in practice, such as the ecological theories of criminology, provides the science with strategic value. It proves the value of combining multi-disciplinary scientific fields to create a more advanced platform to understand land use behaviour and its relationship to crime. Crime in South Africa is a serious concern and it impacts negatively on so many lives. The fear of crime, the loss of life, the socio-economic impact of crime, etc. create the impression that the battle against crime has been lost. The limited knowledge base within the law enforcement agencies, limited logistical resources and low retention rate of critical staff all contribute to making the reduction of crime more difficult to achieve. A practical procedure of using remote sensing technology integrated with geographical information systems (GIS), overlaid with geo-coded crime data to provide a spatial technological basis to analyse and combat crime, is illustrated by a practical study of the Tshwane municipality area. The methodology applied in this study required multi-skilled resources incorporating GIS and the understanding of crime to integrate the diverse scientific fields into a consolidated process that can contribute to the combating of crime in general. The existence of informal settlement areas in South Africa stresses the socio-economic problems that need to be addressed as there is a clear correlation of land use data with serious crime incidents in these areas. The fact that no formal cadastre exists for these areas, combined with a great diversity in densification and growth of the periphery, makes analysis very difficult without remote sensing imagery. Revisits over time to assess changes in these areas in order to adapt policing strategies will create an improved information layer for responding to crime. Final computerised maps generated from remote sensing and GIS layers are not the only information that can be used to prevent and combat crime. An important recipe for ultimately successfully managing and controlling crime in South Africa is to strategically combine training of the law enforcement agencies in the use of spatial information with police science. The researcher concludes with the hope that this study will contribute to the improved utilisation of spatial technology to analyse and combat crime in South Africa. The ultimate vision is the expansion of the science of criminology by adding an advanced spatial technology module to its curriculum. / Criminology / D.Litt. et Phil. (Criminology)

This study explores the utilisation of spatial technologies as a tool to analyse and combat crime. The study deals specifically with remote sensing and its potential for being integrated with geographical information systems (GIS). The integrated spatial approach resulted in the understanding of land use class behaviour over time and its relationship to specific crime incidents per police precinct area. The incorporation of spatial technologies to test criminological theories in practice, such as the ecological theories of criminology, provides the science with strategic value. It proves the value of combining multi-disciplinary scientific fields to create a more advanced platform to understand land use behaviour and its relationship to crime. Crime in South Africa is a serious concern and it impacts negatively on so many lives. The fear of crime, the loss of life, the socio-economic impact of crime, etc. create the impression that the battle against crime has been lost. The limited knowledge base within the law enforcement agencies, limited logistical resources and low retention rate of critical staff all contribute to making the reduction of crime more difficult to achieve. A practical procedure of using remote sensing technology integrated with geographical information systems (GIS), overlaid with geo-coded crime data to provide a spatial technological basis to analyse and combat crime, is illustrated by a practical study of the Tshwane municipality area. The methodology applied in this study required multi-skilled resources incorporating GIS and the understanding of crime to integrate the diverse scientific fields into a consolidated process that can contribute to the combating of crime in general. The existence of informal settlement areas in South Africa stresses the socio-economic problems that need to be addressed as there is a clear correlation of land use data with serious crime incidents in these areas. The fact that no formal cadastre exists for these areas, combined with a great diversity in densification and growth of the periphery, makes analysis very difficult without remote sensing imagery. Revisits over time to assess changes in these areas in order to adapt policing strategies will create an improved information layer for responding to crime. Final computerised maps generated from remote sensing and GIS layers are not the only information that can be used to prevent and combat crime. An important recipe for ultimately successfully managing and controlling crime in South Africa is to strategically combine training of the law enforcement agencies in the use of spatial information with police science. The researcher concludes with the hope that this study will contribute to the improved utilisation of spatial technology to analyse and combat crime in South Africa. The ultimate vision is the expansion of the science of criminology by adding an advanced spatial technology module to its curriculum. / Criminology and Security Science / D.Litt. et Phil. (Criminology)