The forming of an assembly system is a complex task, which should be considered as never ending. In order to successfully plan and implement an assembly system it is of vital importance that the obstacles and preconditions that have an impact on the system are identified and evaluated. This together with the necessary support activities and the attributes of the product to be assembled constitutes the starting point for the forming of the assembly system. The aim of this thesis is to link the theoretical findings with the issues stated above, and through this explain a best practice approach when forming the assembly system. The theoretical work aims at describing the nature and activities within assembly and manufacturing systems and explains these in three different levels of strategies divided into Manufacturing strategies, Layout, material flow and design strategies and finally Logistic, material handling and quality strategies. Then the obstacles and preconditions found are discussed and evaluated which set the basis for the forming of the assembly system and by linking these with the relevant theory, conceptual design proposals for the assembly system and the Logistic support system are formed. These are then evaluated and finally a proposal for the detailed layout of the assembly system is given. This proposal is then to be used as a guideline for the company Aercrete when forming their assembly system.

<p>The forming of an assembly system is a complex task, which should be considered as never ending. In order to successfully plan and implement an assembly system it is of vital importance that the obstacles and preconditions that have an impact on the system are identified and evaluated. This together with the necessary support activities and the attributes of the product to be assembled constitutes the starting point for the forming of the assembly system.</p><p>The aim of this thesis is to link the theoretical findings with the issues stated above, and through this explain a best practice approach when forming the assembly system. The theoretical work aims at describing the nature and activities within assembly and manufacturing systems and explains these in three different levels of strategies divided into Manufacturing strategies, Layout, material flow and design strategies and finally Logistic, material handling and quality strategies. Then the obstacles and preconditions found are discussed and evaluated which set the basis for the forming of the assembly system and by linking these with the relevant theory, conceptual design proposals for the assembly system and the Logistic support system are formed.</p><p>These are then evaluated and finally a proposal for the detailed layout of the assembly system is given. This proposal is then to be used as a guideline for the company Aercrete when forming their assembly system.</p>

Orientador: Otávio José de Oliveira / Banca: Márcio Minto Fabricio / Banca: Adilson Renofio / Resumo: Para que as organizações sejam competitivas e aumentem as chances de sobrevivência no mercado competitivo, é necessária a gestão do processo produtivo cada vez mais eficiente. Nesta gestão são utilizados sistemas focados em qualidade, meio ambiente, segurança e saúde no trabalho, entre outros. A integração desses sistemas otimizam recursos, processos e melhoram a imagem da organização, influenciando, assim, a lucratividade. Esta dissertação tem como objetivo formular diretrizes para o planejamento e implementação de sistema de gestão integrada em empresas da construção civil. Para a elaboração deste trabalho, foi adotada a pesquisa qualitativa, exploratória, bibliográfica com a realização de dois estudos de caso sobre os elementos do sistema de gestão integrada de duas construtoras certificadas em ISO 9001, ISO 4001 e OHSAS 18001 fazendo com que o pesquisador, se ambiente ao universo de estudo. Um referencial teórico foi apresentado sobre as características do processo produtivo, sistema de gestão da qualidade, meio ambiente, saúde e segurança no trabalho e integração desses. Conclui-se que, o objetivo traçado, foi devidamente alcançado, pois foram apresentados os elementos do sistema de gestão integrada nas duas construtoras, sendo identificadas as boas práticas e pode-se propor, diretrizes para o planejamento e implamentação do sistema de gestão integrada em empresas da construção civil / Abstract: To ensure that organizations are competitive and increase the changes of survival in competitive market, it is necessary to management of the productive process ever more efficiently. This management systems are used raised in quality, environment, health and safety at work, among others. The integration of these systems optimize resources, process, and improve the image of the organization, influencing, thus, the profitability. This dissertation has like objetctive, formulate guidelines for the planning and implementation of integrated management system in civil construction companies. For this work was adopted the qualitative research, exploratory, bibliographic with the achievement of two case studies about the elements of the integrated management system of two construction companies certifieds in ISO 9001, ISO 14001, and OHSAS 18001 making the researcher, environment the universe of study. A theoretical reference was presented about the characteristics of the production process, a system of quality management, environment, health and safety at work and integration of these. It concludes that, the outlined objective was duly achieved, because the elements of integrated management system were submitted in the two construction companies, being identified the good practices and could propose, guidelines for the planning and implementation of integrated management system in civil construction companies / Mestre

Manufacturing performance measures the extent to which the manufacturing plant has built capabilities like low cost, high quality, delivery, and flexibility. The importance of identifying drivers of these capabilities has been underscored by many scholars although limited evidence exists so far regarding this issue. The available evidence is also primarily based on data obtained from manufacturing firms operating in developed and emerging economies and not from firms in developing economies. This study, therefore, bridges this gap by exploring key internal and external drivers of manufacturing performance taking evidence from the manufacturing sector of a developing economy - Ethiopia. A quant-emphasis mixed method approach was used along with cross-sectional survey design to gather data and answer the research questions in the study. The unit of analysis is the manufacturing plant, and hence primary data was collected using multidimensional questionnaires at plant level from 197 medium and large scale firms from Addis Ababa and its periphery. Secondary data was obtained from census reports, the country’s Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP), and report on the performance of the Ethiopian economy, which were analyzed qualitatively and the implications to manufacturing performance drawn in the study. A series of scale checks and analyses were made to test unidimensionality, reliability, and validity of measures and then structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to analyze hypothesized relationships. The main finding is that environmental dynamism significantly influences competitive priorities and firm’s strategic orientation, which in turn significantly influence manufacturing decisions. Structural and infrastructural manufacturing decisions eventually significantly influence manufacturing performance when firms place increased emphasis on quality or delivery. The competitive priorities also significantly influence external learning capability of the manufacturing plant, although the influence of strategic orientation on this variable was not significant even at the 0.1 level except in the delivery priority model. Both the competitive priorities and strategic orientation, however, play little role in guiding leadership practices of manufacturing managers. The study further indicates that government support directly influences manufacturing performance, though it does not significantly influence external learning capability. Based on the findings, it is suggested that manufacturing firms should give due attention to what is going on in their external environment and accordingly align their competitive priorities, strategic orientation, and investments in structural and infrastructural resources to enhance plant performance. They should exhaustively utilize the supports provided by government as well. / Business Management / D.B.L.

[pt] A compreensão dos atuais processos produtivos é essencial neste momento em que o conhecimento tornou-se um importante gerador de valor. Uma visão holística dos conhecimentos que estão disseminados, de forma dispersa, entre profissionais, consultores e acadêmicos é necessária para a síntese de novas teorias da produção. Pesquisadores de gerência de operações freqüentemente usam mapeamento causal como um mecanismo para construir e comunicar teorias, particularmente em suporte à pesquisa empírica. As abordagens mais usuais para capturar dados cognitivos para um mapa causal são brainstorming e entrevistas, os quais exigem muito tempo e apresentam um significativo custo em sua implementação. Esta tese visa gerar uma metodologia (Metodologia Evocativa para Mapeamento Causal - ECMM) voltada para aplicação em pesquisa sobre gerência de operações para coletar e estruturar dados disseminados de forma desagregada, como conhecimento e experiência profissional e acadêmica, contidos nas opiniões de um grande número de especialistas dispersos demograficamente e geograficamente. Isto é alcançado evocando opiniões, codificando-as em variáveis e reduzindo o grupo em conceitos e relações. Tem-se uma especial preocupação em conseguir este objetivo em tempo factível e com baixo custo. A coleta de dados é assíncrona, via Internet, possui dois ou três turnos (à semelhança do método Delfos). A análise de dados usa codificação, técnica de grupamento hierárquica e escalamento multidimensional para identificar conceitos na forma de mapas cognitivos. A ECMM foi ilustrada com aplicações que demonstram sua viabilidade. Aplicou-se nas áreas de gestão da cadeia de suprimento (SCM) e administração de serviços (SM) com a participação de aproximadamente 1.300 respondentes de empresas e universidades de quase 100 países. Dentre os desdobramentos para pesquisas futuras propõe-se aplicar nas áreas de ECMM em SCM e SM visando a uni-las em um tema: gestão da cadeia de suprimento de serviços. / [en] The understanding of the present productive processes is essential at this moment when knowledge became an important value creator. A holistic vision of the pieces of knowledge that are spread out and dispersed among practitioners, consultants and academics is necessary for the synthesis of new theories of production. Operations management researchers often use causal mapping as a key tool for building and communicating theory, particularly in support of empirical research. The widely accepted approaches for capturing cognitive data for a causal map are informal brainstorming and interviews, which require a time- consuming and significant cost of implementation. This dissertation aims at creating a methodology (Evocative Causal Mapping Methodology - ECMM) intended for use in operations management research for collecting and structuring dispersed data spread out as practical and research knowledge, and experience contained in the opinions of a large number of specialists demographically and geographically scattered. This is accomplished by evoking opinions, encoding them into variables and reducing the resulting set to concepts and relationships. A special concern is to achieve this goal in a feasible time and cost- efficient way. ECMM consists of two or three round, Delphi- like, Internet-based asynchronous data collection, and a data analysis that uses a coding panel of experts, hierarchical cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling for identifying concepts on cognitive map formats. Applications illustrate ECMM and demonstrate its feasibility. They were developed on supply chain management (SCM) and service management (SM) involving about 1,300 respondents of companies and universities of about 100 countries. Among possible unfolding future studies, this dissertation proposes to apply ECMM in SCM and SM aiming at unifying them into a single topic: service supply chain management.

Behavioral operations management (BOM) has gained popularity in the last two decades. The main theme in this new stream of research is to include the human behavior in Operations Management (OM) models to increase the effectiveness of such models. BOM is classified into 4 areas: cognitive psychology, social psychology, group dynamics and system dynamics (Bendoly et al. 2010). This dissertation will focus on the first class, namely cognitive psychology. Cognitive psychology is further classified into heuristics and biases. Tversky and Kahneman (1974) discussed 3 heuristics and 13 cognitive biases that usually face decision makers. This dissertation is going to study 6 cognitive biases under the representativeness heuristic. The model in this dissertation states that cognitive reflection of the individual (Frederick 2005) and training about cognitive biases in the form of warning (Kaufmann and Michel 2009) will help decisions’ makers make less biased decisions. The 6 cognitive biases investigated in this dissertation are insensitivity to prior probability, insensitivity to sample size, misconception of chance, insensitivity to predictability, the illusion of validity and misconception of regression. 6 scenarios in OM contexts have been used in this study. Each scenario corresponds to one cognitive bias. Experimental design has been used as the research tool. To see the impact of training, one group of the participants received the scenarios without training and the other group received them with training. The training consists of a brief description of the cognitive bias as well as an example of the cognitive bias. Cognitive reflection is operationalized using cognitive reflection test (CRT). The survey was distributed to students at University of North Texas (UNT). Logistic regression has been employed to analyze data. The research shows that participants show the cognitive biases proposed by Tversky and Kahneman. Moreover, CRT is significant factor to predict the cognitive bias in two scenarios. Finally, providing training in terms of warning helps participants to make more rational decisions in 4 scenarios. This means that although cognitive biases are inherent in the mind of people, management of corporations has the tool to educate its managers and professionals about such biases which helps companies make more rational decisions.

An die Musterfertigung von Systemlieferanten stellt sich die besondere Anforderung, Prototypen verschiedener Erzeugnisse, in vielfältigen Kundenvarianten, in jeweils unterschiedlichen Produktreifegraden, parallel zu fertigen. Daraus resultiert eine spezifische Variabilitätsausprägung der Produktionsplanungsparameter, die zu einer hohen Komplexität und Turbulenz in der Ablaufsteuerung einer Musterfertigung führt. Infolgedessen gilt der Planparametervariabilitätsfall Musterfertigung, sowohl in der Theorie als auch in der betrieblichen Praxis, als ein bislang ungelöstes Steuerungsproblem, welches ein hohes Verbesserungspotenzial aufweist. Die vorliegende Arbeit analysiert und beleuchtet diesen Problemfall im Rahmen einer vergleichenden Fallstudienuntersuchung. Aufbauend auf den gewonnenen Erkenntnissen wird ein Konzept zur Steuerung einer Musterfertigung bei Systemlieferanten entwickelt und in seinem Anwendungszusammenhang evaluiert. / Sample production of tier 1 automotive suppliers demands producing simultaneously different product samples in many customised versions and within various maturity levels. The associated variability of the time-phased work content leads to a high degree of complexity and turbulence in the manufacturing process of such a production type. Therefore, sample production control becomes significantly more complicated and most existing control approaches fail in the real world. For this reason the present thesis examines this subject matter by means of a comparative case study. Based on the findings a customized production control concept will be introduced that fully adapts the specific needs of sample production of tier 1 automotive suppliers.

Competitive and high-risk environments require complex high technology systems, which need to be supported and maintained over their respective life cycles. These systems often have a significant consequence of failure, and require complex management systems to achieve their operational objectives. Significant leadership and management challenges exist, not only in South Africa, but also in other developing countries, where systems may be utilised beyond the lifespan they were designed for and are susceptible to obsolescence. This study was conducted by following a structured process; the research consisted of three stages. The first stage dealt with the research problem, including the delimitations of the study. The second stage was further divided into three phases. The first phase deconstructed the appropriate literature, which included the interpretation of numerous definitions of logistics, integrated logistics support, and the integrated logistics support elements. In addition, the research was grounded in the fields of operations management, supply chain management and integrated logistics support. The second phase focused on the deconstruction of six case studies from four different high technology complex systems. From the analysis of the first two phases followed the third phase of research, which focused on the identification of areas requiring further research. Further research was conducted by means of a questionnaire, the results of which were analysed for variable dependency and variable association. The third stage of the research included the collation and analysis of the findings of the first two stages of research. The analysis utilised the principles of Mode 2 research and design science research, whereby an ILS framework and associated grounded technological rules have been recommended. These recommendations are robust in nature, as they can be applied in the most challenging environment and circumstances as identified. Furthermore, by grounding the theory in the disciplines of operations management, supply chain management and integrated logistics support, the reliability, validity, relevance, and applicability of the study could be substantiated. This implied that the generated theoretical knowledge could be transferred to and applied in practice, and as such, an organisation can reap substantial value added benefits, and gain considerable competitive advantage in the market place by applying this developed ILS framework and associated ILS grounded technological rules. / Business Leadership / D. BL.

Competitive and high-risk environments require complex high technology systems, which need to be supported and maintained over their respective life cycles. These systems often have a significant consequence of failure, and require complex management systems to achieve their operational objectives. Significant leadership and management challenges exist, not only in South Africa, but also in other developing countries, where systems may be utilised beyond the lifespan they were designed for and are susceptible to obsolescence. This study was conducted by following a structured process; the research consisted of three stages. The first stage dealt with the research problem, including the delimitations of the study. The second stage was further divided into three phases. The first phase deconstructed the appropriate literature, which included the interpretation of numerous definitions of logistics, integrated logistics support, and the integrated logistics support elements. In addition, the research was grounded in the fields of operations management, supply chain management and integrated logistics support. The second phase focused on the deconstruction of six case studies from four different high technology complex systems. From the analysis of the first two phases followed the third phase of research, which focused on the identification of areas requiring further research. Further research was conducted by means of a questionnaire, the results of which were analysed for variable dependency and variable association. The third stage of the research included the collation and analysis of the findings of the first two stages of research. The analysis utilised the principles of Mode 2 research and design science research, whereby an ILS framework and associated grounded technological rules have been recommended. These recommendations are robust in nature, as they can be applied in the most challenging environment and circumstances as identified. Furthermore, by grounding the theory in the disciplines of operations management, supply chain management and integrated logistics support, the reliability, validity, relevance, and applicability of the study could be substantiated. This implied that the generated theoretical knowledge could be transferred to and applied in practice, and as such, an organisation can reap substantial value added benefits, and gain considerable competitive advantage in the market place by applying this developed ILS framework and associated ILS grounded technological rules. / Business Leadership / D. BL.