The products The Company manufactures are used in an area of the industry where errors leading to a stop in production can be quite expensive. Therefore are testing of the products important and the tests can also give indications about the quality of the products. The Company is in a phase where they are developing a new product line to support all existing and future products. In this phase, it was decided that all products will use a common framework for unit testing and a common build system for all products. One part of the thesis was to investigate and evaluate different frameworks for unit testing and tools for a build system. The unit test framework that were evaluated are Cppunit, cfix, NUnit, Boost test library, Unit Testing++ and CxxTest. The result of the evaluation was that CppUnit were recommended. For the build system MSBuild, NAnt, Automated Build Studio and Cruise Control .NET were evaluated. The recommended tools for a build system is MSBuild in combination with Cruise Control .Net if The Company is interested in the functionality Cruise Control .Net has to offer. The Company also has an interest in evaluating the current test processes and identify improvements as a part of The Company’ s objective were all products should follow a common test process. In order to identify these improvements a literature study of four test process improvement frameworks (Test Process Improvement, Test Maturity Model Integrated, Minimal Test Practice Framework and Test Improvement Model) were carried out. Out of these four frameworks Test Process Improvement (TPI) were chosen to assist when identifying improvements. With the help of TPI a limited assessment took place to give indications about the test maturity for three of The Company’s products where two of the products had low maturity. Results of the improvement measures can be summed up with the need to harmonize the documents, standardize and document the various processes. As a last part of the thesis the possibility to automate testing of two of the products graphical user interfaces with the program Test Complete were investigated. For one of the products the result was that it worked satisfactorily and for the other product it did not work at all. This resulted in recommendations for how The Company should proceed with automated testing of the graphical user interface. / De produkter som företaget tillverkar används i huvudsak inom ett område av branschen där fel som leder till stopp i produktionen kan vara ganska dyrt. Detta gör testning av produkterna viktiga och tester kan också ge indikationer om kvaliteten på produkterna. Företaget är i en fas där man utvecklar en ny produktlinje som ska stödja alla befintliga och framtida produkter. I denna fas har man beslutat att alla produkterna ska använda ett gemensant ramverk för enhetstestning och även använda ett gemensamt byggsystem för samtliga produkter. En del av examensarbetet var att undersöka och utvärdera olika ramverk för enhets testning och verktyg för byggsystem. De ramverk som utvärderades var CppUnit, cfix, NUnit, Boost test library, unitTest++ och CxxTest. Utvärderingen ledde fram till att CppUnit rekommenderades till företaget. Verktyg som utvärderades för byggsystem var MSBuild, NAnt, Automated Build Studio och Cruise Control .Net. För byggsystem rekommenderas MSBuild i kombination med Cruise Control .Net ifall företaget är intresserade av den extra funktionalitet som Cruise Control .Net har att erbjuda. Företaget har även ett intresse av att utvärdera den nuvarande testprocessen och identifiera förbättringar som ett led i att befintliga produkter skall följa en gemensam testprocess. För att kunna identifiera dessa förbättringar utfördes en litteraturstudie över fyra stycken test process förbättrings ramverk (Test Process Improvent, Test Maturity Model integrated, Minimal Test Practice Framework och Test Improvement Model). Utav dessa fyra ramverk så valdes Test Process Improvement (TPI) ut som en hjälp för att identifiera förbättringar. Med hjälp av TPI utfördes en begränsad bedömning av företagets mogenhetsgrad på tre produkter, där två av produkterna har en låg mogenhetsgrad. Resultat av förbättringsåtgärderna kan sammanfattas med att man bör harmonisera dokument, standardisera och dokumentera olika processer. Som en sista del i examensarbetet så utvärderades möjligheten att automatisera testning på två av produkternas grafiska användargränssnitt med programmet TestComplete. För en av produkterna blev resultatet att det fungerade tillfredställande och för den andra produkten så fungerade det inte alls. Resultatet blev rekommendationer för hur företaget borde gå vidare med automatisering av testnig på det grafiska användargränssnittet.

This report generally focuses on the process of getting medicine from the pharmacy in the hospital. The processes are different in Sweden and in China due to the different concrete conditions. Compared with the Swedish process the Chinese flow lags fairly far behind. To optimize the Chinese process by taking advantage of the Swedish process is the intention of this report; it also gives the advice on how to improve the performance for the Swedish process. By comparing the multiple theories for process improvement, I used Business Process Reengineering (BPR) theory to reengineer the Chinese process and used Continues Process Improvement (CPI) theory to ameliorate the Swedish process. The differences between BPR and CPI are also revealed in this report.

Context. Several quality standards have been developed over the years in order to define quality metrics for an organization’s product and even processes. One of the famous standards among them is the ISO 9000 standards which started several years ago. Since its beginning, ISO standards have seen several upgrades. Currently ISO 9001:2008 is in use which is being upgraded to ISO 9001: 2015. Companies have to migrate to the new scheme within three years of the prescribed time in order to retain certification to the ISO 9001 standards. The present thesis is targeted at finding the expected changes and the work improvements in the context of software engineering. Objectives. The main aim of the study is to find the expected changes and work improvements needed to migrate to the new version. This is done by fulfilling the following objectives, they are: analyze the expected changes and motivations for the changes in the new ISO 9001 version. Understand the required work and improvements needed for a software organization to successfully upgrade their certification to the new ISO 9001:2015 version. Predict the estimated cost/time /effort that could be incurred for organization to get certified to the forthcoming ISO version. Methods. In order to meet the objectives, a literature review was done and the changes incorporated in the new scheme are identified. A survey was conducted in order to predict the impact of cost, time and effort on the new changes in moving to ISO 9001:2008 to ISO 9001:2015. The survey was sent only to software organizations as the context of this study is only restricted to quality in software engineering. The collected data was analyzed using bi-variate analysis and Friedman test on SPSS tool. Results. From the literature review, the changes brought about in the new scheme were identified. These changes made were used in the survey questionnaire designed. The survey questionnaire was designed to investigate the expectations of the organizations on the time taken, cost incurred and the effort needed to implement these changes. A total of 63 responses were recorded from the survey. Conclusions. From the analysis it was found that several key changes were identified in the new scheme when compared to the old one. From the survey responses, the cost needed for implementing the changes is expected to be moderate, the time needed is predicted as less than 1 year and the effort needed for implementing the changes was estimated to be more. Along with this, the document also holds clear results about clause by clause expected time, cost and effort estimates and the reasons for these assumptions.

Almost everybody in the software engineering world has read about or has heard of the importance and benefits of the mature software process. This master thesis aims to answer the question why despite all the efforts; software organizations still have difficulties to achieve the mature and effective software process. The results of the literature survey and a case study performed at a real software company have shown that there is a set of factors that may cause process inefficiency in the software companies. These factors are connected with the soft aspects of the software process such as motivation of the software engineers, process understanding and the process training. / Vad är orsakerna till att programvaruföretagen har svårt att uppnå en mogen och effektiv utvecklingsprocess? Resultatet efter en fallstudie och en literaturundersökning visar att det finns ett antal faktorer som påverkar effektiviteten på processen. / Nina Dzamashvili Övre Brunnsvägen 46, SE-372 36 RONNEBY Sweden E-mail: nina.dzamashvili@bth.se

This master thesis describes our work with Team Sweden and how we have attempted to perform a Software Process Improvement using groupware. Team Sweden is a distributed academic software development organization doing research on artificial intelligence and robotics. Such an organization has a lot to gain from the introduction of a more structured process model. We have investigated the possibility of supporting the development processes of a small software development organization by introducing groupware. Only introducing a groupware tool or technique is not enough to improve the processes of an organization. Process improvement requires an infrastructure and groupware could be a useful tool for establishing it. Improved communication and knowledge sharing through groupware can be beneficial for establishing a process infrastructure. Groupware should be used in conjunction with other process improvement measures in order to be effective and improve the capability of the targeted organization. / This master thesis describes our work with Team Sweden and how we have attempted to perform a Software Process Improvement using groupware. / gustav@nordenskjold.com hakingma@hotmail.com

A high level of competition in the food industry, specifically in the Middle East and the UK has forced companies to improve their processes by reducing lead time, waste, and costs and increasing production efficiency. The main challenge to the achievement of the process improvement objectives is the high level of process variability. Therefore, this research investigates the different types of variability in food production system and proposes a methodology to reduce the effect variability in food production system. The variability can be caused by several factors, for instance, in biscuit production lines variability can be induced due to short breakdown and long breakdown, variable processing times, variable temperature, etc. The proposed approach addresses process time variability issues associated with both make-to-stock (MTS) and make-to-order (MTO) manufacturing environments using an iterated approach. The proposed methodology integrates process mapping, (which is a lean tool for identifying value added and non-value added activities), discrete event simulation (to mirror the real production line), Taguchi orthogonal arrays (to generate different scenarios in order to investigate the effect of variability on the simulation model), correlation analysis (to identify the highest variability factors), and the rule based system (to improve food production system performance based on identified key performance indicators (KPIs)). The research uses a biscuit production line as a case study to validate the proposed methodology. The application of the proposed approach determines that the highest effected KPI is %working. The results showed that after implementation of the rule-based system, key performance improved in high variable areas. Results analysis based on before scenario shows that %working performance indicator is highly effected by variable temperature, speed, and breakdown factors for high variable areas such as baking, cooling, aligning, and packing. Based on identified factors and high variable areas, rules are developed by applying standardisation setting (SOP, WI, PP) in high variable areas and the results shows %working improved in baking by 4.78%, in cooling by 16.06%, in aligning by 0.35%, in packing machine1 by 2.5%, in packing machine2 by 2.37%, in packaging1 by 3.35%, and in packaging2 by 3.16%. The integrated method allow quick response , control the environment without production interruption, reduce number of experiments , and reducing variability in high variable areas, which narrowed the improvement in the required areas and increased its effectiveness.

Scania CV AB, Scania Commercial Vehicle Aktiebolag, är ett produktionsföretag som tillverkar och levererar lastbilar, bussar, motorer samt tjänster. Forskning och utvecklingsenheten en stor del av Scanias framgång, bestående av 3500 medarbetare har som mål att utveckla samtförbättra högkvalitativa produkter och lösningar. Detta examensarbete har utförts på forsknings och utvecklingsavdelningen RCDA som ständigt jobbar med att fastställa lastbilarnas upplevda kvalitet. Syftet med examensarbetet var att identifiera förbättringsmöjligheter samt föreslå hur dessa skulle kunna implementeras på företaget med utgångspunkt från det valda förbättringsområdet på avdelningen RCDA. Målet med arbetet var utöver att leverera en litteraturstudie presentera förbättringsförslagen och dess effekt i en implementeringsplan. Säkerställandet att ovanstående syfte och mål uppfylldes gjordes med nedanstående frågeställning:Hur kan processer inom ämnet upplevd kvalitet på Scania utvecklas och förbättras?➢Vilka delprocesser påverkar processer angående upplevd kvalitet mest?➢Vilka delar av den avgränsade processen kan uppnå betydelsefulla förbättringar?➢Vilka förbättringar i den avgränsade processen kan göras? Besvarandet av frågorna gjordes genom datainsamlingsom innefattade, observationer, intervjuer och en litteraturstudie. Projektet avgränsades i samband med datainsamlingen till delprocessen Virtual AAR Evaluation som efter intervjuer och diskussioner med medarbetare visade möjligheter till konkreta processförbättringar. Förbättringsområdena arbetssätt, kommunikation och processtruktur definierades. Varav medhjälp av en litteraturstudie kring ämnena perceived quality och virtual evaluation togs lösningsförslag fram. Lösningsförslagen innefattar:➢Checklistor för kvalitetssäkring➢Mätning av leverantörers prestanda➢Workflow management, ger struktur och effektivitet➢Dialogisk kommunikation➢Transformativt ledarskap Slutsatsen i arbetet visar på att implementering enligt den plan som presenterats ger upphov till konkreta förbättringar inom delprocessen virtual AAR evaluation genom minskad resursanvändning och kvalitetssäkring av processen. / Scania CV AB, Scania Commercial Vehicle Aktiebolag, is a production company that manufactures and supplies trucks, buses, engines, and services. Research and Development Unit, a major part of Scania's success, consisting of 3,500 employees, aims to continually develop, and improve high quality products and solutions. This project was carried out at the research and development department RCDA, which constantly work to determine the perceived quality of Scania’s trucks. The purpose of this thesis work was to identify improvement opportunities and suggest how these could be implemented on the chosen improvement area in the RCDA department. The aim of the work was to provide a literature study and deliver improvement proposals and its impact in an implementation plan. Assurance of the fulfilment concerning the above purpose and objectives were made with the following questions:How can processes in the subject of perceived quality on Scania be developed and improved?➢Which sub process affect the process concerning perceived quality?➢Which parts of the defined sub process can achieve significant improvements?➢What improvements in the defined sub process can be made? The answers to the questions were done through data collection that included observations, interviews, and a literature study. The project was defined subsequently with the data collection to the AAR-sub process Virtual AAR Evaluation. Which, after interviews and discussions with employees showed opportunities for concrete process improvements. Improvement areas such as working methods, communication and process structure were defined. Concrete solutions were then presented and supported with articles from the literaturestudy:➢Checklists for quality assurance➢Measurement of supplier performance➢Workflow management, provides structure and efficiency ➢Dialogical communication➢Transformative leadership The conclusion shows that implementation according to the plan presented may give rise to concrete improvements in the sub process virtual AAR evaluation through reduced resource utilization and quality assuring the process.

Many companies today have to deal with business processes optimization, ongoing removal of system obstacles and identifying any bottlenecks laying on the way which are preventing us to reach our goals. I would like to show how we have dealt with similar problems in our case applied in the department of web application maintenance. In the first chapter I will introduce the basic information about the history, environment the company operate in and maintenance activities which are part of the process. Following with description all of the system obstacles and bottlenecks identified in the process and possible solutions or improvements for their elimination. In the last chapter I will present the achieved results after my executing of the proposed improvements and if the expectations have been met or not and what positive or negative influence it has brought.

The thesis is concerned with application of Decision Support Systems and Business Intelligence as a tool for decision-making support into processes of operational risk management in insurance company to improve them and reach a higher corporate performance.The goal of the thesis is to analyze a theory for a support of a process improvement design with the mentioned reach and to develop a design of improved operational risk management processes in a particular insurance company. The mean to reach goals is through-out a literature and articles research regarding a process improvement, decision-making, models and technologies of DSS and BI, and risk management. The theoretical framework is then used as back-bone for implementation of a practical part of innovated processes design. The thesis offers the analysis of an area of risk management processes improvement via DSS and BI in an insurance company that has been researched relatively little, but whose principles can be used for improvement projects in different areas too. A department of operational risk management in a certain insurance company obtains a complete design of innovated processes including DSS / BI application support specification which respects modern techniques of process improvements involving specific methods of decision-making quality. For the same department a part of the design was implemented -- Knowledge management system, that can be fully used. Introductory part of the thesis is concerned with techniques of business process improvement and its alignment with corporate performance. The next chapter describes specifics of operational risk management processes. In the third one models, techniques, information technologies of Decision Support Systems and Business Intelligence disciplines are analyzed. The practical part of the text starts with strategic analysis of the insurance company, proceeds with operational risk management processes analysis and reaches the design of innovated processes involving DSS and BI application support. Benefits of designed processes' changes are verified. In the conclusion a certain process change is accepted for the implementation and its results are described.

The theoretical part will be focused on presenting information within the process management. Some of the pieces of this theoretical information will be were slightly modified by internal Continental procedures and applied in the practical part of the thesis in order to redesign current purchasing process of non production material. The contents of the practical part of this thesis are the analysis of the current purchasing process of non-production material in the plant of Continental. The intention is to identify the waste and obstacles in the process. The main target is to improve the process in consideration of efficiency, lead time reduction and, if applicable, cost savings. Once the waste in the process is identified, the 100% value added ideal state is going to be developed, under consideration of implementing the improvements, which have been identified in the current state. Based on the differences between the current state and the ideal state of the process, the future state is going to be mapped.