The successful implementation of process improvement (PI) could reduce operating costs of the Department of Defense, which could lessen the impact of budget reductions and the mounting costs of the expanding global mission requirements. Organizations fail to achieve the return on investment for PI and expected savings because of leaders' inabilities and experiences in integrating critical success factors into PI to improve processes. The purpose of this single case study was to explore the strategies that logistics leaders use to implement PI in the military aviation industry. Six purposively selected group and squadron civilian leaders with over 10 years of experience in successful implementation of PI, working with the Air Force in the military aviation industry in Georgia, participated in the study. The theory of constraints was the conceptual framework for the study. Data collection was through semistructured interviews using open-ended questions, review of organizational documents, and archival records. Seven themes emerged from using a modified version of Miles and Huberman's data analysis approach, including coding of transcribed interview data and grouping significant statements into larger units to form themes. Emerging themes included leadership, continuous PI, organizational culture, climate, strategic management, performance management, and resource. These finding may contribute to social change by providing the United States and allied leaders with strategies to improve aircraft availability to increase flight operations for enhanced safety and humanitarian efforts for their citizens and allies.

Employee Engagement in a Cardiac Catheterization Lab by Rhonda J. Smith Project Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Nursing Practice Walden University February 2016 This study adds to the existing body of knowledge on employee engagement and workplace climate in the catheter laboratory setting. The study goals were to discover the current state of workplace satisfaction and then to share the results with the staff to determine what to improve and how to guide them through the Lean process. This study was guided by Kanter's structural empowerment theory, which holds that structural factors inside the workplace have a greater impact on employee work feelings and behaviors than do the employees' own personal tendencies. It was also guided by the Lean model, which aims to transform an organization's culture via a customer-focused method to constantly produce improvement opportunities, remove waste, and create value. This project utilized a descriptive research design. The catheter laboratory staff were e-mailed a link to complete a staff engagement and workplace climate survey. The survey was based off of a prior staff satisfaction survey used by the organization for consistency, but was not validated in the process. This survey provided a means to establish employee attitudes on several aspects analyzed by a 7 point-Likert scale. Of the 19 staff members who received the survey, 11 completed it, yielding a 60% response rate. Overall, the staff indicated that they were satisfied with their job and enjoyed working in their department. The findings from this survey were shared with the catheter laboratory staff and they chose to work on improving teamwork with departments outside of cardiology. The results of this study reinforce existing literature that demonstrates that employees who are engaged in the workplace are happier and more productive. The concept of staff engagement has been linked to higher quality patient outcomes, greater financial viability, increased productivity, and higher employee satisfaction.

Additive manufacturing is becoming a leading technology in the production of consumer parts. In order to compete with traditional methods which have had years to improve, additive systems must achieve a level of performance efficiency greater than it maintains today. While great effort is being expended to improve the printing time and add more systems level thinking to the problem, it is currently lacking a robust improvement methodology. To achieve the desired improvement, a technique from traditional manufacturing based on overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) is proposed. Overall additive manufacturing effectiveness (OAME) provides a methodology for enhancing this important emerging technology.

A nurse-managed clinic in Northeast Tennessee that mainly serves unstably housed patients launched a process improvement project to evaluate Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) implementation and use. These findings could guide future SBIRT efforts among vulnerable groups.

Lean Six Sigma is an approach focused on improving quality, reducing variation and eliminating waste in an organization. The concept of combining the principles and tools of Lean Enterprise and Six Sigma has occurred in the literature over the last several years. The majority of Lean Six Sigma applications have been in private industry, focusing mostly on manufacturing applications. The literature has not provided a framework for implementing Lean Six Sigma programs applied to local government. This research provides a framework roadmap for implementing Lean Six Sigma in local government. The Service Improvement for Transaction-based Entities Lean Six Sigma Framework Roadmap (SITE MAP) identifies the activities, principles, tools, and important component factors to implement Lean Six Sigma. The framework provides a synergistic approach to integrating the concepts and tools of Lean Enterprise and Six Sigma using the DMAIC (Define-Measure-Analyze-Improve-Control) problem solving approach. A case study was used to validate the framework. Lean Six Sigma was successfully applied in a 7,000-citizen municipality to reduce the cycle time of the financial administrative processes in the Finance Department of the city government.

The concept Lean Production has nowadays become an accepted paradigm in several industries and it has become a fundamental part of manufacturing companies, as it seeks to reduce waste and deliver a high customer value. Lean Production is a technique that is a highly efficient manufacturing practice that helps organizations to carry on a competitive advantage. The concept works as a system of methods and measures which when combined have the potential to carry about a lean manufacturing. The objective of this research is to investigate how Strålfors Svenska Card can succeed in carrying out changes in their production in order to reduce waste, with reference to Lean Production. The study starts with a brief historical review about lean production, which is followed by a theoretical framework with useful concepts to adapt. The theoretical frameworks used in this research are: Lean House, “4P” Model, Lead the Change, Culture, Processes and Performance Measurements. The main research question of this thesis is: What are the main barriers for a successful lean implementation in Strålfors Svenska AB? Subsequently, the main research question was broken down to four sub questions. These are: How developed and mature in the organization are process methods? How are performance measurements employed? Which role does standardization, such as availability of tools, have? Which role do soft aspects, such as culture and values, play in understanding concepts?  Strålfors Svenska Card has to build a good platform in order to success with their implementation of lean production. Moreover, it means that the organization has to focus on developing necessary critical factors that are in the guideline with lean production. The researchers has used observations, interviews, surveys and value stream mapping in order to collect necessary data.

The purpose of this DBA is to develop a Customisation Blueprint so that consultancies can provide a more tailored, responsive service to clients. This study seeks to find out what matters to clients when purchasing consultancy, how clients substantiate this and how it affects their decision-making. This study also seeks to establish if the factors influencing buyer’s evaluation of the consultant can be favourably influenced by the consultants. By fulfilling client requirements more precisely and effectively, consultants are able to better serve their clients. In this way they are also able to enhance both ongoing relationship and reputation. The history of consultancy is examined to establish the unfurling and growth of the industry and to understand the forces which have shaped its evolution. Relational and Operations literature is examined to establish what previous research is able to contribute to this quest for understanding what consultants need to do to better serve their clients. Financial Services and Utilities are the two largest private-sector buyers of consultancy. Managers involved in the purchase of consulting services from a selection of these companies were interviewed to capture how consultants are engaged and what selection criteria are the most important. A combination of guidance from the literature and an understanding of what matters to clients is used to develop a systematic approach for consultants to more clearly identify and articulate client needs and thereby serve them better. The outcome is the development of a Customisation Blueprint, a framework to personalise responsiveness and thus enhance customer satisfaction.

Although research and practice have shown that the success of a usability engineering program depends on the identification and correction of usability problems, these problems remain an underutilized source of information. Insufficient guidance regarding the capture of usability problem data results in the loss of information during the problem reporting phase as problem reports are often vague, imprecise, and incomplete. In addition, the absence of a framework for understanding, comparing, categorizing, and analyzing those problems, and their relationship to development context, not only constrains product improvement, but hampers efforts to improve the user interface development process. A new taxonomic model (the Usability Problem Taxonomy) is presented which contributes to both product and process improvement. The Usability Problem Taxonomy (UPT) is used to classify and organize usability problems detected on interactive software development projects. Individual UPT categories are associated with two aspects of development context: developer roles and skills, and development activities, methods, and techniques. Two studies were conducted during the course of this research. The first study showed that the UPT can be used to classify usability problems reliably. Findings indicated that level of agreement among classifiers (beyond chance agreement) was statistically significant. Findings in the second study led to the identification of roles and activities that address individual UPT categories as well as those that do not. Procedures for using the UPT in both product and process improvement are outlined. Examples are presented that illustrate how the UPT can be used to generate higher quality problem descriptions and to group those problem descriptions prior to prioritization and correction. In addition, steps that guide developers in diagnosing weaknesses in the current user interface development process are enumerated. Possible improvement strategies are presented that focus on the selection of specific development activities and team members appropriate for a given project. / Ph. D.

This study has   focused on system development approaches and system development   methodologies. The purpose of the study has been to present a view on the   current situation of different development approaches (agile, traditional,   iterative and hybrid) and methodologies by highlighting the situation from a   number of perspectives. Questions that are answered are: which system   development approaches and methodologies that can be said to be most   frequently used based on the respondents, if the mentioned approaches can be   given certain characteristics based on a selection of factors and the   respondents' attitude towards the approach they practice. The study has been   conducted as a survey where the answers have been obtained via social media.   The result shows that agile methodologies dominate and that they are often   included in various forms of hybrid and agile approaches. Furthermore, it has   not been possible to create an in-depth knowledge of the approaches based on   the selected factors. Finally, it is noted that project members who practice   an agile approach have a great confidence in the approach and have a strong   conviction that it contributes to increase the quality of the software.

The purpose of this study was to find a method for exploring the potential of increasing the efficiency of a manual manufacturing process while simultaneously maintaining the flexibility and the ability to adjust to changes in demand. The study has been conducted in cooperation with Scania CV AB Engine Assembly in Södertälje, Sweden. This explorative study has been conducted using a framework mixing traditional Quality and Process Management literature, with theories of Innovation Management and ways of designing a production process. The framework was designed by focusing on perspectives to help explain and optimize the dynamics of a manual assembly process characterized by high variation. Increasing the efficiency has included the elimination of waste and disturbances while creating opportunities for continuous improvement. Improving the ability to adjust to changes in demand and volume has included reorganization of the information flow. Activities aimed at increasing the efficiency and improving flexibility requires a base of information which is sufficient and enables fact-based decision-making. An analysis of the current state was conducted using triangulation of data collection methods. Interviews, observations, focus groups, surveys, and numeric data was analyzed. Tools of Quality Management, Lean Management, and the Productivity Potential Assessment method were used to develop a framework for evaluating a manual production process and aim to collect, process, compile, weigh, prioritize, and visualize the processes and the identified challenges. Identification of improvement activities and the design of a future state was conducted through extensive interviews and focus groups and by interpreting relevant literature. Mapping of the current state generated five primary challenges which are complicating the daily work in different ways. The challenge estimated to have the highest overall impact on the studied process is Time Data Management. This challenge refers to the lack of valid and correct data on which to accurately plan and control the process.