Operations Research, Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering Commons^™

Optimizing Student Workforce Scheduling At Psu Office Of Information Technology (Oit), Agam Ebramsyah, Aishwarya Joy, Cody Miller, Jake Stevens, Priyanka Patil

Engineering and Technology Management Student Projects

A significant challenge for businesses of any size, is generating a work schedule that ensures adequate personnel coverage to ensure all aspects of the business are properly staffed, while preventing waste produced from having an excess number of employees working at a given time. The decision to manually create spreadsheets and work schedules that take into account availability, staffing requirements, and cost efficiency can become overwhelming and labor intensive. For Portland State University's Office of Information Technology (OIT), there is a significant challenge in scheduling student workers, while ensuring staffing requirements are met, student work hour restrictions are observed, and …

Organics To You - Optimization Of Produce Bins, Rassaniya Lerdphayakkarat, Chuan Chieh Lu, Jon Roschke, Juliana Suzuki, Jessie Truong

Engineering and Technology Management Student Projects

Organics to You (www.organicstoyou.org ) is a produce delivery company that focuses on bringing organic local food from local farms straight to the homes, schools, and businesses of its clients. Each week a "Small Bin" is created using different varieties of local produce from various farms. Customers receive a bin that contains 12-14 varieties of produce with 2-6 "servings" of each variety (e.g., 1 melon, 4 apples, 1 head of lettuce, 2 lbs potatoes, etc).

Our objective is to optimize the contents of the “Small Bin”. The decision we want to make is how much of each variety do …

A Systems-Based Framework For Design And Analysis Of An R And D Structure, Polinpapilinho F. Katina, Charles B. Keating, Luna M. Magpili

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

A critical challenge for managerial effectiveness and competitive advantage in research and development (R and D) organizations is developing an appropriate structural configuration. However, in finding an appropriate structural configuration, R and D managers are faced with unprecedented levels of uncertainty, ambiguity, and accelerating complexity, coupled with demands for increased productivity. This paper develops a systems-based framework to support rigorous design, analysis, and transformation of the structure for R and D organizations. The framework development includes: (1) a review of the literature for the nature and role of the structure in R and D management; (2) setting of the R …

Forecasting Us Army Enlistment Contract Production In Complex Geographical Marketing Areas, Joshua L. Mcdonald, Edward D. White, Raymond R. Hill, Christian Pardo

Faculty Publications

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate an improved method for forecasting the US Army recruiting. Design/methodology/approach: Time series methods, regression modeling, principle components and marketing research are included in this paper. Findings: This paper found the unique ability of multiple statistical methods applied to a forecasting context to consider the effects of inputs that are controlled to some degree by a decision maker. Research limitations/implications: This work will successfully inform the US Army recruiting leadership on how this improved methodology will improve their recruitment process.
Practical implications: Improved US Army analytical technique for forecasting recruiting goals.

An Optimization Model For Operating Room Scheduling To Reduce Blocking Across The Perioperative Process, Amin Abedini, Wei Li, Honghan Ye

Mechanical Engineering Faculty Publications

Operating room (OR) scheduling is important. Because of increasing demand for surgical services, hospitals must provide high quality care more efficiently with limited resources. When constructing the OR schedule, it is necessary to consider the availability of downstream resources, such as intensive care unit (ICU) and post anaesthesia care unit (PACU). The unavailability of downstream resources causes blockings between every two consecutive stages. In this paper we address the master surgical schedule (MSS) problem in order to minimize blockings between two consecutive stages. First, we present a blocking minimization (BM) model for the MSS by using integer programming, based on …

Improving Resource Management In The Afghan Air Force, Jonathan D. Ritschel, Tamiko L. Ritschel

Faculty Publications

The nascent Afghan Air Force (AAF) is rapidly changing with new platforms programmed and existing platforms expanding. As US and coalition forces draw down, the transition of financial responsibility from American to Afghan processes is on the horizon.

Establishment Of Innovative Shared Departments To Advance Interdisciplinary Education, Ronald S. Harichandran, Brian Kench, Summer Mcgee, Michael A. Collura, Jean Nocito-Gobel, Charles David Skipton

Engineering and Applied Science Education Faculty Publications

More and more universities are pursuing interdisciplinary academic activities that span across department and college boundaries. Administrative structures to facilitate such programs are difficult to establish within traditional university frameworks consisting of disciplinary departments and colleges. Often interdisciplinary programs are housed in a traditional disciplinary department or college, or in a standalone center reporting to a college dean or the provost. The difficulty of these structures is obtaining broad buy-in from faculty across departments and having disciplinary degree programs include interdisciplinary coursework.

To overcome the difficulties described above, an innovative shared department structure that fosters collaborations to advance interdisciplinary education …

Comparing Critical Chain Project Managemenet With Critical Path Method: A Case Study, Behzad Montazeri

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Scheduling is a major task in project management. The current scheduling technique, Critical Path Method (CPM), has been widely applied for several decades, but a large number of projects fail to be completed on time and schedule delays occur in many projects. This raises question about the validity of the current project scheduling system. Critical Chain Project Management (CCPM), derived from Theory of Constraints, is a relatively new alternative approach toward scheduling projects. This study compared CCPM and CPM to determine which scheduling method delivers a shorter project duration and has a better usage of resources. A scheduling software called …

Assimilation Of Tracking Technology In The Supply Chain, Rahul Basole, Maciek Nowak

Information Systems and Operations Management: Faculty Publications & Other Works

While tracking technology has become increasingly accessible, firms still struggle with deploying these technologies into the supply chain. Using the complementary perspectives of transaction cost and institutional theory, we develop an understanding of how supply network, product, and environmental characteristics jointly impact tracking technology assimilation. We empirically test our model on a global dataset of 535 supply chain executives and decision makers. The results suggest that assimilation is frequently initiated by an external stakeholder in a firm's supply chain and that firms must develop strong collaborative ties with their partners in order to take full advantage of this technology.

Managing Cities With Urban Computing, Singapore Management University

Research@SMU: Connecting the Dots

SMU Professors Lau Hoong Chuin and Lim Yun Fong are combining their mathematical, computational and business know-how to address challenges facing the inner-city deliveries of orders and shipments.

See the papers:

• A rolling horizon auction mechanism and virtual pricing of shipping capacity for urban consolidation centers
• Achieving economic and environmental sustainabilities in urban consolidation center with bicriteria auction
• Retail precinct management: A case of commercial decentralization in Singapore

Creative Confidence In Organizational Knowledge Creation: A Synthesis Of The Literature, Elnaz Dario, Rafael Landaeta, Resit Unal, E.H. Ng. (Ed.), B. Nepal (Ed.), E. Schott (Ed.)

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

Creative confidence is a newly rising topic in the innovation study area. In a world where creativity has become a vital source of knowledge creation, not believing in one's own creative capacity could be a barrier. At the organizational level, many good ideas are disappearing before ever being written down or shared. Organizations may lose talented people who have great creative potential by either not giving them the opportunity to express their creative ideas or due to a lack of confidence from the employee side, in sharing these ideas. This paper will contribute to the research stream on the role …

The Complementary Perspective Of System Of Systems In Collaboration, Integration, And Logistics: A Value-Chain Based Paradigm Of Supply Chain Management, Raed Jaradat, Frank Adams, Sawsan Abutabenjeh, Charles Keating

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

The importance and complexity of the problems associated with coordinating multiple organizations to configure value propositions for customers has drawn the attention of multiple disciplines. In an effort to clarify and consolidate terms, this conceptual research examines both supply chain management (SCM) and system of systems (SoS) literature to postulate, from a value-chain perspective, what roles integration and collaboration play in helping supply chains satisfy customer requirements. A literature review analysis was used to identify the commonalities and differences between supply chain management and system of systems approaches to examining interfirm coordination of value creation efforts. Although a framework of …

The Impact Of Requirements Management Documentation On Software Project Outcomes In Health Care, Sujatha Alla, Pilar Pazos, Rolando Delaguila

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

Despite considerable time and resources spent on the initiation phase of software projects, discrepancies often exist between formal project documentation, customer requirements, and final project specifications. Such discrepancies in the requirements management process can have a very negative impact on final project outcomes. The Business Requirements Document (BRD) constitutes the formal software requirements documentation, which typically includes stakeholders’ needs and expectations and project scope while providing a clear project roadmap and project plan. According to IEEE standards, a BRD should be a structured document that includes specific elements such as functional and technical requirements while incorporating certain traits such as …

A Method For Key Performance Indicator Assessment In Manufacturing Organizations, Patrick Hester, Barry Ezell, Andrew Collins, John Horst, Kaleen Lawsure

VMASC Publications

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are an essential element of an organization’s ability to monitor its strategic health, helping to ensure the strategic goals of the organization are achieved. However, KPI assessment and improvement is often an ad hoc and consultant-driven process rather than one undertaken using scientific principles. This paper outlines the development and subsequent deployment of a method for KPI assessment founded in scholarly literature and balancing practitioner concerns for ease of use. The proposed method draws heavily on organizational stakeholder involvement at varying levels throughout the KPI assessment process, improving current methods by introducing a mathematical foundation based …