Smart operators: How Industry 4.0 is affecting the worker's performance in manufacturing contexts

Abstract The fourth industrial revolution is affecting the workforce at strategical, tactical, and operational levels and it is leading to the development of new careers with precise and specific skills and competence. The implementation of enabling technologies in the industrial context involves new types of interactions between operators and machines, interactions that transform the industrial workforce and have significant implications for the nature of the work. The incoming generation of Smart Operators 4.0 is characterised by intelligent and qualified operators who perform the work with the support of machines, interact with collaborative robots and advanced systems, use technologies such as wearable devices and augmented and virtual reality. The correct interaction between the workforce and the various enabling technologies of the 4.0 paradigm represents a crucial aspect of the success of the smart factory. However, this interaction is affected by the variability of human behaviour and its reliability, which can strongly influence the quality, safety, and productivity standards. For this reason, this paper aims to provide a clear and complete analysis of the different types of smart operators and the impact of 4.0 enabling technologies on the performance of operators, evaluating the stakeholders involved, the type of interaction, the changes required for operators in terms of added and removed work, and the new performance achieved by workers

Achieving Complex Development Goals Along China’s Digital Silk Road

This report is divided into four main parts. Section 2 summarises the general literature on ICTs and the SDGs to illustrate both synergies and potential trade-offs between accelerating ICT adoption and achieving complex development goals. It first identifies key SDGs that explicitly call for greater ICT adoption and access to ICT infrastructure, and then covers the literature in five key areas: (i) the relationship between ICTs and economic growth and using ICTs to achieve development outcomes; (ii) the relationship between ICTs and inequality and the “leave no one behind” (LNOB) agenda; (iii) digital barriers and inequality that go beyond the provision of infrastructure; (iv) ICTs and the future of work; and (v) ICTs and environmental sustainability. Although digital technologies could be a force for good and help achieve the SDGs, this trajectory is not automatic, nor is it a given, and in many regards current trends can lead to the contrary. Achieving the SDGs in an increasingly digital world will necessarily mean reversing negative trends and finding ways to deal with some of the challenges emerging from greater ICT adoption. This will require actions above and beyond building infrastructure from a wide range of actors. Section 3 covers the “digital Silk Road” and analyses it according to the literature on the interactions between ICTs and the SDGs covered in the previous section. It starts by covering some of the policy objectives of the digital Silk Road. It then lightly analyses potential SDG contributions and challenges on some of the main elements of the digital Silk Road including: ICT infrastructure, the growing market share of Chinese device manufacturers, the promotion of “inclusive globalisation” through e-commerce, the exportation of “smart cities” to countries along the BRI, the expansion of China’s internet giants, and the Digital Belt and Road Program Science Plan. Overall, Section 3 highlights that although Chinese actors in the BRI often frame their activities as having only positive SDG impacts, they fail to consider the potential challenges arising from a greater adoption of ICTs and digitisation including: the potential of increasing inequalities, the implications for leaving no one behind, energy consumption and e-waste among others. Section 4 concludes and provides policy recommendations for traditional development actors seeking to engage with the digital Silk Road. It suggests that traditional donors should: (a) use their convening power to bring together a diverse group of stakeholders to work through the complexities of achieving the SDGs as ICTs continue to spread; (b) be honest knowledge brokers for developing country governments about ICTs and their synergies and trade-offs with achieving the SDGs; (c) work on providing offline channels so the unconnected do not fall further behind; and (d) focus on the future of work which largely gets overlooked in the digital Silk Road. However, direct partnerships in digital BRI projects may be risky for traditional development donors due to concerns that may not bode well with their citizens about the digital Silk Road spreading an unfree internet and technologies that could be used to empower governments while disempowering citizens

Frankenstein and the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR): Ethics and Human Rights Considerations

The “Fourth Industrial Revolution” (4IR) is an expression, which is now used to frame and assess the impact of emergent technologies in the 21st century. The rapidity and quantity of changes that are occurring will result in socio-economic and also political upheavals as there are likely to be increasing shifts in power dynamics, wealth acquisition, and information. This is clearly a foremost transformation in society, and especially the IT worldview demands appropriate ethical insights, actions and sanction. If we are conversant about the vicissitudes and the rate of their occurrence, society will be better placed to try to ensure that advances in technology will benefit all stakeholders. How organisations are likely to respond to the 4IR and its ethical challenges, especially human rights’, is critical. It is certain that management in for example a hotel will need to understand and consider which technologies may affect them and whether there are opportunities or threats to be faced through the 4IR. Drawing on scholarship in an extensive range of disciplines, this article examines the 4IR and how it will impact on human rights and be accommodated within existing legal frameworks pertaining to labour issues. The study has been based on an interpretivistic paradigm which is phenomenological, and in which reality is socially constructed, and thus consists of multiple realities. There is thus a hermeneutic and subjective understanding and interpretation of texts. Epistemologically considered, knowledge is viewed as subjective and relative, and many truths and ‘knowledges’ exist depending on one’s perspective and social context. Axiologically then, this conceptual literature study is valuable as it reflects human subjectivities relating to and deliberating upon the foremost features of the 4IR and the various challenges posed by both ethical and human rights perspectives

EID: Facilitating Explainable AI Design Discussions in Team-Based Settings

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems have many applications with tremendous current and future value to human society. As AI systems penetrate the aspects of everyday life, a pressing need arises to explain their decision-making processes to build trust and familiarity among end users. In high-stakes fields such as healthcare and self-driving cars, AI systems are required to have a minimum standard for accuracy and to provide well-designed explanations for their output, especially when they impact human life. Although many techniques have been developed to make algorithms explainable in human terms, no design methodologies that will allow software teams to systematically draw out and address explainability-related issues during AI design and conception have been established. In response to this gap, we proposed the explainability in design (EID) methodological framework for addressing explainability problems in AI systems. We explored the literature on AI explainability to narrow down the field into six major explainability principles that will aid designers in brainstorming around the metrics and guide the critical thinking process. EID is a step-by-step guide to AI design that has been refined over a series of user studies and interviews with experts in AI explainability. It is devised for software design teams to uncover and resolve potential issues in their AI products and to simply refine and explore the explainability of their products and systems. The EID methodology is a novel framework that aids in the design and conception stages of the AI pipeline and can be integrated into the form of a step-by-step card game. Empirical studies involving AI system designers have shown that EID can decrease the barrier of entry and the time and experience required to effectively make well-informed decisions for integrating explainability into their AI solutions

Revitalizing Multilateral Governance at the World Trade Organization Report of the High-Level Board of Experts on the Future of Global Trade Governance. Bertelsmann Policy Brief 2018

If international trade is not governed by rules, mere might dictates what is right. The World Trade Organization (WTO) serves as a place where trade policy issues are addressed, disputes arbitrated, legal frameworks derived and enforced. Through these functions, the WTO ensures that the rules of trade policy are inspired by fairness and reciprocity rather than national interest. It is more important than ever to vitalize the global public good that it rep-resents against various threats that have been undermining it. Therefore, the Global Economic Dynamics project of the Bertelsmann Stiftung has called into life a High-Level Board of Experts on the Future of Global Trade Governance. Composed of eminent experts and seasoned trade diplomats, it elaborated a series of feasible policy recommendations that will increase the effectiveness and sali-ence of the WTO. We hope that this Report provides helpful suggestions in a time marked by increasing trade disputes and protectionism and instead contributes to stronger multilateral institutions and fora.1 The Bertelsmann Stiftung owes a debt of gratitude to Prof Bernard Hoekman, the Chairman of the Expert Board and author of this report. His invaluable expertise and experience, guidance and ability to bridge controversial opinions have been crucial in defining the work of the Board. We would also like to express our sincere thanks to all our Board Members, who generously contributed their expertise, time and networks. Without their dedication, this Report would not have been possible. Finally, we would like to thank Robert Koopman and Aik Hoe Lim of the WTO for their support throughout the whole process and Christian Bluth of Bertelsmann Stiftung for managing this common endeavour

The Digital in Architecture: Then, Now and In the Future

Authored by architecture theorist Mollie Claypool, it’s your one-stop-shop for the history of digital thinking in architecture. From debates around parametric design to the emergence of collaboration, the report condenses the interplay between digital innovation and architecture into one, tangible piece to reference