A Management Maturity Model (MMM) for project-based organisational performance assessment

Common sense suggests that organisations are more likely to deliver successful projects if they have systems in place that reflect a mature project environment based on a culture of continuous improvement. This paper develops and discusses a Management Maturity Model (MMM) to assess the maturity of project management organisations through a customisable, systematic, strategic and practical methodology inspired from the seminal work of Darwin, Deming, Drucker and Daniel. The model presented is relevant to organisations, such as construction and engineering companies, that prefer to use the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK™ Guide) published by the Project Management Institute (PMI), but without the disadvantages of excessive time and cost commitments and a ‘one size fits all’ approach linked to rigid increments of maturity. It offers a game-changing advance in the application of project-based organisational performance assessment compared to existing market solutions that are unnecessarily complex. The feasibility of MMM is field-tested using a medium-sized data centre infrastructure firm in Tehran

A Participatory Design Framework For Customisable Assistive Technology

High product costs and device abandonment negatively affect people with disabilities who require Assistive Technology (AT), and poor product design is a root cause. The purpose of this research is to develop and demonstrate a participatory design framework for customisable AT, which addresses the need for low-cost assistive products that satisfy a broad range of consumers’ needs. This framework addresses two main gaps in the literature. First, user involvement in the design process of medical and rehabilitative products helps create products that are more effective but, although methods to involve users exist, there are currently scant techniques to translate the research data into design solution concepts. Second, adaptive mass customisation offers a way to reduce a product’s cost by making it useful to more people and adaptable to a user’s changing needs. Although the creation of one-off, tailored AT devices is discussed in the literature, there are no methods to support the development of customisable or adaptable AT. Two-phases of participatory design research are described in the thesis, and make up the body of the design framework. First, a Delphi study is used to facilitate AT professionals working with individuals with disabilities in reaching a consensus on important design issues relating to a specific type of AT. An adapted morphological matrix is then presented as a novel way of applying the results of a Delphi study to concept generation. The second phase facilitates the involvement of AT users with disabilities in a series of participatory design workshops to create a final product design and prototype. The research approach was exploratory and Assistive Technology Computer Input Devices (ATCIDs) were employed as a sample technology domain to develop and substantiate the framework. Three key contributions resulted from this work; a wide range of problems and design issues related to ATCIDs; a method for using touch panel technology as a customisable ATCID; and, most pertinent due to its transferability, a participatory design framework for customisable AT with recommendations for participatory design practice involving individuals with diverse disabilities

Freshwater Culture Of Salmonids In Recirculating Aquaculture Systems (RAS) With Emphasis On The Monitoring And Control Of Key Environmental Parameters

This report is intended as a briefing paper on Recirculating Aquaculture Systems with emphasis on the monitoring of water quality parameters relating to the freshwater culture of the Arctic charr Salvelinus alpinus

Implementing a resource list management system in an academic library

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review the key components of the introduction of a new resource list management system (RLMS) at Nottingham Trent University (NTU) using the Aspire application from Talis Education. It explains the key service goals; the implementation milestones; the main technical challenges which needed to be addressed; and the dynamic relationship between the rollout of the RLMS and existing selection, acquisition and resource delivery processes

Multimodal learning for dyslexic musicians: Practical applications for adults

Dyslexia affects 15 to 20% of the population according to the International Dyslexia Association. Multimodal media, such as smartphones and tablets, which are capable of presenting varied modes of information (for example, visual, aural, and kinetic), have been shown to aid learning in dyslexic children. Music has been identified as a useful multisensory tool to help educators improve literacy skills in children. However, little research has been done on the impact of dyslexia on a child or adult’s ability to learn and perform music. Few studies have been undertaken that focus solely on dyslexia’s effect on musical ability in children; even fewer address dyslexia in adult musicians. This study summarises the techniques and suggestions in the literature used by both professional dyslexic musicians and educators of dyslexic children. It is hoped that this summary can inform the creation of a resource that assist musicians and their educators to use in tackling the challenges dyslexia can pose in learning and performing music. A proposed customisable music reading application is described in detail. This application would utilise the multimodal nature of tablet computers and smartphones to suit the learning styles of dyslexic musicians

ALPS ePortfolio Project Report

The ALPS ePortfolio project was funded by the Yorkshire and Humber Strategic Health Authority (SHA) to involve students in investigating the use, benefits and requirements of ePorfolios in health and social care education. It was undertaken by the ALPS CETL (www.alps-cetl.ac.uk), which involved 5 universities and 16 health and social-care professions. Sixteen students were employed to work on the project, reviewing ePortfolio use and designing an ideal ePortfolio for health and social care education. The main project objectives were achieved; the project team identified benefits that could be achieved through ePortfolio use, wrote guidelines for the effective introduction of ePortfolios and agreed on the specification (a list of desired functionalities) for an ideal ePortfolio. In addition, the use of ePortfolios and reflective diaries increased within the student group and various approaches to championing ePortfolios (to both students and staff) were explored. The students enjoyed working as part of a project team alongside the academic staff; feeling that their work was valued and that they gained important skills and experiences from their involvement. The skills reported as being enhanced were in the common competency areas (teamworking, communication and interprofessional working) that the wider ALPS programme has been supporting. The students identified two key pieces of further work they thought was needed in this area: • To build the improved ePortfolio based on their specification. • To integrate ePortfolios more effectively into the courses and the professions Suggestions for integrating ePortfolios more effectively into their courses included: • linking it to other key university systems (email and submissions) to encourage daily use • ensuring that it provided a place where students could save and manage their own material as well as course reflections • better support and use by staff so that the ePortfolio acted as an interface between students and staff and • better links between HE and the professions' use of ePortfolios to ease the transition from education to the workplace Improved linking between the HE and professional use of ePortfolios is an area that the ALPS CETL is in a good position to investigate further, as the CETL has involved collaboration between the universities and 16 health and social care professions. Work in this area could be taken forward by the ALPS ePortfolio network (ALPS 2010) which was set up in Autumn 2010

Musical Viruses for graceful seduction

The +++ Wearable Player is a result of the application of the Rights through Making approach in designing wearables. This approach aims at designing systems, whose use empowers people towards the materialization of values (e.g. human rights). The +++ Wearable Player system elaborates on the previous project Sound Experience, and introduces the concept of viral music exchange as a motivating factor in the context of social health. This paper describes the morphological genesis, the functional aspects and how they have been implemented in a fully working experienceable prototype. The design process and its outcomes are illustrated, in the framework of the “changing behaviour” design trend

Redistributed manufacturing in healthcare: Creating new value through disruptive innovation

The RiHN White Paper is the first serious attempt to gather expertise and to explore applications in promising areas of healthcare that could benefit from RDM and covers early-stage user needs, challenges and priorities. The UK has an opportunity to lead in this area and RiHN has identified an extensive number of areas for fruitful R&D, crossing production technology, infrastructure, business and organisations. The paper serves as a foundation for discussing future technological roadmaps and engaging the wider community and stakeholders, as well as policy makers, in addressing the potential impact of RDM.The RiHN White Paper is of particular value to policy makers and funders seeking to specify action and to direct attention where it is needed. The White Paper is also useful for the research community, to support their proposals with credible research propositions and to show where collaboration with industry and the public sector will deliver the most benefits.In order to seize the opportunities presented by RDM RiHN proposes a bold new agenda that incorporates a whole healthcare system view of future implementation pathways and wider transformation implications. The priority areas for Future R&D can be summarised as follows: throughAutomated production platform technologies and supporting manufacturing infrastructuresAdvances in analytics and metrologyNew regulatory frameworks and governance pathwaysNew frameworks for business model and organisational transformationThe time to take action is now. Technologies are developing that have the potential to disrupt traditional healthcare pathways and offer therapies tailored to individual needs and physiological characteristics. The challenge is seizing this opportunity and make the UK a world leader in RDM

Preventing suicide by young people

Introduction In 2013, 2,522 people died by suicide in Australia. Twenty-two of these were children aged 5- 14 years, 148 were adolescents aged 15-19 years, and a further 200 were young people aged 20-24 years. Although the suicide rate for children and adolescents is lower than that for some older age groups, suicide is the leading cause of death in children and young people. Suicide has immense effects on the families, friends, and communities of people who die by suicide, causing long lasting grief and guilt. Arguably, these effects are even greater when the person who died by suicide is young. It is estimated that suicide costs the Australian economy more than $17 billion per year. Researchers and policy makers recognise that suicide is preventable, yet suicide rates have changed little in the past 10 years. This discussion paper aims to focus a spotlight on the unique experience of young people. It does this by providing a critical analysis of existing policy and evidence based responses relevant to young people