Modular product development for mass customization

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Perspectives of business process ethics in data-driven marketing management

In today's digitalized world, people leave trails of data about themselves when operating online. While marketers are eagerly utilizing this data for marketing insights, many consumers have a growing fear of their personal data ending up in the wrong hands and losing their privacy. The aim of this study was to understand the role of ethics in current marketing based on consumer data and to examine how data could be used ethically in marketing. The empirical research was conducted by analyzing secondary data from a 2018 survey about the use of digital services in Europe. The main conclusions that can be drawn from study findings are that the need for ethics is even more apparent in marketing than ever before, because of the broad access to personal data. Giving the consumers the ability to opt-out from data use and data selling without it affecting the use of services can create an enormous competitive advantage for organizations in the future.© 2021 The Authors. Security and Privacy published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Improvement of an order-to-cash business process by deploying lean six sigma tools

Purpose This study is focused to support an ongoing development project of the case company's current state and the challenges of the order-to-cash (O2C) process. The O2C process is the most visible process to the customer, and therefore, its punctual and fluent order management is vital. It is observed that the high degree of manual work in the O2C process causes mistakes, delays and rework in the process. The purpose of this article is therefore to analyze the case company's current state of the O2C process as well as to identify the areas of development in this process by deploying the means of Lean Six Sigma tools such as value stream mapping (VSM). Design/methodology/approach The study was conducted as a mix of quantitative and qualitative analysis. Based on both the quantitative and qualitative data, a workshop on VSM was organized to analyze the current state of the O2C process of a case company, engaged in the energy and environment sector in Finland. Findings The results found that excessive manual work was highly connected to inadequate or incorrect data in pricing and invoicing activities, which resulted in canceled invoices. Canceled invoices are visible to the customer and have a negative impact on the customer experience. This study found that by improving the performance of the O2C process activities and improving communication among the internal and external stakeholders, the whole O2C process can perform more effectively and provide better customer value. Originality/value The O2C process is the most visible process to the customer and therefore its punctual and fluent order management is vital. To ensure that the O2C process is operating as desired, suitable process performance metrics need to be aligned and followed. The results gathered from the case company's data, questionnaire interviews, and the VSM workshop are all highlighted in this study. The main practical and managerial implications were to understand the real-time O2C process performance, which is necessary to ensure strong performance and enhance continuous improvement of the O2C process that leads to operational excellence and commercial competitiveness of the studied case company.© Emilia Kääriä and Ahm Shamsuzzoha. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcodefi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Women leadership development in local governance in South and Southeast Asia: a critical analysis

Purpose The main goal of the study is to participate in academic debates and explore women's leadership and related challenges and opportunities in governance, and the extent to which women’s leadership has been enhanced by administrative reforms. The goal is to broaden the scope of action by promoting women's engagement and leadership in local government. Design/methodology/approach This is a qualitative study that uses inductive content analysis to examine the relationship between administrative reforms and women’s leadership development in the context of local government in Southeast and South Asia. Findings There is a positive impact of administrative reforms on women's leadership development. There is evidence that women are preparing for leadership roles in administration, which is a sign of progress in political change and modernization of society. They have been empowered by political and administrative education in a transformative way. Research limitations/implications This article contributes to the literature that expands knowledge about governance, female leadership and administrative reform. They are interrelated because they are precursors to the development of women's leadership in countries. Practical implications The findings of this study can help governments in South and Southeast Asia become more aware of strategies to promote gender balance in governance. The unsatisfactory situation was found to exist because of problems related to socio-political, economic, cultural, and personal development. Originality/value This study is the first to highlight the relationship between administrative reform and the development of women in leadership positions in a rarely studied developing country.© Muhammad Azizuddin and Ahm Shamsuzzoha. Published in Southeast Asia: A Multidisciplinary Journal. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcodefi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

The perspective of environmental sustainability from Finnish consumers viewpoint on eco-friendliness and corporate governance

This study aims to form a general understanding of sustainability, its building blocks, and corporate governance of environmental matters. Also, with the help of the empirical part, the opinions, and points of view of Finnish consumers are studied and analyzed since there has not been research on the topic limited to Finland. The goal is to conclude that taking environmental sustainability into account in business creates additional value for companies’ stakeholders and how companies could improve their corporate governance of environmental matters, especially in terms of the parts that are visible to the consumers as well. Quantitative research was conducted by collecting answers to a survey that consisted of different multiple-choice questions regarding the topic. The data collected was analyzed and presented with different graphs and values to draw conclusions based on the survey results. Overall, according to the research, consumers in Finland are aware of environmental matters when they are buying products and services. Most of them are also, at least sometimes, actively searching for environmentally friendly alternatives when shopping, but only a few of them are willing to pay a noticeably higher price for eco-friendly products. However, most consumers still expect companies to take environmental concerns into account in their strategic planning and think it gives a positive picture of the company.© 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Identification and analysis of the driving factors for product modularity by Interpretive Structural Modelling

Goal: The purpose of this study is to identify the driving factors that affects modular product design and development and to determine the contextual relationships between the identified factors. Design / Methodology / Approach: This research study adopted both qualitative and quantitative methodologies. In qualitative part, an extensive literature review is conducted along with interviews with the experts experienced in product design and development in order to identify and sorted out the driving factors for product modularity. In quantitative part, all the identified factors were analyzed through Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) method. MICMAC (Matrice d'Impacts Croisés Multiplication Appliquéeáun Classement (cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification) analysis is carried out to determine the relative driving and dependency power of the factors. Results: The contribution of this paper is the identification of the factors associated with developing a modular product. Through the use of ISM diagraph, the identified factors were clustered into different layers based on their driving and dependency characteristics. The ISM diagram also presented the relationship between one factor over others and the reason for such relationship. Such a diagram offers decision maker better visibility on the factor that they need to consider or strategy they need to implement to improve their modular product design and development architecture. The results from this research study encompass organizational managers for handling multiple design views, controlling design related interfaces and ranking the status and progress of product modularity and design completeness. Practical implications: The study outcomes support product designers to optimize their product development processes, especially to develop modular products. The presented methodology can be used extensively used by the product designers/planners/managers to find the driving factors related to modular product design and development. Originality / Value: The originality of this research study is to deploy the ISM approach, which can be used by the organizational managers and/or product designers to plan product development strategies. Such strategies help to them to make necessary decisions on resources allocations. Limitations of the investigation: The outcomes from this research may not be generalize sufficiently due to subjectivity of the interviewers.© 2020 Brazilian Association of Production Engineering (ABEPRO). This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Virtual supply chain for networked business : perspective of collaborative bill-of-materials, scheduling and process monitoring for developing innovative product

This article presents a methodology applicable to the formation of collaborative bill-of-materials (C-BOM), coordinating production scheduling and monitoring operational processes. The concept of collaborative product development process is described in detail through an example network, where the participating organisations form a temporary virtual organisation (VO) and contribute throughout the entire product development processes. In this paper, the basic need for exchanging product information among the partners is carried out through IT-based software tools, where the partners are enabled to visualise and monitor the operational processes in a real-time environment. This research study concludes with the overall research outcomes and future research directions.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Developing a practical methodology to improve the health-care services : studying a neonatal intensive care unit case in Oman

Purpose This study aims to develop a practical methodology to identify possible areas of improvements as well as exploring how to improve the health-care staff flow within a selected department in a hospital. Design/methodology/approach It focuses on showing how to properly study and analyze the health-care services and processes practiced at a selected department within a hospital. For this, several techniques like non-value-adding activities, time motion study, spaghetti diagram, layout analysis, etc. are used. Findings To test the proposed methodology, a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) of a hospital in Oman was considered as a case study. The study revealed that this unit has several potential improvements capabilities. Further, this study also discussed possible areas of improvements of this case unit and suggested how such improvements can be implemented. Originality/value Several possible improvements are suggested and are discussed with the hospital authority, which can be clarified as the re-layout of the NICU rooms, reorganization of the store to improve the staff flow, increase the work efficiency, introduction of Help Us Support Healing policy, etc., which can enhance the entire operational system at the studied NICU.©2020 Emerald Publishing Limited. This manuscript version is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY–NC 4.0) license, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Measurement of product innovation in small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) : a case study in Oman

In this research study, an attempt has been taken to measure the level of product innovation in Oman. The aims of this research were to measure the product innovation level of selected small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Oman and to assess necessary effort to improve product innovation level to a standard level. To fulfil these objectives, 24 SMEs engaged in both manufacturing and service sectors were selected, studied and analysed. The outcomes from the study indicates that the level of product innovation in selected Omani SMEs are noticeably low and substantial efforts are necessary to improve it to a standard level. In order to demonstrate the procedural steps to calculate and measure the product innovation level and necessary effort, out of 24 SMEs one SME was highlighted within the scope of this paper. Overall study outcomes are discussed in conclusion section along with research limitations and future research directions.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed