Industry 4.0: Research and Practice offers a non-technical introduction to the rapidly evolving landscape of the fourth industrial revolution. With advancements in artificial intelligence, big data, cyber-physical systems, and the Internet of Things (IoT), organizations across the world are experiencing a profound digital transformation. This essential guide is tailored to academics, business leaders, and practitioners who are seeking to understand the complexities of Industry 4.0. Through...

Design for Lean Six Sigma (DFLSS) is a powerful methodology adopted by many world-class companies today. It aims to build quality into products or services at the very early stages of the product development process. Ten Commandments of Design for Lean Six Sigma brings together the experience of six authors with more than 50 years of cumulative DFLSS deployment in the field.The book covers key topics such as alignment of DFLSS with organizational strategy; top management s...

Operational Excellence (OPEX) is all about achieving efficiency and effectiveness in business processes of any organization, despite of the nature of the business and size. There are various OPEX methodologies adopted by world class corporations for the past three decades including: Lean, Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma, Kaizen, and Agile. These methodologies have proved to be very successful in many manufacturing and service companies around the world for over three decades. However, until now,...

This book reports on advances in applications of Lean Six Sigma and Operational Excellence in Higher Education Institutes and in other Public Sector organisations with a special emphasis on Kaizen, Lean, Business Excellence Models, and Digitisation. Further topics include Leadership for Higher Education Institutes and public sectors in Operational Excellence and building a culture for Operational Excellence. Chapters report on theoretical research and case studies concerning Operational Ex...

Strategic Corporate Communication in the Digital Age explores how contemporary communication approaches are crossing boundaries as innovative media formats and digital transformations offer new challenges and opportunities to academia and practitioners. New technologies have empowered various organisations and their stakeholders. The digital and social media are central to the process of building trust, reputation and support, as online users can use them to scrutinise and influen...

Although Lean Six Sigma (LSS) and its popularity in the context of larger manufacturing and service organizations has long been recognized, it is not widely recognized in the context of Higher Education (HE).This book serves as a practical and systematic roadmap for developing, implementing, sustaining and deploying LSS in any higher education institution. Including various case examples and studies carried out by leading research scholars and practitioners in the field, plus a ded...

This book aims to offer a comprehensive overview of the issues facing organizations when deciding whether to accept e-commerce as a platform for business. It provides a detailed evaluation of how the implementation of e-commerce may affect all parties within the supply chain: suppliers, retailers and consumers. It also compares various opportunities and threats of accepting e-commerce in order to conclude whether it might offer access to a new digital era, or whether it is an uncertain opt...

Organizations are increasingly investing in consulting capabilities to understand what changes they need to make to keep up the pace with the competition and future-proof their business. Consultancy, Organizational Development and Change is a guide for students and internal and external consultants needing to develop the necessary skills to consult in organizational settings where there is a great deal of complexity.It tackles the issues posing the greates...

Mentorship in Academic Medicine is an evidence-based guide for establishing and maintaining successful mentoring relationships for both mentors and mentees.Drawing upon the existing evidence-base on academic mentoring in medicine and the health sciences, it applies a case-stimulus learning approach to the common challenges and opportunities in mentorship in academic medicine. Each chapter begins with cases that take the reader into the evidence around specific issues in me...

The building performance evaluation (BPE) framework emphasizes an evaluative stance throughout the six phases of the building delivery and life cycle: (1) strategic planning/needs analysis; (2) program review; (3) design review; (4) post-construction evaluation/review; (5) post-occupancy evaluation; and, (6) facilities management review/adaptive reuse. The lessons learned from positive and negative building performance are fed into future building delivery cycles. The case studies illustra...

Due to the growing importance of global interdependencies, corporate social responsibility has become an important issue both for the business and the entire society. Customers expect corporate social responsibility, and if an organization is insensitive to these issues, it runs the risk of losing its key customers. The interaction and integration of corporate social responsibility and supply chain management have led to the emergence of sustainable supply chain management. This book is a ...

This book is a novel treatment of Operations Management. It takes a fresh insight to this increasingly important topic, exploring fundamental principles equally applicable to service and manufacturing situations. The book adapts a strategic stance by providing a framework for effective decision making and is aimed at practising managers who need to design working processes, manage change and make decisions within a strategic framework. The framework and supporting case vignettes allow the ...