Collaborative business networks evaluation of technological tools for decision support making

Nowadays, companies are living great difficulties on managing their business due to constant and unpredictable economic market fluctuations. Recent changes in market trends (such as the constant demand for new products and services, mass customization and the drastic reduction of delivery time) lead companies to adopt strategies of creating partnerships with other companies as a way to respond effectively to such difficult economical times. Collaborative Networks’ concept born by the consequence of companies could no longer consider their internal business processes’ management as sufficient and tend to seek for a collaborative approach with other partners for their critical processes. Information technologies (ICT) assumed a major role acting as “enablers” of these kinds of networks, enhancing information sharing and business process integration. Several new trends concerning ICT architectures have been created to support collaborative networks requirements, but still doesn’t exist a common platform to reduce the needed integration effort on virtual organizations. This study aims to investigate the current technological solutions available in the market which enhances the management of companies’ business processes (specially, Collaborative Planning). Finally, the research work ends with the presentation of a conceptual model to answer to the constraints evaluated.

Gestão de riscos: análise de impacto no negócio

O objetivo deste estudo é identificar dentro de um instituto público, um cenário tecnológico para recuperação de negócio através de soluções de recuperação de baixo investimento e que permita simultaneamente a redução das despesas operacionais. Para a elaboração do presente estudo foi utilizada a metodologia de investigação científica de estudo de caso com propósito exploratório de forma a obtenção de respostas às questões propostas. Relativamente ao estado da arte adotou-se uma metodologia baseada na investigação da literatura referente ao plano de continuidade de negócio, gestão de risco, análise de risco e avaliação ou análise de impacto de negócio. Da pesquisa efetuada, através de consultadoria externa, concluiu-se que, por aplicação da metodologia Análise do impacto nos negócios, os sistemas considerados extremamente críticos e estratégicos para a organização são o sistema de correio eletrónico, sistema central de diretório, repositório de ficheiros e o principal sistema de informação de suporte ao negócio. Foi ainda possível identificar, através do estudo de caso os cenários de recuperação de desastres que melhor se ajustam à situação atual da organização em estudo, por responderem às questões da pesquisa.

Systems thinking: learning or driving?

The ability to foresee how behaviour of a system arises from the interaction of its components over time - i.e. its dynamic complexity – is seen an important ability to take effective decisions in our turbulent world. Dynamic complexity emerges frequently from interrelated simple structures, such as stocks and flows, feedbacks and delays (Forrester, 1961). Common sense assumes an intuitive understanding of their dynamic behaviour. However, recent researches have pointed to a persistent and systematic error in people understanding of those building blocks of complex systems. This paper describes an empirical study concerning the native ability to understand systems thinking concepts. Two different groups - one, academic, the other, professional – submitted to four tasks, proposed by Sweeney and Sterman (2000) and Sterman (2002). The results confirm a poor intuitive understanding of the basic systems concepts, even when subjects have background in mathematics and sciences.

Systems thinking: learning or driving?

The ability to foresee how behaviour of a system arises from the interaction of its components over time - i.e. its dynamic complexity – is seen an important ability to take effective decisions in our turbulent world. Dynamic complexity emerges frequently from interrelated simple structures, such as stocks and flows, feedbacks and delays (Forrester, 1961). Common sense assumes an intuitive understanding of their dynamic behaviour. However, recent researches have pointed to a persistent and systematic error in people understanding of those building blocks of complex systems. This paper describes an empirical study concerning the native ability to understand systems thinking concepts. Two different groups - one, academic, the other, professional – submitted to four tasks, proposed by Sweeney and Sterman (2000) and Sterman (2002). The results confirm a poor intuitive understanding of the basic systems concepts, even when subjects have background in mathematics and sciences.