Tuotantoympäristön jatkuva parantaminen

Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli luoda kohdeyritykseen toimintamalli, jonka avulla saadaan osallistettua työntekijät, tiiminvetäjät ja työnjohto tuotannon jatkuvaan parantamiseen sekä parannettua tuotannon takaisinkytkentää tiimitasolla. Tutkimus rajattiin pilottitiimiin sekä tiimissä olevien työpisteiden kautta reititettyihin tuotteisiin. Ennen tutkimuksen aloitusta yrityksellä oli jo olemassa sähköinen aloitejärjestelmä, mutta sen käyttö oli organisaation uudelleen järjestelyjen myötä vähentynyt. Tutkimuksen teoriaosassa tutustuttiin jatkuvan parantamisen kulttuuriin ja työkaluihin. Lisäksi tutustuttiin laadunhallinnan sisältöön, käsitteistöön ja laadunvalvontatyökaluihin sekä tuotannon mittareihin. Teorian pohjalta tutkimuksessa luotiin jatkuvan parantamisen toimintamalli, joka tunnistaa ja eliminoi prosessissa olevaa hukkaa osallistamalla pilottitiimin työntekijöitä hukkakorttien avulla. Lisäksi tutkimuksessa luotiin toimintamalli tuotannon kehitysideoiden raportointiin ja käsittelyyn. Tuotannon takaisinkytkentää kehitettiin luomalla pilottitiimiin tuloskortti sekä perustamalla yritykseen päiväkatsauskäytäntö. Tutkimuksessa suoritettiin myös toimihenkilötason kehitysprojekteja käyttäen apuna teoriassa esiteltyjä malleja ja työkaluja. Tuloksena saatiin toimintamalli, joka tuottaa työntekijämäärään suhteutettuna enemmän kehitysideoita sekä käsittelee ne tehokkaammin kuin sähköinen aloitejärjestelmä. Hukkakorteilla toteutetun hukan raportoinnin kautta tunnistettiin ja raportoitiin seitsemän viikon tarkasteluajanjakson aikana yhteensä 23,6 tuntia hukka-aikaa. Tiimin tuloskortin avulla tiimin työntekijät pystyivät viikkotasolla seuraamaan oman tiiminsä suorituskykyä tavoitearvoihin verrattuna. Tämä näkyi muun muassa tiimin suoritustason nousuna. Kehitysprojektien avulla saatiin parannettua pilottitiimin toiminnan ja tuotteiden laatua. Päiväkatsauskäytännön avulla saatiin osallistettua tiiminvetäjät ongelmaratkaisuun sekä tuotannon suorituskyvyn varmistamiseen.

The advantages and disadvantages of logistics centralization and decentralization from employee’s perspective

Tämän tutkimuksen tarkoituksena on havainnoida keskittämisen ja hajauttamisen hyötyjä ja haittoja logistiikassa, ja selventää mitä tekijöidä tulee huomioida näiden kahden rakenteen väliltä valitessa. Tutkimus kokoaa molempien rakenteiden hyödyt ja haitat hyödyntämällä sekä haastateltujen työntekijöiden osaamista ja mielipiteitä että aiheeseen liittyvää kirjallisuutta. Päätavoitteena on lisätä ymmärrystä siitä, miten organisaatiorakenne vaikuttaa logistiseen toimintaan.

The nature and role of trust in temporary virtual problem-solving teams

The objective of this study is to increase understanding of the nature and role of trust in temporary virtual problem-solving teams engaged in real-life co-creation activities, while much of previous research has been conducted in student settings. The different forms and bases of trust, possible trust barriers and trust building actions, and perceived role of trust in knowledge sharing and collaboration are analyzed. The study is conducted as a qualitative case study in case company. Data includes interviews from 24 people: 13 from 3 different project teams that were going on during the study, 8 from already finalized project teams, and 3 founders of case company. Additional data consists of communication archives from three current teams. The results indicate that there were both knowledge-based and swift trust present, former being based on work-related personal experiences about leaders or other team members, and latter especially on references, disposition to trust and institution-based factors such as norms and rules, as well as leader and expert action. The findings suggest that possible barriers of trust might be related to lack of adaptation to virtual work, unclear roles and safety issues, and nature of virtual communication. Actions that could be applied to enhance trust are for example active behavior in discussions, work-related introductions communicating competence, managerial actions and face-to-face interaction. Finally, results also suggest that trust has a focal role as an enabler of action and knowledge sharing, and coordinator of effective collaboration and performance in temporary virtual problem-solving teams.

CSR and CSR communication’s effect on prospective employees

The aim of this Master’s Thesis was to examine whether corporate social responsibility and CSR communication has effect on company’s image in the eyes of 18-25 year olds young job seekers and thus study young adults perceptions on these issues. By utilizing previous academic literature a through picture of the main topics was built and by conducting quantitative research, research’s aim was sought to answer. The framework defines the link between research’s main concepts corporate image, CSR and CSR communication and how this can lead to attracting prospective employees. A quantitative research method was applied and an online survey was sent to people whom had applied for L&T by June during the year 2015. Out of these people, those who were aged 18-15 and had vocational education were qualified to answer the survey. The data was analyzed by utilizing statistical analysis and causal relationships were found though which the explanation of perceptions and impacts was possible. The results showed that young adults are influenced by CSR and CSR communication and thus these factors have an impact on prospective employees.

Datenherrschaft – an Ethically Justified Solution to the Problem of Ownership of Patient Information

Patient information systems are crucial components for the modern healthcare and medicine. It is obvious that without them the healthcare cannot function properly – one can try to imagine how brain surgery could be done without using information systems to gather and show information needed for an operation. Thus, it can be stated that digital information is irremovable part of modern healthcare. However, the legal ownership of patient information lacks a coherent and justified basis. The whole issue itself is actually bypassed by controlling pa- tient information with different laws and regulations how patient information can be used and by whom. Nonetheless, the issue itself – who owns the patient in- formation – is commonly missed or bypassed. This dissertation show the problems if the legislation of patient information ownership is not clear. Without clear legislation, the outcome can be unexpected like it seems to be in Finland, Sweden and United Kingdom: the lack of clear regulation has come up with unwanted consequences because of problematic Eu- ropean Union database directive implementation in those countries. The legal ownership is actually granted to the creators of databases which contains the pa- tient information, and this is not a desirable situation. In healthcare and medicine, we are dealing with issues such as life, health and information which are very sensitive and in many cases very personal. Thus, this dissertation leans on four philosophical theories form Locke, Kant, Heidegger and Rawls to have an ethically justified basis for regulating the patient infor- mation in a proper way. Because of the problems of property and ownership in the context of information, a new concept is needed and presented to replace the concept of owning, that concept being Datenherrschaft (eng. mastery over in- formation). Datenherrschaft seems to be suitable for regulating patient infor- mation because its core is the protection of one’s right over information and this aligns with the work of the philosophers whose theories are used in the work. The philosophical argumentation of this study shows that Datenherrschaft granted to the patients is ethically acceptable. It supports the view that patient should be controlling the patient information about themselves unless there are such specific circumstance that justifies the authorities to use patient information to protect other people’s basic rights. Thus, if the patients would be legally grant- ed Datenherrschaft over patient information we would endorse patients as indi- viduals who have their own and personal experience of their own life and have a strong stance against any unjustified paternalism in healthcare. Keywords: patient information, ownership, Datenherrschaft, ethics, Locke, Kant, Heidegger, Rawls

Model to Build a Service Quality Centric Customer Reference Portfolio in a Software as a Service Company

The goal of the master’s thesis was to develop a model to build a service quality centric customer reference portfolio for a software as a service company. The case company is Meltwater Finland Oy that leverages customer references externally but there is no systematic model to produce good quality customer references that are in line with the company strategy. The project was carried out as a case study, where the primary source of information were seventeen internal interviews with the employees of the case company. The theory part focuses on customer references as assets and service quality in software as a service industry. In the empirical part the research problem is solved. As a result of the case study, the model to build a service quality centric customer reference portfolio was created and further research areas were suggested.

Exploring knowledge worker motivation in autonomous and interdependent problem solving tasks on virtual platforms

The objective of this study is to understand why virtual knowledge workers conduct autonomous tasks and interdependent problem solving tasks on virtual platforms. The study is qualitative case study including three case organizations that tap the knowledge of expert networks, and utilize virtual platforms in the work processes. Research data includes 15 interviews, that is, five experts from each case company. According to the findings there are some specific characteristics in motivation to work on tasks on online platforms. Autonomy, self-improvement, meaningful tasks, knowledge sharing, time management, variety of contacts, and variety of tasks, and projects motivate virtual knowledge workers. Factors that may enhance individuals’ engagement to work on tasks are trust, security of continuous task flow and income, feedback, meaningful tasks and tasks that contribute to self-improvement, flexibility and effectiveness in time management, and virtual tools that support social interaction. The results also indicate that there are some differences in individuals’ motivation based on the tasks’ nature. That is, knowledge sharing and variety of contacts motivated experts who worked on interdependent problem solving tasks. Then again, autonomy and variety of tasks motivated experts who worked on autonomous tasks.

Corporate Entrepreneurship in Healthcare Organizations: An explorative study of employees’ corporate entrepreneurial behavior, job satisfaction and turnover intention

The Finnish healthcare industry is currently facing significant challenges due to economic crises, aging population and major structural reforms, which have resulted in decreased job satisfaction and increased levels of turnover. This proposes that healthcare organizations need to come up with new, creative means to tackle these issues. Several researchers have argued that corporate entrepreneurship may be the necessary means to achieve this. As previous research has mainly focused on examining this concept from organizational perspective, this study looks at how it occurs on the level of individual employees. The purpose of this study is to examine how corporate entrepreneurship is manifested in individual behavior, and how this type of behavior is associated with the individual’s job satisfaction and turnover intention. Additionally, this study will examine the differences in corporate entrepreneurial behavior between private and public sector organizations, as previous research suggests that these two may be characterized differently. Data was collected with the help of a literature review as well as a survey study, which was sent out to a number of employees of four different healthcare organizations, out of which three were public and one was a private sector organization. Six distinct behavioral characteristics were recognized in previous research, which make up the measure for corporate entrepreneurial behavior. Principal components were formed from the different areas of the survey (corporate entrepreneurial behavior, job satisfaction, turnover intention), after which the association of these components were examined with linear regression analysis, which proved that corporate entrepreneurial behavior is positively correlated with both job satisfaction and intention to leave the organization. Differences between sectors were analyzed with analysis of variance and cross tabulation analysis, but neither of these suggested that any significant differences would occur. These results suggest that employees who behave entrepreneurially tend to be more satisfied with their jobs, but also consider leaving their current organizations more often than others. This may be due to the fact that healthcare organizations are not fertile for entrepreneurial behavior, which will drive entrepreneurial individuals looking for employers who may be more supportive of this type of behavior. With growing levels of dissatisfaction as well as little room for entrepreneurial behavior, the studied organizations may actually be in the process of losing those employees who have the ability and desire to behave in such manner, and who could very well be those who will eventually come up with solutions for the major challenges that these organizations are facing.

Development of a New Welding Product Quality Control and Management System Model for China

The Chinese welding industry is growing every year due to rapid development of the Chinese economy. Increasingly, companies around the world are looking to use Chinese enterprises as their cooperation partners. However, the Chinese welding industry also has its weaknesses, such as relatively low quality and weak management. A modern, advanced welding management system appropriate for local socio-economic conditions is required to enable Chinese enterprises to enhance further their business development. The thesis researches the design and implementation of a new welding quality management system for China. This new system is called ‗welding production quality control management model in China‘ (WQMC). Constructed on the basis of analysis of a survey and in-company interviews, the welding management system comprises the following different elements and perspectives: a ‗Localized congenital existing problem resolution strategies‘ (LCEPRS) database, a ‗human factor designed training system‘ (HFDT) training strategy, the theory of modular design, ISO 3834 requirements, total welding management (TWM), and lean manufacturing (LEAN) theory. The methods used in the research are literature review, questionnaires, interviews, and the author‘s model design experiences and observations, i.e. the approach is primarily qualitative and phenomenological. The thesis describes the design and implementation of a HFDT strategy in Chinese welding companies. Such training is an effective way to increase employees‘ awareness of quality and issues associated with quality assurance. The study identified widely existing problems in the Chinese welding industry and constructed a LCEPRS database that can be used in efforts to mitigate and avoid common problems. The work uses the theory of modular design, TWM and LEAN as tools for the implementation of the WQMC system.