Using process mapping and business process simulation to support a process-based approach to change in a public sector organisation

A case study demonstrates the use of a process-based approach to change regarding the implementation of an information system for road traffic accident reporting in a UK police force. The supporting tools of process mapping and business process simulation are used in the change process and assist in communicating the current process design and people's roles in the overall performance of that design. The simulation model is also used to predict the performance of new designs incorporating the use of information technology. The approach is seen to have a number of advantages in the context of a public sector organisation. These include the ability for personnel to move from a traditional grouping of staff in occupational groups with relationships defined by reporting requirements to a view of their role in a process, which delivers a performance to a customer. By running the simulation through time it is also possible to gauge how changes at an operational level can lead to the meeting of strategic targets over time. Also the ability of simulation to proof new designs was seen as particularly important in a government agency were past failures of information technology investments had contributed to a more risk averse approach to their implementation. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The experiences and perceptions of fathers attending the birth and immediate care of their baby

Fathers in the United Kingdom (UK) usually attend the birth and immediate care of their baby. They also have an increasing presence during complicated and preterm childbirth, newborn resuscitation and early neonatal unit(NNU) care. However, there is limited evidence about the effect of these experiences on them. The aim of this study was to gain an understanding of the experiences of fathers encountering these situations. The study consisted of three phases and was undertaken in one National Health Service trust in the UK. Qualitative semi-structured interviews using a phenomenological approach were undertaken with 20 first-time fathers present at the delivery, resuscitation and/or admission of their baby to the NNU. Direct observations were made of 22 normal and complicated deliveries and initial newborn care and qualitative semi-structured interviews using the critical incident approach were undertaken with 37 health care professionals (HCPs). The study generated qualitative and quantitative data that were analysed accordingly. The findings show that most fathers were involved for at least some of the time and often spontaneously initiated their involvement. Their most important need was for information. They were usually more concerned about their partner, irrespective of the baby?s need for resuscitation and NNU care. To facilitate their involvement, fathers needed guidance and support from HCPs, particularly delivery suite midwives. Most HCPs recognised the needs of fathers and ways in which they could be helped to connect with their experience. However, these needs were not always met, usually because of inadequate staffing levels, a lack of resources or a mother-centred philosophy of care. The findings suggest the service often determines the extent to which fathers are involved. It is anticipated that these findings will inform HCP education and training and the development of both policy and health education thereby enhancing the quality of care provision for fathers.

Improved production of industrially relevant recombinant proteins: application of multi-factorial design of experiments and scalable process modelling

The work described in this thesis focuses on the use of a design-of-experiments approach in a multi-well mini-bioreactor to enable the rapid establishments of high yielding production phase conditions in yeast, which is an increasingly popular host system in both academic and industrial laboratories. Using green fluorescent protein secreted from the yeast, Pichia pastoris, a scalable predictive model of protein yield per cell was derived from 13 sets of conditions each with three factors (temperature, pH and dissolved oxygen) at 3 levels and was directly transferable to a 7 L bioreactor. This was in clear contrast to the situation in shake flasks, where the process parameters cannot be tightly controlled. By further optimisating both the accumulation of cell density in batch and improving the fed-batch induction regime, additional yield improvement was found to be additive to the per cell yield of the model. A separate study also demonstrated that improving biomass improved product yield in a second yeast species, Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Investigations of cell wall hydrophobicity in high cell density P. pastoris cultures indicated that cell wall hydrophobin (protein) compositional changes with growth phase becoming more hydrophobic in log growth than in lag or stationary phases. This is possibly due to an increased occurrence of proteins associated with cell division. Finally, the modelling approach was validated in mammalian cells, showing its flexibility and robustness. In summary, the strategy presented in this thesis has the benefit of reducing process development time in recombinant protein production, directly from bench to bioreactor.

The influence of formulation and manufacturing process parameters on the characteristics of lyophilized orally disintegrating tablets

Gelatin is a principal excipient used as a binder in the formulation of lyophilized orally disintegrating tablets. The current study focuses on exploiting the physicochemical properties of gelatin by varying formulation parameters to determine their influence on orally disintegrating tablet (ODT) characteristics. Process parameters, namely pH and ionic strength of the formulations, and ball milling were investigated to observe their effects on excipient characteristics and tablet formation. The properties and characteristics of the formulations and tablets which were investigated included: glass transition temperature, wettability, porosity, mechanical properties, disintegration time, morphology of the internal structure of the freeze-dried tablets, and drug dissolution. The results from the pH study revealed that adjusting the pH of the formulation away from the isoelectric point of gelatin, resulted in an improvement in tablet disintegration time possibly due to increase in gelatin swelling resulting in greater tablet porosity. The results from the ionic strength study revealed that the inclusion of sodium chloride influenced tablet porosity, tablet morphology and the glass transition temperature of the formulations. Data from the milling study showed that milling the excipients influenced formulation characteristics, namely wettability and powder porosity. The study concludes that alterations of simple parameters such as pH and salt concentration have a significant influence on formulation of ODT. © 2011 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.

Liquid desiccant dehumidification and regeneration process to meet cooling and freshwater needs of desert greenhouses

Agriculture accounts for ~70% of freshwater usage worldwide. Seawater desalination alone cannot meet the growing needs for irrigation and food production, particularly in hot, desert environments. Greenhouse cultivation of high-value crops uses just a fraction of freshwater per unit of food produced when compared with open field cultivation. However, desert greenhouse producers face three main challenges: freshwater supply, plant nutrient supply, and cooling of the greenhouse. The common practice of evaporative cooling for greenhouses consumes large amounts of fresh water. In Saudi Arabia, the most common greenhouse cooling schemes are fresh water-based evaporative cooling, often using fossil groundwater or energy-intensive desalinated water, and traditional refrigeration-based direct expansion cooling, largely powered by the burning of fossil fuels. The coastal deserts have ambient conditions that are seasonally too humid to support adequate evaporative cooling, necessitating additional energy consumption in the dehumidification process of refrigeration-based cooling. This project evaluates the use of a combined-system liquid desiccant dehumidifier and membrane distillation unit that can meet the dual needs of cooling and freshwater supply for a greenhouse in a hot and humid environment.

Understanding and improving the manufacturing and changeover process in Saudi Arabian business - a multiple case study approach

The importance of the changeover process in the manufacturing industry is becoming widely recognised. Changeover is a complete process of changing between the manufacture of one product to manufacture of an alternative product until specified production and quality rates are reached. The initiatives to improve changeover exist in industry, as better changeover process typically contribute to improved quality performance. A high-quality and reliable changeover process can be achieved through implementation of continuous or radical improvements. This research examines the changeover process of Saudi Arabian manufacturing firms because Saudi Arabia’s government is focused on the expansion of GDP and increasing the number of export manufacturing firms. Furthermore, it is encouraging foreign manufacturing firms to invest within Saudi Arabia. These initiatives, therefore, require that Saudi manufacturing businesses develop the changeover practice in order to compete in the market and achieve the government’s objectives. Therefore, the aim of this research is to discover the current status of changeover process implementation in Saudi Arabian manufacturing businesses. To achieve this aim, the main objective of this research is to develop a conceptual model to understand and examine the effectiveness of the changeover process within Saudi Arabian manufacturing firms, facilitating identification of those activities that affect the reliability and high-quality of the process. In order to provide a comprehensive understanding of this area, this research first explores the concept of quality management and its relationship to firm performance and the performance of manufacturing changeover. An extensive body of literature was reviewed on the subject of lean manufacturing and changeover practice. A research conceptual model was identified based on this review, and focus was on providing high-quality and reliable manufacturing changeover processes during set-up in a dynamic environment. Exploratory research was conducted in sample Saudi manufacturing firms to understand the features of the changeover process within the manufacturing sector, and as a basis for modifying the proposed conceptual model. Qualitative research was employed in the study with semi-structured interviews, direct observations and documentation in order to understand the real situation such as actual daily practice and current status of changeover process in the field. The research instrument, the Changeover Effectiveness Assessment Tool (CEAT) was developed to evaluate changeover practices. A pilot study was conducted by examining the CEAT, proposed for the main research. Consequently, the conceptual model was modified and CEAT was improved in response to the pilot study findings. Case studies have been conducted within eight Saudi manufacturing businesses. These case studies assessed the implementation of manufacturing changeover practice in the lighting and medical products sectors. These two sectors were selected based on their operation strategy which was batch production as well as the fact that they fulfilled the research sampling strategy. The outcomes of the research improved the conceptual model, ultimately to facilitate the firms’ adoption and rapid implementation of a high-quality and reliability changeover during the set-up process. The main finding of this research is that Quality’s factors were considering the lowest levels comparing to the other factors which are People, Process and Infrastructure. This research contributes to enable Saudi businesses to implement the changeover process by adopting the conceptual model. In addition, the guidelines for facilitating implementation were provided in this thesis. Therefore, this research provides insight to enable the Saudi manufacturing industry to be more responsive to rapidly changing customer demands.

Chronology

In this chronological table of the ‘long’ eighteenth century I have sought to place scientific publications in the context of their cultural milieu. I have purposefully omitted birth and death dates of the great figures of the eighteenth century in preference for the dates when their most significant publications and/or other contributions appeared.

New business formation in a rapidly growing economy: The Irish experience

The extraordinary growth of the Irish economy since the mid-1990s - the 'Celtic Tiger' - has attracted a great deal of interest, commentary and research. Indeed, many countries look to Ireland as an economic development role model, and it has been suggested that Ireland might provide key lessons for other EU members as they seek to achieve the objectives set out in the Lisbon Agenda. Much of the discussion of Ireland's growth has focused on its possible triggers: the long term consequences of the late 1980s fiscal stabilisation; EU structural funds; education; wage moderation; and devaluation of the Irish punt. The industrial policy perspective has highlighted the importance of inflows of foreign direct investment, but a notable absence from the discourse on the 'Celtic Tiger' has been any mention of the role of new business venture creation and entrepreneurship. In this paper we use unpublished Irish VAT data for the years 1988 to 2004 to provide the first detailed look at national trends in business birth and death rates in Ireland over the 'take-off' period. We also use sub-national VAT data to shed light on spatial trends in new venture creation. Our overall conclusions are that new business formation made no detectable contribution to the acceleration of Ireland's growth in the late 1990s, although we do find evidence of spatial convergence in per capita business stocks.

New business formation in a rapidly growing economy:the Irish experience

The extraordinary growth of the Irish economy since the mid-1990s—the ‘Celtic Tiger’—has attracted a great deal of interest, commentary and research. Indeed, many countries look to Ireland as an economic development role model, and it has been suggested that Ireland might provide key lessons for other EU members as they seek to achieve the objectives set out in the Lisbon Agenda. Much of the discussion of Ireland’s growth has focused on its possible triggers: the long-term consequences of the late 1980s fiscal stabilisation, EU structural funds, education, wage moderation and devaluation of the Irish punt. The industrial policy perspective has highlighted the importance of inflows of foreign direct investment, but a notable absence from the discourse on the ‘Celtic Tiger’ has been any mention of the role of new business venture creation and entrepreneurship. In this paper we use unpublished Irish VAT data for the years 1988–2004 to provide the first detailed look at national trends in business birth and death rates in Ireland over the ‘take-off’ period. We also use sub-national VAT data to shed light on spatial trends in new venture creation. Our overall conclusions are that new business formation made no detectable contribution to the acceleration of Ireland’s growth in the late 1990s, although we do find evidence of spatial convergence in per capita business stocks.

Watch that space! The county hierarchy in firm births and deaths in the UK, 1980-1999

The paper investigates the relationships between registrations, de-registrations and population density at county level in the UK using VAT data for 20 years over the period 1980–1999. The rationale for this is based on the need to understand how the extent to which, in different parts of the UK, differences in the relationship between birth rates and death rates combine to produce an interpretable pattern in net birth rates. The analysis of the net birth rate shows that a strategy aimed at the net birth rate might, in principle, just as well aim at reducing business failure, rather than raising the birth rate. Indeed this might be more efficient, since it implies that less start-ups are ‘‘wasted’’ as it would avoid the necessity, if targets are to be reached, of encouraging those individuals who are patently unsuited to running their own business into business ownership.