International Journal for Quality Research

10

Authors: Radoica Luburic

This paper is a part of the author`s wider research that examines the impact of operational risks on the functioning of financial organisations, with particular reference to central banks. The research clearly demonstrates the importance of the human factor in the timely identification and efficient management of operational risks. People are the basic strength of organisations; they are the source of innovation, as well as of good relations with customers and other interested parties. The paper highlights the illusion that people can be successful in improving products or providing better services without improving themselves as well. Any assessment of the impact of the human factor on the appearance, identification, and efficient management of operational risks is a very complex process. This has to be an ongoing process that develops through the development of the organisation, staff competences and motivation, as well as organisational culture. In particular, emphasis must be placed on the importance of learning and knowledge in both the recognition and the efficient management of operational risks. The paper identifies education as the foundation of knowledge and knowledge as the foundation of the long-term development of organisations. They grow in significance when employing a process approach to risk management, especially the connected roles of ?process owners? and ?risk owners? in effective process and risk management. It is also clearly shown that any defence against risk, is as strong as its weakest link, and the weakest link in the chain of defence is an untrained, demotivated or dissatisfied employee or team, who are unable to recognize risk on time.

12

Authors: Tarun Soota

Integrated approach to multi-criteria decision problems is proposed using quality function deployment and analytical network process. The objective of the work is to rationalize and improve the method of analyzing and interpreting customer needs and technical requirements. The methodology is used to determine, prioritize engineering requirements based on customer needs for development of best product. Framework allows decision maker to decompose a complex problem in a hierarchical structure to show relationship between objective and criteria. Multi-criteria decision modeling is used for extending the hierarchy process to both dependence and feedback. A case study on bikes is presented for the proposed model.

12

Authors: Pawel Lula, Monika Hamerska

The main goal of the paper is to propose a framework for building ontology-based models for quality of life evaluation and similarity analysis of complex objects derived from social domain. The paper is composed with several sections. The subsequent parts of the paper contain general remarks about measurement of quality of life, description of ontology-based models and details of the proposed approach. Conclusion and bibliography are placed in the final part of the paper.

14

Authors: Ismail Wilson Taifa, Darshak A. Desai

Engineering Students in India like elsewhere worldwide need well designed classrooms furniture which can enable them to attend lectures without negative impact in the long run. Engineering students from India have not yet been involved in suggesting their requirements for improving the mostly out-dated furniture at their colleges. Among the available improvement techniques, Kano Model is one of the most effective improvement approaches. The main objective of the study was to identify and categorise all the main attributes regarding the classrooms furniture for the purpose of increasing student satisfaction in the long run. Kano Model has been well applied to make an exhaustive list of requirements for redesigning classroom furniture. Cronbach Alpha was computed with the help of SPSS 16.0 for validation purpose and it ranged between 0.8 and 0.9 which is a good internal consistency. Further research can be done by integrating Kano Model with Quality Function Deployment.

16

Authors: Pratik Badgujar, Bachchan Kanungo, G.D. Thakar

Lean Manufacturing has now become a common word in the industrial corridors. It has now been applied to the industries of several domains. No wonder that the Pump manufacturing has also witnessed profound influence of Lean philosophy. Pump manufacturing in India has a history as old as 80 years with more than 500 pump manufacturing units presently working. The present research is an explorative study and was undertaken to identify various factors affecting lean manufacturing implementation in pump manufacturing industry. Analysis of results revealed that the companies registered increase in productivity and reduction in costs and wastes. Lack of understanding, Supply chain and Company culture are found to be the strongest barriers of lean manufacturing implementation. The multiple regression model revealed that Lack of workers support can be fairly reduced by educating them about Lean Manufacturing and establishing a healthy communication with workers. An analysis across different management levels revealed disparity in perceptions and views of personnel. There is a need for top management to align organization toward common goals so as to achieve better success in implementing lean manufacturing.

18

Authors: Polastri Andrea, Pozza Luca

A crucial issue in the design of a mid-rise Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) building under horizontal seismic action, is the definition of the principal elastic vibration period of an entire superstructure. Such vibration period depends on the mass distribution and on the global stiffness of the buildings. In a CLT structure the global stiffness of the buildings is highly sensitive to deformability of the connection elements. Consequently for a precise control of the vibration period of the building it is crucial to define the stiffness of each connections used to assemble a superstructure. A design procedure suitable for a reliable definition of the connection stiffness is proposed referring to code provisions and experimental tests. Discussion addresses primary issues associated with the usage of proposed procedure for numerical modeling of case study tall CLT buildings is reported.

24

Authors: Cristiano Fragassa, Martin Ippoliti

A modern tire merges up to 300 different chemical elements, both organic and inorganic, natural and synthetic. During manufacturing, various processes are present such as mixing, calendering and extrusion, forming dozens of individual parts. Then, moulding and vulcanization inside special moulds provides the tire its final shape. Since the surface quality of moulds strongly affects the quality of tire, mould cleaning is a fundamental aspect of the whole tire production and cleaning techniques are in continuous development. This investigation proposes a global technology assessment of tire mould cleaning systems including uncommon solutions as multi-axis robots for cleaning on board by laser or dry ice, or ultrasonic cleaning which use cavitation. A specific attention is also focused on the industry adoption of spring-vents in moulds and how they are influencing the development the quality of final products.