Agile manufacturing: a literature review and Pareto analysis

Operational performance entitling the knowledge of inventory management practices on business performance: a mediational study

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of knowledge of inventory management practices (KIMP) on operational performance (OP) and business performance (BP). This study emphasized understanding the mediational effect of OPs among KIMP and BP in manufacturing firms of Indian small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Design/methodology/approach

This study analysed the above relationship from the data collected from 351 key officials of 170 Indian SMEs. The detailed analysis, including reliability, validity and testing hypothesis, was done in advanced SmartPLS-SEM 3.3.3 software.

Findings

The findings show that KIMP directly influences OP; thus, a company's OP significantly impacts the overall BP. The KIMP has no significant effect on BP. In line with this, the study findings demonstrate a significant, high mediation effect of OPs between KIMP and BP.

Originality/value

The KIMP on OP has been sparsely studied earlier, and neither have they conceptualized in understanding its impact on BP. In such tumultuous times, key manufacturing executives should stress the importance of KIMP as a comprehensive perspective.

Enterprise agility – its meaning, managerial expectations and barriers to implementation – a survey of three countries

Purpose

The aim of the article is to define the way of understanding of agile in enterprises, to verify the factors limiting agility implementation, as well as to understand what the expectations of enterprise management towards agile implementation are.

Design/methodology/approach

The article uses both literature studies and empirical research. The research was conducted in 2019 in 152 companies located in Luxemburg, Croatia and Poland, which have implemented an agile approach to management.

Findings

In most of the surveyed organisations, agile is understood as a methodology for creating projects or applications. The most common barriers to implementing agile in the surveyed enterprises are culture too deeply rooted in traditional methodologies and the lack of funds to introduce transformations. Growth in productivity and competitiveness and reducing delivery time stand out among the most common expectations of the management of the surveyed enterprises.

Originality/value

The article is in line with the idea of analysing the key factors of a successful agile implementation, which can be a guideline for an enterprise to manage the adoption of agility. The article utilises original research tools, provides comparisons between countries and presents implications for practitioners and researchers.

Evaluation of Flexible Strategies to Manage the COVID-19 Pandemic in the Education Sector

COVID-19 has had a substantial impact on almost every field including the education sector. Due to the requirements for social distancing, the pandemic has provided an impetus for change in the education sector; technology-based sustainable education platforms not experienced previously have become essential. This research aims to propose flexible strategies to mitigate challenges of COVID-19 pandemic in the education sector of an emerging economy: Bangladesh. A total of 16 challenges and 19 flexible strategies were identified based on stakeholders’ inputs and literature review. To evaluate the flexible strategies, a methodology based on Pareto analysis and a revised rough-decision making trial and evaluation laboratory (rough-DEMATEL) method is proposed. Findings reveal that in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, ‘Maintain social distancing and health protocol,’ ‘Enhance the communication and collaboration among students and teachers,’ ‘Financial incentives from government,’ ‘Utilize modern technologies for digitizing the entire education system,’ and ‘Know how to engage students in an online environment’ are the vital strategies that must be implemented if education continues through E-learning. Because the current pandemic situation is a new experience for many individuals around the world, this study helps to recognize the challenges and to propose effective strategies to solve these challenges so that education does not become stagnant.

Challenges in the implementation of circular economy in manufacturing industry

Purpose

The circular economy concepts are useful for resource conservation, eliminating waste and enhancing the efficiency of production to improve the sustainability of the system. The application of CE in Indian manufacturing industry is in nascent stage. India’s manufacturing sector significantly contributes to the economic development of the nation; therefore, this study aims to identify and analyze the sustainability related challenges faced during the implementation of the circularity concept.

Design/methodology/approach

Comprehensive survey of literature and the use of Pareto analysis yield ten significant challenges which are further analyzed using fuzzy-Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory approach.

Findings

Findings revealed that noncompliance of environmental laws, revenue generation, design issues owing to technological limitations and less preference to refurbished and reused product are some of the major challenges to the CE practices in the manufacturing industry.

Research limitations/implications

The results will help the researchers and practitioners in strategic decision-making for the improved application of circularity in the production process.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to the identification and prioritization of sustainability-related challenges faced during the implementation of a novel concept by a developing economy.

Maintenance downtime evaluation in a process bottling plant

Purpose

Downtime is a process parameter that substantially impacts on the operating hours and results in production losses, thus motivating maintenance engineers to control process plants. Notwithstanding, the impacting nature of process equipment failure on the operating hours in bottling plants remains inadequately examined. In this paper, the cause-and-effect analysis was used to establish the root cause of the downtime problem and Pareto analysis employed to justify the greatest opportunities for improvement in reducing downtime and increasing reliability levels. Weibull analysis is then conducted on the industrial setting. Novel aspect ratios are proposed.

Design/methodology/approach

Using the Weibull failure function of machines as a principal facilitator to produce failure predictions, the downtime behaviour of a process plant was modelled and tested with practical data from a bottling process plant. This research was conducted in a Nigerian process bottling plant where historical data were examined.

Findings

The analysis of the results shows the following principal outcome: First, the machines with the highest and least downtime values are 2 and 5, respectively, with correspondingly mean values of 22.83 and 4.39 h monthly. Second, the total downtime 92.05 and 142.14 h for the observed and target downtime, with a coefficient of determination of 0.5848 was recorded. Third, as month 1 was taken as the base period (target), all the machines, except M5 had accepted performance, indicating proper preventive maintenance plan execution for the bottling process plant. Availability shows a direct relationship between the failure and uptime of the machines and the downtime impacts on production. Two machines had random failure pattern and five machines exhibited a wear-out failure pattern and probably due to old age and wear of components in the machines.

Originality/value

The major contribution of the paper is the Weibull modelling in a unique application to a bottling plant to avoid current practices that use reliability software that is not easily accessible.