Global Perspective for Competitive Enterprise, Economy and Ecology addresses the general theme of the Concurrent Engineering (CE) 2009 Conference – the need for global advancements in the areas of competitive enterprise, economy and ecology. The proceedings contain 84 papers, which vary from the theoretical and conceptual to the practical and industrial. The content of this volume reflects the genuine variety of issues related to current CE methods and phenomena. Global Perspective for Competitive Enterprise, Economy and Ecology will therefore enable researchers, industry practitioners, postgraduate students and advanced undergraduates to build their own view of the inherent problems and methods in CE.

Many fields are beginning to implement developing practices that prove to be more efficient and environmentally friendly compared to traditional practices. This holds true for the realm of business, as organizations are redesigning their operations through the incorporation of sustainable methods. Research is needed on the specific techniques companies are using to promote efficiency and improved effectiveness using sustainability. Handbook of Research on Sustainable Supply Chain Management for the Global Economy is an essential reference source that discusses the incorporation of sustainability in various facets of business management. Featuring research on topics such as disruptive logistics, production planning, and renewable energy sources, this book is ideally designed for researchers, practitioners, students, managers, policymakers, academicians, economists, scholars, and educators seeking coverage on sustainable practices in supply chains to ensure a cleaner environment.

How six industries are collaborating with competitors, society, and the public sector for competitive advantage No longer can we consume the equivalent of 1.3 Earths resources and expect to remain prosperous in perpetuity. We need a new economic paradigm, one that yields growth in a way that strengthens the global systems we rely on daily for survival, such as the global water, food, and energy systems. The Collaboration Economy—a model where the private, public, and civil sectors collaborate for prosperity that can last in perpetuity—is emerging. But what does this economic model look like? How does it work? How can companies survive and thrive in the Collaboration Economy? The Collaboration Economy provides easy to use frameworks and tools to enable leaders of industry, of government, and of society to lead the effort to align growth with sustainable development. Offers a plan for how the private, public, and civil sectors can successfully collaborate to steward resources, fortify global water, food, and energy systems, and spark a new era of prosperity at the same time Contains case study profiles of the leaders of the Collaboration Economy, including Unilever, GE, Coca-Cola, Nestle Waters North America, Grieg Green, and the European Parliament Written by Eric Lowitt, a globally recognized and sought after consultant, thought leader, and speaker in the fields of competitive strategy, growth, and sustainability, who has been named one of the Global Top 100 Thought Leaders on Trustworthy Business Behavior by Trust Across America

This book explores several branches of the social sciences and their perspectives regarding their relations with decision-making processes: computer science, education, linguistics, sociology, and management. The decision-making process in social contexts is based on the analysis of sound alternatives using evaluative criteria. Therefore, this process is one that can be rational or irrational, and can be based on knowledge and/or beliefs. A decision-making process always produces a final decision, which may or may not imply prompt action, and increases the chances of choosing the best possible alternative. The book is divided into four main parts. The concepts covered in the first part, on computer science, explore how the rise of algorithms and the growth in computing power over the years can influence decision-making processes. In the second part, some traditional and innovative ideas and methods used in education are presented: compulsory schooling, inclusive schools, higher education, etc. In turn, the third part focuses on linguistics aspects, and examines how progress is manifested in language. The fourth part, on sociology, explores how society can be influenced by social norms, human interactions, culture, and religion. Management, regarded as a science of the decision-making process, is explored in the last part of this book. Selected organizations’ strategies, objectives and resources are presented, e.g., human resources, financial resources, and technological resources. The book gathers and presents, in a concise format, a broad range of aspects regarding the decision-making process in social contexts, making it a valuable and unique resource for the scientific community.

"This book explores the recent advancements in the areas of lean production, management, and the system and layout design for manufacturing environments, capturing the building blocks of lean transformation on a shop floor level"--

This book constitutes the refereed post-proceedings of the 9th IFIP WG 5.1 International Conference on Product Lifecycle Management, PLM 2012, held in Montreal, Canada, in July 2012. The 58 full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. They cover a large range of topics such as collaboration in PLM, tools and methodologies for PLM, modeling for PLM, and PLM implementation issues.

This book contains the refereed proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Agile Software Development, XP 2014, held in Rome, Italy, in May 2014. Because of the wide application of agile approaches in industry, the need for collaboration between academics and practitioners has increased in order to develop the body of knowledge available to support managers, system engineers, and software engineers in their managerial/economic and architectural/project/technical decisions. Year after year, the XP conference has facilitated such improvements and provided evidence on the advantages of agile methodologies by examining the latest theories, practical applications, and implications of agile and lean methods. The 15 full papers, seven short papers, and four experience reports accepted for XP 2014 were selected from 59 submissions and are organized in sections on: agile development, agile challenges and contracting, lessons learned and agile maturity, how to evolve software engineering teaching, methods and metrics, and lean development.

As the main theme of Improving Complex Systems Today implies, this book is intended to provide readers with a new perspective on concurrent engineering from the standpoint of systems engineering. It can serve as a versatile tool to help readers to navigate the ever-changing state of this particular field. The primary focus of concurrent engineering was, at first, on bringing downstream information as far upstream as possible by introducing parallel processing in order to reduce time to market and to prevent errors at a later stage which would sometimes cause irrevocable damage. Up to now, numerous new concepts, methodologies and tools have been developed, but over concurrent engineering’s 20-year history the situation has changed extensively. Now, industry has to work in the global marketplace and to cope with diversifying requirements and increasing complexities. Such globalization and diversification necessitate collaboration across different fields and across national boundaries. Thus, the new concurrent engineering calls for a systems approach to gain global market competitiveness. Improving Complex Systems Today provides a new insight into concurrent engineering today.

Concurrent Engineering (CE) is based on the premise that different phases of a product’s lifecycle should be conducted concurrently and initiated as early as possible within the Product Creation Process (PCP). It has become the substantive basic methodology in many industries, including automotive, aerospace, machinery, shipbuilding, consumer goods, process industry and environmental engineering. CE aims to increase the efficiency of the PCP and reduce errors in later phases while incorporating considerations for full lifecycle and through-life operations. This book presents the proceedings of the 22nd ISPE Inc. (International Society for Productivity Enhancement) International Conference on Concurrent Engineering (CE2015) entitled ‘Transdisciplinary Lifecycle Analysis of Systems’, and held in Delft, the Netherlands, in July 2015. It is the second in the series ‘Advances in Transdisciplinary Engineering’. The book includes 63 peer reviewed papers and 2 keynote speeches arranged in 10 sections: keynote speeches; systems engineering; customization and variability management; production oriented design, maintenance and repair; design methods and knowledge-based engineering; multidisciplinary product management; sustainable product development; service oriented design; product lifecycle management; and trends in CE. Containing papers ranging from the theoretical and conceptual to the highly pragmatic, this book will be of interest to all engineering professionals and practitioners; researchers, designers and educators.