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- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- Many System Dynamics researchers have found that decision-makers have difficulties in controlling System Dynamics model which represent complex social reality. This means that heuristics employed by decision-markers are not appropriate for controlling dynamic social problems. As alternative ways for understanding and controlling System Dynamics models, various mathematical methods have been suggested. Some simulation-based experiment demonstrated the possibility of decision-makers’ learning ability. For instance, the experiment performed by Sterman showed that game players' performance was improved slowly as their experiences are accumulated. The slow learning process is often regarded as indicating the limitation of human intelligence. On the contrary, it may be interpreted as indicating a potential power of human intelligence or heuristics. In previous studies, decision-makers’ heuristics are formulated in simple decision rule. Such decisions rules failed to incorporate the learning ability of decision-makers. To experiment the learning ability of decision-makers, this study replace decision-makers with neural network model. The neural networks are recognized as a representative of human intelligence by many students in artificial intelligence. In this study, neural network heuristic are applied to two System Dynamics models; Meadow's commodity cycle (1969) and Sterman’s model of the Kondratiev cycle, or long wave (1985). Neural networks model have demonstrated a surprising performance in learning and pattern recognition. In addition to neural networks applications, this study demonstrated technical feasibilities in IBM environments using Smalltalk.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- An ongoing study, in Company X, has been underway for some three years. The management team in the company has been working on a program of continuous improvement which includes changing attitudes and work conditions in an effort to improve productivity; cut the costs of achieving quality or the costs of producing non-quality; and generally make the organization more competitive.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- This paper is concerned with urban strategy planning on macro SocioEconomyEnvironmentR&D. Based on Grey System Theory, a urban grey simulated model (UGSM) has been established. The base run shows that it is high efficient in system action fitting. Taking a city as an example, some strategy policy tests are illustrated and main conclusion are presented.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- This paper shows the connection between the softer tools of system dynamics and the foundation of personal quality. This accomplished by portraying the problems and issues students experienced while engaging in individual personal quality improvement projects using system archetypes or casual loop diagramming. A major objective of the improvement project was to provide a critical and fuller glimpse of organizational quality by building on personal experience. Because the feedback from own actions is rapid and unambiguous while working within the framework of personal quality improvement project, it becomes possible to learn about the important systemic issues in a relatively short duration. Furthermore the visual representation of the issues using system dynamic tools preserved the learned lessons.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- Total Quality Management (TQM) has been experiencing great deal of attention. It has become the competitive strategy of choice. However, a seeming lack of a unifying framework, TQM appears to be fragmented into isolated approaches. For an organization to achieve business success, various quality initiatives should be mutually reinforcing. Implication is that managing relationship among several TQM component programs is at least as important as the implementation of the individual programs. In contrast to many other tools, system dynamics tools facilitate management of relationships in a proactive way. The focus of this paper is to advance this role of system dynamics. Several relevant processes and critical initiatives generally confronted by an organization engaged in phasing in quality management are captured in distinct casual frameworks. The paper also explores how and when system dynamics tool can be leveraged with commonly known quality management tools by quality professionals.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- No system is 100% efficient and so by definition produces waste. Whilst the concept of waste and waste minimization is entrenched in the industrial systems sector eg with the Just In Time philosophy, it is still not widely used in others such as business information systems. Waste is not confirmed to material loss, but also to such things as time wasted, or to more intangible concepts such as loss of morale. In fact, any unwanted system output is waste. The identification of all but the most obvious of these by system designers can be difficult because they are designing the system using their own perceptions of what is a “good” output and what is waste. Waste can be “in the eye of the beholder”. The identification of waste in all but simple systems can itself be a contentious issue. One person’s waste can be another’s benefit.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- The Business Flight Simulator is a major action research project involving academic and industrial collaborators. Its central purpose is to support the creation and development of learning organizations through the application of wide variety of IT and software tools. The particular influence of evolving system dynamics thinking on the project is identified. The project also draws in finding from a recent international study of the application of information technology to support group working. The preoccupation of the Business Flight stimulators is with creating a physical and networking environment for group decisions and their implementation. Groups are supported by a variety of software tools. Much of the emphasis during the last decade has been on the application of single tool to support group working. These range from the highly quantitative to those which focus on more qualitative and inter-personal issues. The research project involves applying combinations of tools to business processes across a variety of industrial sectors, and preliminary conclusions in this area will be discussed.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- This paper is concerned with the use of a set of influence Diagrams representing the major processes in retail branch operations. (i.e., stock flow, sales activities, and human resources management), to identify I.T. applications that can help improve control over these processes. These applications can then be mapped onto the type of retail branch to give a portfolio for development and implementation. Prioritisation may be based on cost/benefit/risk analyses.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- The organizational learning orientation to systems thinking requires managers to think together and share mental models using a variety of related techniques. It is generally recognized that this is no easy matter since the demand for new ways of thinking puts stress on old habits of mind. The purpose of this paper is to show how treating this difficulty as purely a technical problem falls short by overlooking the cognitive dimension of what new events have to happen in the brains of the managers. Cognitive biology gives a starting point to consider the decision behavior relates to implicit mental models. The consequences of mental models without feedback and systemic coherence are illustrated by an analysis of faulty thinking in privatization. A classification of system and feedback types emphasizes that, in managing organizations, uni-dimensional systems thinking is not adequate. The requisite multi-dimensional systems thinking requires holistic multi-factor thinking, multi-future thinking combined with causal feedback thinking. A crucial link between practical consulting, applied cognitive science and applied system science is the use of visual facilitation which increasingly makes use of the power of interactive visual representations of mental models behind decisions.
-
- Type:
- Document
- Date Created:
- 1994
- Collection:
- System Dynamic Society Records
- Collecting Area:
- University Archives
- Collection ID:
- ua435
- Parent Record(s):
- 23d738ba88f8333bc39725f9cb5bd0b8, c060552994c1527f70693734935660f1, and fe35db792b573af835d96e6eba4759cd
- Description:
- This paper describes a consultancy project where the main aim was for the client to learn about systems thinking (ST) through an application in the area of business process re-design (BPR). Over a two week period, systems thinking was applied in variety of contexts: exploring the interfaces between business processes; re-designing a single process; and structuring a chronic problem relating to the client’s budgeting process. It was found that systems thinking performed differently depending on the problem context within which it was being applied. Systems thinking performed well when applied to specific and chronic problems, but less so when used to explore business processes where no particular problem had been identified. Blending systems thinking with other problem-structuring techniques, however, created an integrated and powerful method for re-designing a business process. Four ways are describes in which systems thinking was applied during the project and pays particular attention to the way a range of techniques was used to re-design a business process.