I
M P A C T
Emerging Work from CTPID
Impact
Spring 2003: News at the
Center
News
MIT IQ Certificate
Courses Begin in May
The MIT Information Quality (MIT IQ) Program based in CTPID, in collaboration
with School of Engineering, is launching a series of programs to provide
the skills needed for job positions such as IQ analyst, IQ manager, and
IQ trainer. "With the strong support from the U.S. Navy and industry
partners," said MIT IQ Director Richard Wang, "CTPID is offering
the first sessions of Information
Quality Management I (IQM I) on May 19-23 and August 11-15."
See more information
at http://web.mit.edu/tdqm/www/
or e-mail rwang@mit.edu.
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IT Leaders Address
'Extreme Communications'
Leaders of two CTPID programs gathered support for a new coalition of
academic interests at the MIT Industrial
Liaison Program's April 15-16 conference on "Extreme Communications:
A Radical Rethinking of Business, Technology, and Regulatory Strategies."
Sloan School Chrysler Leaders for Manufacturing Professor Charles Fine,
IMVP researcher and former co-director,
and David Clark, director of the Program
on Internet and Telecoms Convergence and a senior research scientist
at the Laboratory for Computer Science,
framed a new concept about the communication industry's changing business
and operating structures.
See more information
at http://ilp.mit.edu/ilp/Conferences/Current.html.
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Widnall Among 'Most
Important Women in Science'
Professor Sheila Widnall, LAI Executive board co-chair and former Secretary
of the Air Force, is featured among the "50 Most Important Women
in Science" in the November issue of Discover Magazine. "Blow
a smoke ring and notice that in calm air, it undulates gently," reported
Discover. "Those wiggles are termed the 'Widnall instability,'
and, by discovering them, this scientist rewrote the book on fluid dynamics."
In citing the importance of the scientists' work, Discover wrote,
"If just one of these women had gotten fed up and quit... the history
of science would have been impoverished."
See more information
at http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/nr/2002/women.html
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Department of
Labor Funds LARA's Boeing Study
The Labor Aerospace Research
Agenda (LARA) recently received a grant from the US Department of
Labor to examine operations at Boeing/IAM St. Louis, which recently agreed
to compress approximately 47 job classifications into eight integrated
classifications. This new, flexible job structure is linked to three developments:
a lean implementation initiative, a high-performance partnership between
the company and the union, and a new material flow initiative reaching
out into the supply chain. Research will focus on how the company's new
system enables flexibility in utilizing its 3,000 person workforce. It
will also measure increased organizational effectiveness, improved quality
of work life, and greater employability. A three-person team, LARA CO-Director
Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, Research Scientist Betty Barrett, and Research
Assistant Lydia Fraile, will continue the research through 2003.
Also
see LARA's Program
Profile in Impact.
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Air Force General,
Raytheon CEO at LAI Plenary
General Lester Lyles, Air Force Materiel Commander and Lean
Aerospace Initiative executive board co-chairman, kicked off the annual
LAI Plenary Conference, "Transformation across Enterprise Boundaries:
Pioneering the Future of Aerospace," March 25-26 in Dayton, Ohio.
Lyles conducts research,
development, test and evaluation, acquisition management, and logistics
support to keep Air Force weapons systems ready for war. At the Ohio conference,
he discussed the enterprise of government and its transformation.
Raytheon Chairman
and CEO Dan Burnham delivered a keynote industry address, sharing leadership
insights into Raytheon's corporate transformation strategy and journey.
Snapshots of breakout
sessions featuring Air Force, industry, and academic presentations:
- Experiencing
Enterprise Transformation included Paul Mullenhour, Lean Learning
Center, on identifying an organization's operating system as a framework
for understanding transformation. George Koenigsaecker, Lean Investments
LLC, recommended using productivity as a key metric for lean transformation
and continually revisiting already lean areas for further improvements.
- Transition to
Production a joint presentation by Ed Peterson, Aerojet Corp., and
Bob Morris, COHESIA Corp., argued for using Value Stream Mapping in
product development and Characteristic Lifecycle Management as lean
tools.
- In Willingness
to Change, Ford-MIT Alliance Executive Director George Roth offered
a framework for learning and change that included the use of force field
analysis as an exercise for developing common insights.
- The Creative
Approaches to Learning Lean session featured Hugh McManus, Metis
Design, who described how the LAI Lean Enterprise Business Simulation
Game uses a sophisticated Lego simulation to teach advanced lean lessons
of enterprise integration. Peggy Holly, Boeing Company, described how
Boeing IDS has incorporated the game into their Lean Engineering training.
- Enabling Value
to Multiple Stakeholders offered examples of putting to lean to
work: value engineering at Raytheon, improved cash collection at Rolls
Royce, and training change agent teams at Lockheed Martin Space and
Strategic Missiles.
LAI Educational Network
was introduced by panelists from Rolls-Royce Corporation, MIT, University
of Tennessee, University of Michigan, and the Defense Acquisition University.
Each described how they included lean in their educational programs from
modules in core curriculum to on-line programs to certificate programs.
The group, which welcomed the University of Bath UK, Loyola Marymount
University, and the University of Texas, Arlington, discussed a lean systems
engineering graduate course, how to catalog resources, and an internship
program set to begin this summer at Rolls Royce.
Visit the LAI
website for plenary presentations.
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MSL Plans Move to Amherst Street
The Materials Systems Laboratory
(MSL) plans an end-of-semester move from its 238 Main Street headquarters
to newly renovated offices on the fourth floor of MIT's Building E40 on
Amherst Street. The program's staff includes Director Richard Roth, Administrative
Assistant Jamie Sieger, and CTPID Senior Research Engineer Frank Field IIIl.
MSL researchers include Principal Investigator and Professor Joel Clark
and Assistant Prof. Randolph E. Kirchain, Jr., both of whom hold joint positions
in the Engineering Systems Division.
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Industry Issues
Talk Probes Air Force Concerns
Lean Aerospace Initiative
stakeholder Co-Director Terry Bryan is slated to discuss the US Air Force's
lean efforts at the May 1 CTPID Industry Issues Community Lunch. Bryan,
a Raytheon executive on loan, is a retired US Marine Corps lieutenant,
a former test pilot, and holds a MS in Aeronautical Engineering from the
Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, CA. His topic is "Transformation:
LAI and the Air Force 'Lean Now' Initiative." (.ppt)
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CTPID Fellow Explores
Infrastructure Funding
Mahdi H. Mattar, a
post-doctoral fellow in the Civil
and Environmental Engineering Department, is continuing research on
privatization issues as a research fellow for the Center for Technology,
Policy, and Industrial Development.
Since last summer,
Mattar has collaborated with CTPID Director Fred Moavenzadeh, who was
his research adviser since 1997, as well as School of Management Prof.
Gordon M. Kaufman and Civil and Environmental Engineering Senior Lecturer
Prof. Massood V. Samii.
The team is focusing
on new ways of financing traditional infrastructure projects, including
ports, rail systems, toll roads, water, and wastewater. These projects
have traditionally been funded on a project-by-project basis. Mattar and
his colleagues are investigating how to secure funds for several projects
bundled together.
Mattar received his
PhD in risk management in 2002. His current research should be useful
for development banks and multinational institutions like the World Bank
since these institutions provide funding for infrastructure projects.
"Most players
in infrastructure projects would benefit from the increased liquidity
to this market," Mattar added.
Also
see Mattar's dissertation "Private
Risk."
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IMVP Meeting Looks at 2nd-Tier Suppliers
A global gathering
of International Motor Vehicle Program (IMVP)
researchers and guests at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School,
hosted April 2-3 by IMVP CO-Director John Paul MacDuffie, discussed industry
changes from Detroit to Brazil.
Research reports included
Sloan Industry
Fellow Matthias Holweg and University of Pittsburgh Assistant Professor
Frits Pil's update on their book-in-progress.
Case Western Reserve
University Professor Sue Helper discussed new research on 2nd-tier suppliers.
Helper is looking at the impact of factor such as global competition and
economic pressures from both auto industry original equipment manufacturers
(OEMs) and raw materials producers.
The two-day session
included demonstrations of Wharton's FutureView, an interactive teaching
tool, and a web-based study of brown field transformation, developed by
the MIT Engineering Systems Learning Center headed by CTPID's Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld.
Also
see IMVP news on the April meeting
and
Holweg's Researcher Profile
in Impact.
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Program Links: CMP
| Ford-MIT
| IMVP | LAI
| LARA | LSI
| MSL | MITIQ
| T&L
|
