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Wakefield and Pontefract Community Health NHS Trust uses the European Business Excellence Model self‐assessment for continuous improvement. An outline of the key aspects of the model, an approach to TQM, is presented. This article sets out the context that led to the adoption of the model in the Trust and describes the approach that has been taken to completing self‐assessments. Use of the model to secure continuous improvement is reviewed against Bhopal and Thomson’s Audit Cycle and consideration is given to lessons learned. The article concludes with a discussion on applicability of the model to health care organisations. It is concluded that, after an initial learning curve, the model has facilitated integration of a range of quality initiatives, and progress with continuous improvement. Critical to this was the linking of self‐assessment to business planning and performance management systems.

This paper aims to perform the real-time and accurate ergonomics analysis for the operator in the manual assembly, with the purpose of identifying potential ergonomic injuries when encountering labor-excessive and unreasonable assembly operations.

Instead of acquiring body data for ergonomic evaluation by arranging many observers around, this paper proposes a multi-sensor based wearable system to track worker’s posture for a continuous ergonomic assessment. Moreover, given the accurate neck postural data from the shop floor by the proposed wearable system, a continuous rapid upper limb assessment method with robustness to occasional posture changes, is proposed to evaluate the neck and upper back risk during the manual assembly operations.

The proposed method can retrieve human activity data during manual assembly operations, and experimental results illustrate that the proposed work is flexible and accurate for continuous ergonomic assessments in manual assembly operations.

Based on the proposed multi-sensor based wearable system for posture acquisition, a real-time and high-precision ergonomics analysis is achieved with the postural data arrived continuously, it can provide a more objective indicator to assess the ergonomics during manual assembly.

Continuous improvement is a primary principle in total quality management. It is applied to all aspects of the organisation including products, processes, and even the management of the firm. In this context, quality management self‐assessment is a useful tool for fostering the continuous improvement of the whole company, comparing its activities and results with an excellence model. However, little is known about the variables and relationships underlying self‐assessment application. This paper tries to shed light on this topic.

The methodology is an exploratory case study. Three Spanish organisations with a broad experience in self‐assessment application are analysed.

A model of self‐assessment application – containing variables and relationships among variables is proposed. Thus, the establishment of a holistic or systemic self‐assessment model where all the variables linked to self‐assessment employment are analytically and explicitly interrelated becomes the fundamental contribution of the research presented here.

This framework may constitute a starting point for subsequent academic research in this area.

The framework may also constitute a practical guide for managers interested in the use of self‐assessment technique.

Provides information on self‐assessment in a continuous improvement context.

During the 1990s a growing number of firms have been encouraging continuous improvement (CI) in all aspects of working life, and some impressive results have been achieved. However, the process of implementing CI is long and challenging. Companies need to know what progress they have made, and the outcome of any interventions, in order to consolidate and further develop CI. The CIRCA CI self‐assessment tool is a research‐based tool which helps users to make an objective assessment of CI in their company. It is designed to be used by any organisation regardless of size, industry, length of time working with CI, and the particular approach taken. The tool went through several phases of development, culminating in a paper‐based Version 3.0 in 1997. Since then further development and testing of the tool has taken place in the UK and abroad, and future plans include an electronic version.

In recent years, two performance evaluation methodologies have received significant attention in managerial circles: quality audit and self‐assessment. While the quality audit examines the compliance of a quality system with ISO 9000 standards and its suitability to achieve stated objectives, the self‐assessment measures organizational performance against a selected business excellence model. In a continuous improvement effort, an organization can lay out the groundwork by establishing an ISO 9000 quality system, and subsequently use an excellence model to enhance performance, thereby effectively applying both evaluation methodologies. This paper compares the principles and practices of quality audits and self‐assessments, for the purpose of examining their compatibility and providing the basis for integration. Numerous differences in the concepts, purpose, scope and methodology are illustrated, and self‐assessments are found to be more advantageous in enabling continuous improvement. However, it is concluded that audits and self‐assessments are compatible, and further research into the issues of enhancing both methodologies is suggested.

The study presented in this article is based on two basic premises. First, successful continuous improvement (CI) is dependent on shop floor level involvement and participation in improvement efforts. Second, the term “self‐assessment” clearly implies that those whose performance is being measured, and who are involved in conducting the assessment process. Excerpts from longitudinal case studies in a single Danish manufacturing organization demonstrate how teams involved in the process of conducting self‐assessment of CI developed a better understanding of the basic principles of CI. Furthermore, the study shows how these principles relate to the teams’ own work processes, and a deeper understanding of their organization's strategy and objectives.

The purpose of this paper is to represent a unique combined Real time Delphi (RTD) – analytic network process (ANP) approach considering efficient decision making with practical validation.

An ANP model encounters invisible relationship and interdependency among qualitative and quantitative criteria for assessment. RTD supports continuous assessment and improvement in team building, modeling, developing, implementing and validating the procedure. To illustrate practical validation of the model, the authors apply it in a manufacturing firm. A case illustrating the model, finds improved results and judgments followed by conclusion.

A case illustrating the model, finds improved results and judgments. This model improves warehouse performance by integrating lean and people issues. The outcome results in an efficient decision making and consensus judgments. It also fosters high trust and coordination level among people in warehouse.

Previous studies have assessed leanness either at enterprise or manufacturing level. As lean transformation and assessment both are continuous and long-term procedure, first the concept should apply to single function and should lead toward enterprise level. A web-based approach and multi criteria decision-making techniques like analytic hierarchy process, and ANP had been applied individually to measure leanness at enterprise level. Because of the warehouse contributing significantly to the total wastes and costs for an organization, such operations are considered presently.

This study proposes targeted modernization of the Department of Defense (DoD's) Joint Forces Ammunition Logistics information system by implementing the optimized innovative information technology open architecture design and integrating Radio Frequency Identification Device data technologies and real-time optimization and control mechanisms as the critical technology components of the solution. The innovative information technology, which pursues the focused logistics, will be deployed in 36 months at the estimated cost of $568 million in constant dollars. We estimate that the Systems, Applications, Products (SAP)-based enterprise integration solution that the Army currently pursues will cost another $1.5 billion through the year 2014; however, it is unlikely to deliver the intended technical capabilities.

The aim of this paper is to respond to calls for in‐depth studies of production and operations management (OM) teaching by providing an analysis of the relative effectiveness of a continuous problem‐based assessment and a traditional final exam assessment in OM.

An undergraduate OM module is used to assess how well a problem‐based assessment method performs against a more traditional final exam in terms of impact on student learning, student classification and feasibility. Quantitative data on student performance, feedback and satisfaction are used.

The analysis shows that the problem‐based assessment provides a better learning experience for the students, but is a worse classificatory of student results than the conventional exam. In terms of feasibility, problem‐based assessment can be a cost‐effective assessment method.

This study analyses the assessment method used on one module for nine years; to increase the generalizability of the findings further research is needed with different modules and contexts.

This paper gives guidance to OM educators on how to improve assessment methods to achieve both improved learning effects as well as an accurate classification of student performance.

This study extends the literature on problem‐based learning to assessments and provides an empirical analysis of one such method. This study also provides detailed analysis of different assessment methods in OM based on longitudinal data.

Emphasis on quality improvement has been one of the most characteristic features of higher education policy in Nordic and other European countries during the 1990s. In Sweden, the universities’ work with quality management has been evaluated for several years. In January 2001, the National Agency of Higher Education in Sweden introduced a new comprehensive system for quality assessment. The Swedish assessment system stresses that the assessment should have as a corner‐stone the specific prerequisites for each university and subject, e.g. business administration and their development strategy. The comprehensive quality assessments of Swedish higher education institutions are discussed together with stimulating innovation and continuous improvement of higher education.