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This chapter provides an overview of the role of technology and policy in shaping care plans for patients. Historically, healthcare has lagged behind other industry sectors in adopting and deploying useful technologies, and policy surrounding use is an important component of establishing a long-term strategy. This chapter evaluates the current state of technology in the clinical setting and extends the widely adopted policy-based approaches into the palliative care context.

Steam explosions are a major safety concern in many modern furnaces. The explosions are sometimes caused by water ingress into the furnace from leaks in its high-pressure (HP) cooling water system, coming into contact with molten matte. To address such safety issues related to steam explosions, risk based inspection (RBI) is suggested in this paper. RBI is presently one of the best-practice methodologies to provide an inspection schedule and ensure the mechanical integrity of pressure vessels. The application of RBIs on furnace HP cooling systems in this work is performed by incorporating the proportional hazards model (PHM) with the RBI approach; the PHM uses real-time condition data to allow dynamic decision-making on inspection and maintenance planning.

To accomplish this, a case study is presented that applies an HP cooling system data with moisture and cumulated feed rate as covariates or condition indicators to compute the probability of failure and the consequence of failure (CoF), which is modelled based on the boiling liquid-expanding vapour explosion (BLEVE) theory.

The benefit of this approach is that the risk assessment introduces real-time condition data in addition to time-based failure information to allow improved dynamic decision-making for inspection and maintenance planning of the HP cooling system. The work presented here comprises the application of the newly proposed methodology in the context of pressure vessels, considering the important challenge of possible explosion accidents due to BLEVE as the CoF calculations.

This paper however aims to optimise the inspection schedule on the HP cooling system, by incorporating PHM into the RBI methodology, as was recently proposed in the literature by Lelo et al. (2022). Moisture and cumulated feed rate are used as covariate. At the end, risk mitigation policy is suggested.

In this paper, the proposed methodology yields a dynamically calculated quantified risk, which emphasised the imperative for mitigating the risk, as well as presents a number of mitigation options, to quantifiably affect such mitigation.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused significant societal changes and altered how much of the construction industry operates. This study investigates the impacts of pandemic-related changes, how these changes may apply to different companies, and which changes should continue post-pandemic.

We aim to identify pandemic-driven changes that have affected the construction workplace and the advantages and challenges associated with them. We then make recommendations for what could and should endure through the pandemic and beyond, and under what circumstances. To achieve this objective, we conducted both qualitative and quantitative analyses of 40 semi-structured interviews with US-based construction professionals.

Identified through these interviews were 21 pandemic-driven changes across six categories: management and planning, technology, workforce, health and safety, supply chain, and contracts. This study noted both positive and negative impacts of the changes on cost, schedule, productivity, collaboration, employee retention, flexibility, quality, and risk mitigation. Participants indicated that some changes should remain after the pandemic and others (e.g. select safety measures, schedule adjustments) should be temporary.

By incorporating these lessons learned into recommendations, the findings of this study will help businesses identify and implement the most appropriate improvements for their organizations. The findings also provide policymakers with valuable insights on how to promote innovation in the construction industry and potentially enact more effective policies during crises to drive long-term improvements.

This chapter presents a COVID-19 case study from the perspective of a library director’s workplace dynamics during the COVID-19 response implemented by the Blount County Public Library (BCPL) in Maryville, Tennessee, US. Prior to COVID-19, the BCPL had a robust program offering extensive use of the library’s resources and spaces. When the library shutdown in mid-March 2020 in response to the global COVID lockdown, staff continued to provide services to the public via online resources and curbside delivery of library materials. The library reopened to the public in July 2020 with extreme spatial protocols addressing staff and visitor safety. This case study looks at the COVID-driven changes and their impacts on the library staff, the library board, and the community at large, as well as evaluates the resulting permanent changes occurring due to deficits in funding, staffing levels, and the restructuring of library board procedures for handling library staff and working with the library director. This work reflects on the mental and behavioral responses to these issues and their impact on the operation of a public library during the pandemic.

This study aims to provide evidence on how the issuance of a nonreliance restatement affects non-restating clients of the same audit office.

To test the effect of restatement issuance on office-level quality, this study runs regressions using both input- and output-based measures of audit quality.

This study finds that in the years where one or more clients of an audit office issue a restatement, audit effort is lower for non-restating clients of the same office. When two or more clients issue a restatement, other clients are charged lower audit fees, file later and are more likely to experience an audit failure.

This study contributes to the literature on office-level audit quality and provides an explanation for the longitudinal correlation of office-level audit failures.

The inherent variability on process times and demand are the factors that prevent the efficient application of lean philosophy in multi-project product development (PD) environments. Considering this variability, a hybrid push–pull project control system is developed, and value stream costing (VSC) analysis is performed to reflect the relation between project lead time, capacity and project cost. The assessment of the push/pull project control on lead time improvement and long-term savings on capacity have been aimed with the proposed complete design structure.

In a team-based structure, formed through clustering, push control techniques for planning tasks within cross-functional teams and pull control techniques for planning tasks between cross-functional teams are developed. The final step evaluates the proposed structure through VSC and long-term savings have been pointed out, especially in terms of freed-up capacity. For the validation of the proposed methodology, an office furniture manufacturing firm’s PD department has been considered and the performance of the hybrid system has been observed through simulation experiments and based on the simulation results, the lean system is evaluated by VSC.

The results of simulation experiments show a superior performance of the proposed hybrid push/pull project control mechanism under different settings of cycle time between projects or shortly project cycle time, dispatching rules within teams and variability levels. The results of the Box-Score (tool to apply VSC) indicate increased capacity in the long term to add extra projects during the planning period with the same project lead time and without additional cost.

Although extensive simulation experiments have been performed to quantify the effect of project control structure and positive results have been reported on lead time and cost, the proposed design structure has not been tested in all existing PD environments.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, the quantification of the effect of hybrid project control with VSC is the first attempt to be applied in lean PD projects.

Robotic process automation (RPA) has recently emerged as a technology focusing on the automation of repetitive, frequent, voluminous and rule-based tasks. Despite a few practical examples that document successful RPA deployments in organizations, evidence of its economic benefits has been mostly anecdotal. The purpose of this paper is to present a step-by-step method to RPA investment appraisal and a business case demonstrating how the steps can be applied to practice.

The methodology relies on design science research (DSR). The step-by-step method is a design artefact that builds on the mapping of processes and modelling of the associated costs. Due to the longitudinal nature of capital investments, modelling uses discounted cashflow and present value methods. Empirical grounding characteristic to DSR is achieved by field testing the artefact.

The step-by-step method is comprised of a preparatory step, three modelling steps and a concluding step. The modelling consists of compounding the interest rate, discounting the investment costs and establishing measures for comparison. These steps were applied to seven business processes to be automated by the case company, Estate Blend. The decision to deploy RPA was found to be trivial, not only based on the initial case data, but also based on multiple sensitivity analyses that showed how resistant RPA investments are to changing circumstances.

By following the provided step-by-step method, executives and managers can quantify the costs and benefits of RPA. The developed method enables any organization to directly compare investment alternatives against each other and against the probable status quo where many tasks in organizations are still carried out manually with little to no automation.

The paper addresses a growing new domain in the field of business process management by capitalizing on DSR and modelling-based approaches to RPA investment appraisal.

The Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) for Higher Education in the UK focuses on maintaining, enhancing and standardising the quality of higher education. Of significant impact are the development of subject benchmark statements (SBS) by the QAA, which describe the type and content of study along with the academic standards expected of graduates in specific disciplines. Prior to 2022, the QAA did not have a SBS to which higher education policing programmes could be directly aligned.

Over 12-months, a SBS advisory group with representatives from higher education across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, The College of Policing, QAA, Police Federation of England and Wales and policing, worked in partnership to harness their collective professional experience and knowledge to create the first UK SBS for policing. Post publication of the SBS, permission was sought and granted from both the College of Policing and QAA for members of the advisory group to reflect in an article on their experiences of collaborating and working in partnership to achieve the SBS.

There is great importance of creating a shared vision and mutual trust, developed through open facilitated discussions, with representatives championing their cause and developing a collaborative and partnership approach to completing the SBS.

A collaborative and partnership approach is essential in developing and recognising the academic discipline of policing. This necessarily requires the joint development of initiatives, one of which is the coming together of higher education institutions, PSRBs and practitioner groups to collaborate and design QAA benchmark statements.

The SBS advisory group has further driven forward the emergence of policing as a recognised academic discipline to benefit multiple stakeholders.

The SBS for policing is the first across the UK. The authors experiences can be used to assist others in their developments of similar subject specific benchmarking or academic quality standards.

The present study aims to inform the requirements for developing a sustainable rating tool for small-scale infrastructure projects (SSIPs) through research findings.

A review-based comparative study of existing infrastructure sustainability (IS) rating tools for assessment of SSIPs is presented. Key stakeholder participants of the existing IS rating tools, are interviewed to identify existing barriers and requirements for sustainability rating. The study further presents possible rating tool options to optimise the sustainable performance evaluation of SSIPs.

Findings of this study indicated that prevalent IS rating tools are majorly applied to large-scale infrastructure projects and sustainability of SSIPs are seldom assessed. Based on a literature review and series of interviews, it was found that user friendliness, efficient structure, training and technical support, cost effectiveness and stakeholder recognition are the five key requirements of a sustainability rating tool for SSIPs. Additionally, six sustainability assessment options were proposed for SSIPs which range from pathways for existing tools through to new, customisable tools. Upon comparison, a new modified tool with verification process and revised tool with defined grouping of sustainable criteria was more effective for evaluation of SSIPs.

Use of case specific information for validation and framework development may lack generalisation. However, methodology can be used for future decision-making by making necessary adjustments to suit different local regional requirements.

Despite lack of generalisation, the findings can lead to future general studies on sustainability of SSIPs. Findings of the study provide foundation knowledge and awareness for sustainability evaluation of SSIPs.

Auditors should realize misstatements and communicate to managers for adjustments. Managers usually modify the misstatements, but they have motivations, like earnings management, for not altering the misstatements. The auditor expects to identify the misstatements’ earnings management, inform the managers and reduce earnings management by proposing adjustments. This study aims to determine whether identified and adjusted misstatements cause a decline in earnings management. Is the increase in the materiality of identified and adjusted misstatements associated with a reduction in earnings management?

The identified and adjusted misstatements are obtained from the difference between nonaudited financial statements and audited ones. Earnings management is computed using the adjusted Jones model, and the quantitative materiality threshold has also been calculated based on the Iranian auditors’ guidelines. These variables and other required information were gathered for 159 listed firms on the Tehran Stock Exchange during 2014–2019 and examined by the regression models.

The results show a negative relationship between identified and modified misstatements of total assets and earnings management and a positive and significant relationship between identified and adjusted misstatements of total liabilities and earnings management. However, the positive relationship between identified and adjusted misstatements of net income with earnings management is not significant. Besides, the relationship between the materiality difference and an absolute value of identified and adjusted misstatements (materiality minus the absolute value of misstatements) of total assets and earnings management is positive and significant, but the negative association between materiality difference and the absolute value of identified and adjusted misstatements of total assets and earnings management is not significant. The relationship between materiality difference and the absolute value of identified and adjusted net income and earnings management misstatements is negative and significant. These results indicate that the more material the identified and adjusted misstatements, the less earnings management.

The difference between nonaudited and audited financial statements represents identified and adjusted misstatements (audit adjustments). The client probably made some adjustments, but separating these adjustments from the auditor’s identified items was impossible with the available data.

The results show that significant audit adjustments decline earnings management. Paying more attention to a high-quality audit performed by the audit firms, auditors, managers and users and, consequently, discovering misstatements and adjusting or reporting them would decline the earnings management’s unfavorable impacts.

The unfavorable consequences of earnings management can cause the inappropriate transfer of wealth in the capital market and some investors’ loss to others’ benefit. These consequences can cause a loss of trust and leave unfavorable psychological effects on the capital market and society. Identifying and adjusting significant misstatements can lead to the decline of such impacts.

The previous studies assessed the relationship between identified and adjusted misstatements (audit adjustments) and earnings quality or earnings management. However, this study focuses on audit adjustments’ materiality to assess the impact of significant adjustments on earnings management.