Industrial Engineering is System Efficiency Engineering. It is Machine Effort and Human Effort IE. 3.90+ Million Page View Blog. 200,000+ visitors. (36,000+ pv, 25,500+ visitors in 2025.)------------------
Blog Provides Industrial Engineering Knowledge: Articles, Books, Case Studies, Course Pages and Materials, Lecture Notes, Project Reviews, Research Papers Study Materials, and Video Lectures. 2025 - New Project - Effective Industrial Engineering and Productivity Management.
Productivity communication is a topic of directing function of management. Once the resources are acquired, they need to allocated to departments and individuals to use them and execute productivity plans. The plans are implemented through directions of managers at various levels in the departments. In IE department or other productivity improving sections, there are managers or industrial engineers or engineers who have to issue directions on long-term basis as well as very short term like day, hour and instant.
Productivity improvement is still a misunderstood activity. Many people bring in quality versus productivity debate into picture and create more confusion. Quality and productivity are different dimensions and both may be improved simultaneously or in a sequential order. If there is a tradeoff at any point of time, decision that gives net benefit to the system is taken.
What Taylor wrote on quality is not quoted by the quality people. They may not even know it.
Taylor on #Quality.
The inspector is responsible for the quality of the work, and both the workmen and speed bosses (#Productivity bosses) must follow his directions.
Functional Foremanship - F.W. Taylor. Organization for Productivity Management.
Lesson 342 of Industrial Engineering ONLINE Course/Productivity Management Module.
Taylor advocated a quality boss for the shop who is responsible for quality of the output of the processes, quality related training, quality control and quality assurance. Even productivity boss has to be satisfy him. But in the quality literature this point is not mentioned at all.
It is up to the productivity managers to make efforts to clarify their position and clearly communicate the benefits of productivity improvement activities contemplated by them. They have to use various communication channels like bill boards, circulars, and day to day reinforcement messages to clarify the objectives of productivity improvement projects, activities and instruction and develop positive attitudes toward them apart from clarifying the specific tasks to be done.
Directing Productivity Effort
Garner Participation and Commitment
A harmonious and open corporate culture is essential to continuous productivity improvement. This can be achieved through the following:
Commitment from Top Management
Top management sets the direction of an organisation. For any productivity plan to succeed, senior leadership must be fully committed to the cause. This commitment can be expressed through direct communication with employees on your productivity goals and strategies, as well as allocation of resources for productivity improvement. A senior employee could also be put in charge of the organisation’s productivity efforts.
In organizations, "top - down" and "bottom - up" have to be synthesized in every task. Managers have to make efforts to encourage operators to speak about productivity improvement measures that they want. Productivity should also result in extra income to the operators unless the product lines lose market support. In which case, the managers and operators have to search for new product introductions and new processes.
Communication and Creation of Awareness
Employees must have a clear understanding of productivity concepts, the organisation’s productivity goals and how these goals will benefit them as well as the organisation. They then need to be armed with the right tools to improve their productivity and know how they can play a part in the productivity journey.
It is, therefore, important to set up open communication channels between departments, staff and management to facilitate exchange of ideas and information, create trust and engage employees.
Mobilisation of Employees
Employees should be involved in each stage of the productivity effort — from the setting of targets and development of initiatives, to the measurement and management of productivity performance. Their involvement helps to foster commitment and provides them with a sense of ownership.
What is the relationship between the amount of communication in an organization and its productivity? What are the factors that may moderate this relationship?
One particularly important factor is the type of work the organizational unit in question does. For units engaged in the production of verbal outputs-such as plans, reports, audits and in those whose primary work involves interacting with clients or customers-such as those delivering education, therapy, or advice-an argument can be made that the greater the amount of communication, the higher the productivity.
For units engaged in action or production, however, a different relationship would be expected: communication is good up to a point, but too much communication interferes with action or production. Moreover, in these units, high levels of communication may signal that they are experiencing difficulties and hence must engage in problem solving that requires high levels of communication. In this case, we can expect a non-linear relationship between communication and productivity, communication is positively related to productivity up to a point, past which it is negatively related.
In the case of the organizational unit engaged in producing software, we would expect an inverted-U shaped (2nd order polynomial) relationship between communication and productivity.
A qualitative study on communication challenges in production and operations management of high technology organizations. Nikhil K. Mehta Associate Professor- HR/OB, NITIE, Mumbai, 400087, INDIA https://pomsmeetings.org/confpapers/059/059-0008.pdf
2017
Nudge management: applying behavioural science to increase knowledge worker productivity
Authors
Authors and affiliations: Philip Ebert, Wolfgang Freibichler
Open AccessPoint Of View, First Online: 21 March 2017
Journal of Organization Design, December 2017, 6:4
2013
Productivity Management in an Organization: Measurement and Analysis
Evidence-based Productivity Improvement: A Practical Guide to the Productivity Measurement and Enhancement System (ProMES)
Robert D. Pritchard, Sallie J. Weaver, Elissa L. Ashwood
Routledge, 2012 - 316 pages
This new book explains the Productivity Measurement and Enhancement system (ProMES) and how it meets the criteria for an optimal measurement and feedback system. It summarizes all the research that has been done on productivity, mentioning other measurement systems, and gives detailed information on how to implement this one in organizations. This book will be of interest to behavioral science researchers and professionals who wish to learn more about the practical methods of measuring and improving organizational productivity.
Service Productivity Management: Improving Service Performance using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)
H. David Sherman
Springer, 10-Sep-2006 - Business & Economics - 350 pages
The service economy is now the largest portion of the industrialized world's economic activity. This development has dramatically raised the importance of maximizing productivity excellence in service organizations. The correlation between the service economy and productivity excellence has lead service organization managers to recognize the value of using benchmarking techniques to identify and adopt best practices in their organizations. As the use of benchmarking metrics in service organizations has increased, correspondingly these organizations have improved continuously by allowing service units to learn from methods that prove the most effective. Service Productivity Management provides the insights and methods to answers questions on a whole range of productivity issues, of which some examples are: How do you manage profitability of a network of hundreds or thousands of branch offices disbursed over several states and countries? How can managed-care organizations manage the quality and cost of hundreds of physicians providing health services to millions of plan members? What methods would enable a government to ensure that the multiple offices serving citizens across a country are operating at low cost while meeting the required service quality? Each of these service settings are examples of the many service providers that deliver a complex set of services to a widely diversified set of customers. The book systematically explores complex service issues and analyzes each case for a variety of ways to improve service productivity, quality, and profitability. Service Productivity Management is an in-depth guide to using the most powerful available benchmarking technique to improveservice organization performance -- Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). (1) It outlines the use of DEA as a benchmarking technique. (2) It identifies high costs service units. (3) It isolates specific changes to each service unit to elevate their performance to the best practice services level providing high quality service at low cost. (4) And most important, it guides the improvement process. The discussion and methods are all supported by case-study applications to organizations that have sought and have successfully improved its performance. The techniques discussed in the book are accessible to any and all managers with access to Microsoft. Excel spreadsheet software (Excel). Throughout the book, step-by-step guidance is provided to enable any reader to apply DEA and the Excel software to their organization. Packaged with the book comes a ready-to-use DEA software CD for Microsoft. Excel Add-in to run DEA analyses on any set of organizations of interest to the reader.
The Power of Productivity: Wealth, Poverty, and the Threat to Global Stability
William W. Lewis
McKinsey Global Institute
University of Chicago Press, 01-Sep-2005 - Business & Economics - 368 pages
The Power of Productivity provides powerful and controversial answers to the question of ameliorating economic disparity among countries. William W. Lewis, the director emeritus of the McKinsey Global Institute, draws on extensive microeconomic studies of thirteen nations over twelve years—conducted by the Institute itself—to counter virtually all prevailing wisdom about how best to ameliorate economic disparity. Lewis's research, which included studying everything from state-of-the-art auto makers to black-market street vendors and mom-and-pop stores, conclusively demonstrates that, contrary to popular belief, providing more capital to poor nations is not the best way to help them. Nor is improving levels of education, exchange-rate flexibility, or government solvency enough. Rather, the key to improving economic conditions in poor countries, argues Lewis, is increasing productivity through intense, fair competition and protecting consumer rights.
As The Power of Productivity explains, this sweeping solution affects the economies of poor nations at all levels—from the viability of major industries to how the average consumer thinks about his or her purchases. Policies must be enacted in developing nations that reflect a consumer rather than a producer mindset and an attendant sense of consumer rights. Only one force, Lewis claims, can stand up to producer special privileges—consumer interests.
The Institute's unprecedented research method and Lewis's years of experience with economic policy combine to make The Power of Productivity the most authoritative and compelling view of the global economy today, one that will inform political and economic debate throughout the world for years to come.
Measuring and Improving Organizational Productivity: A Practical Guide
Robert D. Pritchard
Greenwood Publishing Group, 1990 - 248 pages
Productivity has become a national priority. Its effects are being felt on all levels--national, industrial, and individual. An organization must be able to measure productivity before effectively improving it. This volume is the first practical guide for developing productivity measurement systems. It describes the use of the Productivity Measurement and Enhancement System (ProMES) designed by its author and his colleagues. An important tool for organizations, this step by step guide discusses how to measure productivity and then how to use this measurement.
Robert Pritchard's guide first presents a detailed description of the development and uses of ProMES. The background and description of ProMES is followed by details on how to develop ProMES in any organization. Questions and answers about using the system are discussed together with further issues on how to implement the system. The use of the system with other productivity improvement techniques is also covered. The volume concludes with a discussion on evaluating the effects of a productivity improvement system. It is a valuable practical source for industrial and organizational psychologists, management consultants, classes, and workshops.
Written by a well-known authority in the field, this practical reference focuses on the definition of productivity and how increasing productivity is measured, managed, paid for, and improved. Discusses performance appraisal systems, trends in productivity, and the design and implementation of successful productivity management systems, highlighting strategic planning, action planning, and effective implementation as critical components of productivity management. Includes case studies, exercises, and software support.
Productivity management: A neglected approach for reducing federal government costs
Authors
Peter J. Lemonias,
Brian L. Usilaner
Global Business and Organizational Excellence, Volume 3, Issue 2, Spring 1984
Pages 145–154
First published: March 1984, National Productivity Review, Volume 3, Issue 2,
1984
Sumanth, David J., Productivity Engineering and Management, McGraw Hill Book Company, 1984.
1982
Organizing for productivity management
Marta Mooney
National Productivity Review
Volume 1, Issue 2, pages 141–150, Spring 1982
Energy efficiency offers a powerful and cost-effective tool for achieving a sustainable energy future. Improvements in energy efficiency can reduce the need for investment in energy infrastructure, cut fuel costs, increase competitiveness and improve consumer welfare. Environmental benefits can also be achieved by the reduction of greenhouse gases emissions and local air pollution. Energy security can also profit from improved energy efficiency by decreasing the reliance on imported fossil fuels. For these reasons, energy efficiency was one of six broad focus areas of IEA's G8 Gleneagles Programme. The IEA has published 25 policy recommendations for promoting energy efficiency that were updated and endorsed by IEA ministers in 2011. If implemented globally it is estimated that global CO2 emissions could be reduced by 7.6 gigatonnes by 2030.
The IEA promotes energy efficiency policy and technology in buildings, appliances, transport and industry, as well as end-use applications such as lighting. Our analysis identifies best-practice, highlighting the possibilities for energy efficiency improvements and policy approaches to realise the full potential of energy efficiency for our Member countries.
Reducing energy consumption and eliminating energy wastage are among the main goals of the European Union (EU). EU support for improving energy efficiency will prove decisive for competitiveness, security of supply and for meeting the commitments on climate change made under the Kyoto Protocol. There is significant potential for reducing consumption, especially in energy-intensive sectors such as construction, manufacturing, energy conversion and transport. At the end of 2006, the EU pledged to cut its annual consumption of primary energy by 20% by 2020. To achieve this goal, it is working to mobilise public opinion, decision-makers and market operators and to set minimum energy efficiency standards and rules on labelling for products, services and infrastructure.
Industrial engineers have to step up the efforts in Energy Industrial Engineering. Energy is part of IE definition.
Tata Steel is actively engaged in energy saving - Energy Industrial Engineering.
Energy Industrial Engineering SAINT-GOBAIN - ENERGY SAVINGS PLAN
10/06/2022
The plan is based on two pillars:
Continuous optimization of its production processes and the use of its buildings, to limit energy consumption and CO2 emissions,
Designing and commercializing solutions that combine both performance and sustainability for energy-efficient building renovation and light construction.
Doubling our actions for continuous improvement of our production processes by:
improvements to production tools (e.g. work on furnace insulation; installation of more energy-efficient and/or variable-speed motors; improved metering and visualization of energy consumption, energy management system; reduction of equipment idling) and production processes (e.g. recovery of waste energy for heating or energy production),
solutions to reduce the use of natural resources, through the reuse or recycling of raw materials: the use of recycled glass - cullet - for the production of flat glass or glass wool also has the advantage of emitting less energy during melting than sand,
the development of lighter materials and products, which require less energy and fewer raw materials to manufacture.
Additional energy savings thanks to the investment of €100 million per year to reduce CO2 emissions
Saint-Gobain is earmarking a targeted investment and research and development budget of around €100 million per year until 2030 to reduce CO2 emissions and save energy, especially in the European plants.
Shifting the energy mix towards low-carbon and renewable sources
Throughout the world, the Group is accelerating the switch to green energy sources, with very concrete results in Mexico, Brazil, Poland, Spain and the United-States. In the latter, for example, the Group doubled in 2021 its share of renewable electricity in its global electricity consumption to nearly 40%.
Mobilizing all Group employees
In addition to these initiatives, the Group is mobilizing all its employees worldwide to save energy, with numerous initiatives in offices, sales outlets, logistics centers, research centers and on sustainable mobility:
Renovation of our current buildings,
Systematic installation of LEDs, presence detectors, time-based controls, daylighting,
Limiting the use of heating and air-conditioning, lowering the temperature in offices (-1.5°C at Group headquarters),
Deployment of photovoltaic solutions, in particular on plant roofs and parking lot shelters,
Reduction of business travel and development of soft mobility and carpooling.
Saint-Gobain Benchmarking Result - Energy IE Project in gypsum board dryer process
Saint-Gobain’s Gypsum business applies World Class Manufacturing (WCM) techniques to identify, prioritize, and implement projects in the environmental, technical reliability, safety, focused improvement, and people development fields. Saint-Gobain stacks opportunities up against the performance of all major consumers of gas and electricity to compare them against theoretical minimums and worldwide best practices within the company. From there they can identify how they specifically improve certain processes. The project in Moundsville, West Virginia, was initiated when one of these comparisons showed more than $500,000 of excess electricity being spent on the gypsum board dryer process. Saint-Gobain knew there was a significant cost-savings to be achieved through improving the process.
HOW THEY DID IT
After a brief audit, the team saw a potential opportunity to assess the five fans serving the gypsum board dryers. These fans were already equipped with Variable Frequency Drives (VFD) to modulate the speed of the fan motors in response to differing demand conditions so if adjustments needed to be made, the team believed they could be executed quickly.
The facility was given a budget of $10,000 and 12 months to complete the work. They started by installing five thermocouples (one for each of the five fan zones) to check for drastic changes in process conditions. They purchased the thermocouples for $5,000 and five new temperature transmitters for $1,500. All installation and wiring were done in house at no additional cost and was completed by March. The working hypothesis for the test was that significant energy savings could be achieved by lowering the fan speeds without impacting the quality of the ultimate product.
SOLUTION
Once the equipment was installed, the team needed to show all of the operators how testing different fan speeds would affect the running of the equipment. Many had been operating it the same way since the plant was commissioned. To achieve these, the team held individual trainings with each operator showing them that the board quality would remain constant with no changes to operational procedure if the fans were adjusted by using specific techniques that would still allow for the test outcomes.
By the end of April, the facility had completed two trials with each operator (eight trials in total) showing that no adverse effect was present on any of their products.
At the beginning of the project, the team put the goal at 2% reduction in electrical consumption in the dryer, but by the end of the testing, they were able to exceed this. The ultimate total reduction was 3%.
With this now known, the fan speeds were reduced by up to 30% with no effect on product quality. The total electrical savings was $68,000 per year.
EXPANDING COMPANY-WIDE
Once this project was completed, the results were shared to the North American Gypsum Energy Champions, a group that works to replicate best practices for sustainability across the gypsum business, and then they were shared with all of Saint-Gobain’s North America Sustainability Champions which sees what can be done company-wide.
EcoStruxure Resource Advisor, cloud-based enterprise software that provides one view into energy and sustainability data and savings opportunities
To track consumption and spend, the company now uses EcoStruxure Resource Advisor, cloud-based enterprise software that provides one view into energy and sustainability data and savings opportunities
• Within its factories, Saint-Gobain relies on Schneider Electric's edge control and connected devices that help gather the energy data necessary to optimise and actively manage consumption.
7th Annual IEA’s Global Conference on Energy Efficiency - Video
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uq3B4tlFPCQ
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10 June 2022
7th Annual IEA’s Global Conference on Energy Efficiency
Global energy and climate leaders meeting at the IEA’s Global Conference on Energy Efficiency have agreed on actions to accelerate improvements in energy efficiency that can reduce energy bills, ease dependence on imported fuels and speed up reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
Industrial Engineering - IIE Definition - Emphasis on Energy
"Industrial engineering is concerned with the design, improvement and installation of integrated systems of people, materials, information, equipment and energy. It draws upon specialized knowledge and skill in the mathematical, physical, and social sciences together with the principles and methods of engineering analysis and design, to specify, predict, and evaluate the results to be obtained from such systems."
Energy was identified as an important resource to be specifically highlighted in the definition so that it gets adequate attention of industrial engineers. Despite the addition of the term to the definition, no focused efforts were done by IE profession and discipline to come out with any standard IE approach for increasing the energy efficiency. There is a lot of energy efficiency work being undertaken by specialists in this field but IE departments in companies have not reported their embracing this activity and providing the benefit to their organizations.
John Preston, ( Corporate Industrial Engineer, Dura Automotive Systems in Rochester Hills, Mich. and president of IIE’s Greater Detroit Chapter ) authored a paper on energy efficiency studies, "Energizing continuous improvement," and it was published in Industrial Engineer (IIE Magazine), July 2011.
The ideas presented in the paper could give a starting point for IEs to look at their work in the field of energy industrial engineering.
It is common for management to think that energy costs are fixed. Managers surmise that their operations will incur similar utility charges each month regardless of any actions taken to reduce expenses.
Energy cost analysis
But energy bills are visible and clear. They are simple measures. They show how much energy the facility used, and when it was incurred. They can be compared to other monthly figures such as total direct labor hours or sales. Facilities or units that do not manage their energy costs will have similar monthly utility usage over time, even with variation in monthly sales or labor hours. The facilities that lack correlation between these figures are more than likely those with the most opportunities to reduce utility and other major expenses. Hence, industrial engineers can locate units that offer scope for energy efficiency improvement.
This data is readily available. Accounting departments typically store well-organized utility bills for four or five years. Accounting department also can assist by providing sales, labor hours or other figures to be used for comparison. It takes little time to create trend charts of these records.
Once the data is collected simple linear regression is to used in the analysis. Most of the projects identified in operations that previously had no energy management program have payback periods of less than one year. In operations with significant opportunities, excellent projects exist that will have payback periods of less than a month. Most importantly, the resulting utility bills with decreased costs quickly demonstrate the benefit of these projects.
Getting started - More Concrete Steps
The first step is identifying the facility that has the most opportunity. Collect each facility’s utility bills for the last 12 months. Using simple linear regression, compare the monthly electricity bills to monthly sales or another common measure, such as labor hours. The facility with the lowest R² probably has the most opportunity to reduce energy costs. The closer R² is to one (1 ), the more likely the plant’s monthly sales are related to electricity costs and can be predicted by the model. As R² gets closer to zero (say up to 0.5), it’s less likely that sales correlate to energy costs, meaning the model cannot predict future outcomes.
Next is conducting an analysis of the chosen site to determine if the targeted facility effectively manages its energy costs. Investigate if and how the facility tracks its energy costs and usage over time. Note who in the organization has the data and how it is used. Ask the maintenance or engineering manager if they know which equipment or building uses the most energy and when the energy is used. Ask them if projects have been completed or planned to be completed that reduce energy costs. If there is little evidence of measurement, analysis or improvement, it is likely that there are significant opportunities to reduce energy costs.
Energy Audit
The targeted facility needs to have an energy audit performed. The energy audit will show what is using the most energy and when it is used. The energy audit of the targeted facility needs to be performed by an individual or group who have experience in that facility’s industry. Industrial engineers can take the services of certified energy managers who will have the capabilities and equipment to perform the needed analysis. The audit needs to yield quantitative data that provide direction toward the most wasteful forms of energy use within the facility. The analysis will provide hard evidence and improvement ideas to eliminate the wastes.
Using the results of the energy audit and its recommendations, develop and implement a project that reduces energy waste without much investment. Popular quick payback projects include installing high-efficiency lighting, developing shutdown procedures and investing in auto-off controls. These kinds of projects carry little risk. They are inexpensive and significantly reduce electricity bills. After the project is completed, develop a presentation that documents the project’s success.
Shutdown procedures
A good initial project could focus on shutdown procedures. One factory that left on its equipment when production was not running developed basic shutdown procedures. These procedures included who was responsible for turning off equipment, how to turn off the equipment and what equipment was to be left on. The changes reduced the factory’s electricity bill by 12 percent, which saved the company approximately $60,000 per year.
Build and sustain the momentum from the success of your first project. The momentum can be used to replicate the project at other facilities within the organization. If the first project was well-documented, it will not take significant effort to convince other facilities of the project’s worth.
Automatic Shutoff Controls
A good follow-up to shutdown procedures would be to analyze the efficacy of automatic shutoff controls. In one example, a large automotive factory left its stamping presses running continuously, even when production was not scheduled. The project led to the purchase of 86 programmable logic controllers, which were installed on the presses. These devices automatically shut down equipment after the machines have been idle for a period of time. The devices cost the company about $20,000, but they saved the business at least $260,000 per year in electricity. This project reduced the factory’s electrical usage by 5 percent.
Lighting Upgrade
A lighting upgrade is a more expensive project that also can yield positive results. One factory used inefficient metal halide high-intensity discharge (HID) fixtures and bulbs to light its floor space. The factory removed the HID fixtures and replaced them with high-efficiency T8 fluorescent lamps. The cost to purchase and install the new fixtures was about $55,000 after rebates. The project saved the company roughly $90,000 per year in electricity and bulbs.
Roadblocks to success
Energy cost reduction have not received high priority in many organizations. So Industrial engineers have to take some precautions in proposing projects.
Ensure the direction from the energy audit. The energy audit needs to provide clear direction. The audit has to document the source of and solutions to the facility’s energy waste. The audit needs to include interval trend data on the largest users of energy. Interval trend data will provide clear evidence of the energy use and waste. Without interval trend data, the results of the audit will not offer the quantitative proof necessary to request capital funding for improvements.
Ensure capable resources. In these situations, the opportunities to reduce costs need to be well-documented and escalated to decision makers so that for quick ROI projects, upper management sanctions seeking resources external to the facility.
John Preston provided a beginner's guide for energy industrial engineering. Make a regression between utility bills and sales. Employ and conduct an energy audit. Take up some low cost projects like shutdown procedures, automatic shutoff systems and lighting improvement. Then develop further expertise in energy efficiency improvement,
Indianapolis-based Energy Systems Network has launched 'a first-of-its-kind statewide program' in partnership with the Emerging Manufacturing Collaboration Center. Energy INsights aims to help manufacturers use artificial intelligence and data science to reduce energy costs.
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Energy Efficiency of Manufacturing Processes and Systems
This Special Issue addresses the important issue of the energy efficiency of both manufacturing processes and systems. Manufacturing is responsible for one-third of global energy consumption and CO2 emissions. Thus, improving the energy efficiency of production has been the focus of research in recent years. Energy efficiency has begun to be considered as one of the key decision-making attributes for manufacturing. This book includes recent studies on methods for the measurement of energy efficiency, tools and techniques for the analysis and development of improvements with regards to energy consumption, modeling and simulation of energy efficiency, and the integration of green and lean manufacturing. This book presents a breadth of relevant information, material, and knowledge to support research, policy-making, practices, and experience transferability to address the issues of energy efficiency.
Energy & Productivity Optimisation with non-invasive IOT, Embedded Dataloggers, Simulation, AI, Energy Auditor
HETA Datain
Nagpur, Maharashtra, India
Productivity and Energy Optimisation of Industry and Institutions using non-invasive IOT, Embedded Datalogger, Cloud Computing, Real Time Monitoring and Alerts, Simulation, and Off-site data analysis using Artificial Intelligence by Energy Auditors
June - IE Economics, Mathematic, Statistics and OR - IE & Information Systems
July - Gilbreth - Human Effort IE - Modern IE
August - Emerson - Productivity Improvement and Management Cost Reduction, Waste Elimination
September - Toyota Production System - Lean Systems - Improvement Priorities - Delivery and Bottleneck
October - Productivity Engineering - Operation Analysis
November - Supply Chain
December - News
October 2025
Celebrating the birthdays of famous second generation industrial engineers - Ralph M. Barnes and H.B. Maynard. Birthday Barnes - 17 October, Birthday Maynard - 18 October.
Modern Industrial Engineering - October 2025 Barnes - Maynard Months - Human Effort - Machine Effort Industrial Engineering.
Ten Types of Innovation: The Discipline of Building Breakthroughs
Larry Keeley, Helen Walters, Ryan Pikkel, Brian Quinn
John Wiley & Sons, 15 Jul 2013
Using a list of more than 2,000 successful innovations, including Cirque du Soleil, early IBM mainframes, the Ford Model-T, and many more, the authors applied a proprietary algorithm and determined ten meaningful groupings—the Ten Types of Innovation—that provided insight into innovation. The Ten Types of Innovation explores these insights to diagnose patterns of innovation within industries, to identify innovation opportunities, and to evaluate how firms are performing against competitors. The framework has proven to be one of the most enduring and useful ways to start thinking about transformation.
Details how you can use these innovation principles to bring about meaningful—and sustainable—growth within your organization
The Ten Types of Innovation concept has influenced thousands of executives and companies around the world since its discovery in 1998. The Ten Types of Innovation is the first book explaining how to implement it.
Ten Types of Innovation framework (developed by Larry Keeley) categorizes innovation into three key areas—Configuration, Offering, and Experience—to move beyond just product improvements. It helps businesses analyze competitors, identify gaps, and combine at least five types to create sustainable, hard-to-copy competitive advantages.
Configuration (Focus on internal workings)
Profit Model: Innovative ways to convert offerings into cash.
Network: Leveraging partnerships and connections.
Structure: Organizing company assets, processes, and talent.
Process: Developing proprietary or superior methods to do work.
Offering (Focus on product/service)
Product Performance: Enhancing value, features, and quality.
Product System: Creating complementary products or services that connect.
Experience (Focus on customer-facing elements)
Service: Enhancing the value, functionality, and perceived quality of an offering.
Channel: How offerings are delivered to customers.
Brand: Representing the business in a way that creates recognition and preference.
Customer Engagement: Fostering compelling interactions and connections.
The Collection aims to present the latest achievements in automation strategies, digitalization, and process efficiency improvement, with particular emphasis on sustainable practices. It covers topics related to modern technologies used in industrial engineering, innovations in production management, and the use of data analysis in improving the efficiency of production systems. It aims to discover the future generation in manufacturing by implementing smart technologies, intelligent systems using up-to-date approaches, and modern software based on IoT, VR/AR, ANN, GA, etc. These technologies allow using data and information throughout the entire life cycle of the product and ensure the creation of flexible production processes that rapidly respond to challenges in demand at low cost to the enterprises as well as to the environment.
https://link.springer.com/collections/aifcbbghie
Positioning Industrial Engineering in the Era of Industry 4.0, 5.0, and Beyond: Pathways to Innovation and Sustainability
45 Pages Posted: 23 Jan 2025 Last revised: 16 Jan 2025
Ocident Bongomin
Moi University; Africa Centre of Excellence II in Phytochemical, Textile and Renewable Energy (ACE II-PTRE); Ain Shams University; National Crops Resources Research Institute; Ndejje University; Pabplek Advanced Simulation and Modeling Solutions
At its core, industrial engineering focuses on improving processes by eliminating waste—be it time, materials, or labor. This field thrives on data analysis and process mapping to create streamlined workflows that not only boost efficiency but also improve quality outcomes
The Transformative Power of Industrial Engineering in Modern Innovation
Cultivating Tomorrow's Leaders in Industrial Engineering
Industrial Engineering advances the science of optimization, systems integration, and process improvement across diverse industries. Our faculty and students blur the lines of traditional IE academic pillars of IE and rethink the basics to best tackle tomorrow's challenges. We develop innovative methods for improving efficiency, reducing costs, and enhancing productivity in nearly every sector of society.
