Document Type

Thesis

Date of Award

5-31-1985

Degree Name

Master of Science in Management Engineering - (M.S.)

Department

Industrial and Management Engineering

First Advisor

Carl Wolf

Abstract

While traditional industrial engineering methods can be successfully applied to improve productivity in the operations area, their effectiveness is limited where knowledge type work is being performed. For these types of activities, self-assessment has been proposed as a methodology to achieve increased efficiency. This thesis presents the results of applying this concept to the engineering function of a manufacturing firm.

Using a directed set of questionnaires as a focus, a self-assessment of itself was conducted by the Project Engineering Department to consider how well it thought itself to be performing and what its deficiencies were. Co-jointly the departments whose work is impacted by Project Engineering such as Sales, Accounting, Production, Materials Control and Testing assessed its performance from their perspective.

The most significant finding was that both Project Engineering and the other Departments identified the major cause of inefficiency to be the poor planning being done by the Engineering Department. The reason being that the perception of work task priorities differed and that there was a lack of understanding by the Project Engineering Department of its role in the manufacturing process. The findings defined the problem on a system basis and serve as the foundation for corrective action. Furthermore, the study serves as a guide for making such assessments by listing the experiences that were gained in making this study.

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