The construction of a comprehensive model for production strategy evaluation

Abstract

To acquire reasonable profits and to be competitive in the globalize market, more and more firms today have exploited various kinds of production strategies, such as outsourcing, joint venture, or some kind of strategic alliance. Since every production strategy has its benefits and costs and may bring a firm different opportunities and risks, which kind of production strategy is the most suitable for a firm to carry out is a difficult and complicated decision with a high degree of uncertainty. Therefore, this research proposes a comprehensive production strategy evaluation model that can facilitate such a decision making for a firm. The factors that should be considered for devising a production strategy are listed for the benefits, opportunities, costs and risks (BOCR) merits first, and fuzzy Delphi method is applied next to select the most important factors under each merit. A network with BOCR merits is constructed to incorporate the selected factors, and fuzzy analytic network process is then applied to consider the interdependence and feedback inside the network. The proposed model can effectively aid decision making on which kind of production strategy should be adopted by a firm. A case of a printed circuit board manufacturer is presented for the illustration of the proposed model.

An integrated fuzzy QFD framework for new product development

“…The Delphi method, first proposed by Dalkey and Helmer in 1963, can facilitate forecasting by converging a value through the feedback of experts after several rounds (Lee et al 2010b). This popular method has been widely applied in many research and practical areas, but it has some shortfalls, such as repetitive questionnaires and evaluations, declining response rate of experts, inappropriate convergence, ambiguity and uncertainty in survey questions and in response, lengthy time and high cost (Chang et al 2000;Chang and Wang 2006;Lee et al 2010b).…”

“…This popular method has been widely applied in many research and practical areas, but it has some shortfalls, such as repetitive questionnaires and evaluations, declining response rate of experts, inappropriate convergence, ambiguity and uncertainty in survey questions and in response, lengthy time and high cost (Chang et al 2000;Chang and Wang 2006;Lee et al 2010b). The incorporation of fuzzy set theory is one of the approaches to tackle the problems.…”

“…The incorporation of fuzzy set theory is one of the approaches to tackle the problems. Some of the attributes of the fuzzy Delphi method (FDM) include: the decrease in the number of rounds of questionnaire survey, and thus improvement in the response rate, time and cost; the reduction in the distortion of individual expert opinion; a clear expression of the semantic structure of predicted items; and the incorporation of fuzziness in the information contents of the respondents (Chang et al 2000;Chang and Wang 2006;Hsiao 2006;Lee et al 2010b).…”

“…Wang et al (2010) applied the FDM to extract the factors for the sustainable development of a housing community and used ANP to evaluate different development projects. Lee et al (2010b) applied the FDM to extract factors under the benefits, opportunities, costs and risks (BOCR) merits and adopted the FANP to evaluate various production strategies for a manufacturer. Lee et al (2010c) used the FDM to select the critical factors for technology transfer of new equipment in high technology industry.…”

Inclusion of Management Desirability and Risk in Service FMEA-Based Corrective Action Selection Methodology

“…In addition to considering the impact and effort components, decision makers should also take the risks that may occur in selecting corrective action candidates into consideration [17]. The risk will be considered since uncertainty is an unavoidable factor to implementing strategy [18].…”