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5

COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE

As shown in Table 1, the communications and information infrastructure of an agile enterprise
differs greatly from that of traditional enterprises. “Virtual Corporations” (Nagel
and Dove, 1992) and availability of electronic data communications lead to coworkers
collaborating from geographically dispersed locations. Concurrent engineering within a
fast-paced product development environment favors collaborative work between engineering
disciplines over “meet and disperse” work patterns (Forsythe and Grose, in press).
Emphasis is placed on seamless and direct information flows. With agility, many of the
traditional bottlenecks that provided time buffers to the product development process are
no longer present, due to automation and streamlining. Consequently, changes to product
and related artifacts occur much faster, leading to increased demands for information and
product data management. Finally, as enterprises focus on core competencies and opportunistically
enter Virtual Corporations, it is no longer practical to maintain and rely on
internal sources of information. Instead, the need arises for mechanisms that enable the
accessibility and efficient utilization of diverse, external sources of information.

TABLE 1.

General Differences Between Traditional and Agile Enterprises

Traditional Enterprise

Agile Enterprise

• Geographical colocation • Geographical separation
• Solitary work • Collaborative work
• Sequential information flow • Parallel information flow
• Time is negotiable • Time is critical
• Standardization of technology • Opportunistic technology use
• Artifacts relatively static • Artifacts change rapidly
• Information flow correlated with
organizational structure
• Information flow correlated with
project structure
• Extensive use of hard media • Extensive use of electronic media
• Constant, known, internal sources
of information
• Diverse, often unknown, external
sources of information
• Many indirect lines of communication • Mostly direct lines of communication

5.1

Electronic Data Communications

Agility introduces a dynamic, fast-paced environment that requires extensive collaboration
between widely dispersed team members who must work together with an efficiency
comparable to their being located in the same building, if not the same room (Virtual
Colocation). In the development of an agile product realization process for custom electromechanical
devices, information flow requirements for an agile enterprise have been
analyzed (Forsythe and Ashby, 1994). This analysis provided an understanding of the
roles filled by each participant in the enterprise, their information needs and sources, the
timing of information needs and information availability, and restrictions on the ability of
participants to use information once it had been received.
The information flow analysis followed the sequence illustrated in Figure 1. In the first step, team members were surveyed to determine their information needs. Before this survey
could take place, measures were necessary to heighten team member’s awareness of
their information needs. This was accomplished through a series of team meetings during
which the team jointly developed the project plan, including objectives, strategies for
meeting objectives, a detailed task network, schedule, and resource and funding projections.
Initially, team members completed paper surveys describing their roles and activities,
followed by in-depth interviews utilizing techniques from information requirements
analysis. Based on the information needs survey, the seven categories of information exchange
shown in Table 2 were developed. Subsequently, a matrix was developed showing
the information exchange categories relevant to each pair of team members.

To allocate technologies to various modes of information exchange, it was necessary to
develop functional requirements for each category of information exchange. The nature
of these requirements is illustrated by the following example of functional requirements
identified for the General Knowledge or Requests category:

TABLE 2.

Categories of Information Exchange

General Knowledge or Requests Transfer of Work/General Level of Skill
Meetings and events Documents
Memos and letters Figures and tables
Schedules Presentation graphics
Agendas Spreadsheets
Forms (surveys, progress reports) Project management materials
News, reports and announcements (e.g., PERT charts, Gantt charts)
Policies
Requests for information Collaborative Work
General Information (e.g., phone lists) Design and design analysis
Brainstorming
Person-to-Person Discourse Group planning
Communications requiring unequivocal Process documentation
and immediate confirmation or response Computer code development
Communications where a need exists to Document and presentation development
assure understanding of information content Project management
Communications in which a spontaneous
dialogue is essential Urgent Communications
Communications where concern exists Changes in schedules or availabilities
for emotional connotations or responses Meetings
Communications where socialization is Demonstrations
part of the implicit or explicit intent Important visitors
Demonstrations and tours Events, cccurrences, or other situations
Team building Requests for information
Transfer of Work/Specialized Level of Skill Casual or Informal Communications
CAD, CAM and solid model files Lunch or hallway discussions
Computer code Casual exchanges before and after meetings
Numerical control programs Discussions to break-up work sessions
FYI conversations
Authorized Gateway Customer Bull sessions

• It should be relatively easy (a few simple steps in addition to creating the message)
to transmit the message to every intended recipient.
• After receiving the message, each recipient should have a clear understanding of
what action is expected on their part and any needed details regarding how to accomplish
this action (e.g., meeting place and time.
• Given the occasional urgency of this type of communication, messages should be
available to recipients almost immediately following transmission and some mechanism
should be provided to alert recipients of the presence of the message.
• Most often the message content may be readily captured verbally or with alphanumeric
characters; however, there may occasionally be a need to include limited tables
or figures (e.g., maps, calendars, charts, etc.).

Alternative technologies were identified and assessed relative to the functional requirements
of each category. Based on these assessments, technology solutions for each information
exchange category were developed. These solutions were then incorporated into a
communications infrastructure design, which allocated technologies to meet the needs of
each team member. This infrastructure included e-mail, voice-mail, file sharing, product
data management, and collaborative work tools.Aproject-wide infrastructure was implemented
through these technologies, the success of which was demonstrated by the design
and production of custom, precision, electromechanical devices in 24 days or less (Forsythe
et al., 1995).

:Human Factors in Agile Manufacturing
A Brief Overview with Emphasis on
Communications and Information Infrastructure

Chris Forsythe
Sandia National Laboratories, MS 0829, Albuquerque, NM 87185-0829

ABSTRACT
Agile manufacturing has been promoted as a national strategy for improving industrial competitiveness.
Agility refers to the capability to very rapidly go from a set of unique customer requirements
to a quality, finished product. An appreciation of the human factors inherent to agile product
development is pivotal to the successful integration of agility-enabling technologies, as well as the
coordination of personnel working within a concurrent engineering environment. This article briefly
summarizes human factors contributions to: (1) development of agile business practices; (2) design
of enabling technologies; and (3) management of the introduction and fielding of new technologies
and business practices. More detailed discussion is offered for human factors related to the communications
and information infrastructure essential to an organization making the transition from
traditional to agile product development. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

1. INTRODUCTION
As industries position themselves for the competitive markets of today, and the increasingly
competitive global markets of the 21st century, agility, or the ability to rapidly develop
and produce new products, represents a common trend (Kovac, 1993; Levary, 1992;
Nagel and Dove 1992). Agility manifests itself in many different forms, with the agile
manufacturing paradigm proposed by the Iacocca Institute offering a generally accepted,
long-term vision (Nagel and Dove, 1992). In its many forms, common elements of agility
or agile manufacturing include: (1) changes in business, engineering, and production practices;
(2) seamless information flow from design through production; (3) integration of
computer and information technologies into all facets of product development and production
processes; (4) application of communications technologies to enable collaborative
work between geographically dispersed product development team members; and (5)
introduction of flexible automation of production processes.

Industry has rarely experienced as dramatic an infusion of new technologies or as extensive
a change in culture and work practices. In recognition of these emerging trends, a
panel session entitled Human Factors in Agile Manufacturing was held at the 1995 Human
Factors and Ergonomics Society Meetings in San Diego, CA, USA to discuss human
factors issues relevant to agile manufacturing and to present different perspectives on
those issues. The articles appearing in this special issue represent the perspectives presented
at that panel session and reflect the continuing evolution of thought concerning
these matters. This article briefly summarizes human factors related to the development of agile business practices, design of enabling technologies, and management of the introduction
of new technologies and business practices. Afterwards, more thorough discussion
is offered concerning human factors related to the communications and information
infrastructure essential to an enterprise fully realizing agility.

2

DEVELOPMENT OF BUSINESS PRACTICES

Implementation of agile manufacturing requires, at a minimum, extensive modification
of existing business practices, but often complete overhaul of existing practices (Greiss,
1993). In a market environment where corporate success hinges on rapid turnaround of
quality products, each new product development effort cannot begin from a blank slate.
Instead, corporations must maximize their ability to capture and utilize corporate history
and lessons learned (Goldman and Priess, 1992). Likewise, manufacturing processes fitted
to the demands of a given product must be replaced by flexible systems composed of
different pieces of equipment that readily accommodate a range of product parameters
(Brost et al., 1992; Staffend, 1992). Serial progression of designs through the product
development cycle is unacceptable. Concurrent engineering of designs is desirable, but
collaborative design is preferred for fast-paced design decisions in an environment that
offers little or no tolerance for error (Forsythe and Ashby, 1994). For the development of
agile business practices, there needs to be consideration of human factors affecting decision
making within fast-paced, dynamic environments (Eisenhardt, 1989). Likewise, knowledge
of team dynamics, individual information requirements and information flow,
information management and utilization, and monitoring and assessment of the status of
complex, dynamic systems is needed (Forsythe and Ashby, 1996). These areas have received
considerable attention from human factors within military, space, aviation, and
traffic domains, but little attention within business contexts.

Of comparable importance to accomplishing the goals of agile manufacturing as product
design and manufacture is the corporate administrative and infrastructure support structure.
Support for the communications and information infrastructure is of particular concern.
System and software compatibility is essential to the seamless flow of product data through
the agile enterprise (Forsythe and Ashby, 1996).With major vendors on update cycles of
6 months or less, this compatibility cannot be maintained without the coordination and
empowerment of administrative and support staff. With agile manufacturing, integration
and networking of information technologies occurs at all levels of the enterprise. As a
consequence, the enterprise must address the support needs of a complex infrastructure
and the numerous human points of failure in supporting such an infrastructure (Haney
et al., 1994). When information does not flow, due to technical or human causes, agility
is lost. For this reason, elimination of human points of failure in infrastructure support is
essential (Forsythe and Ashby, 1996).

3

DESIGN OF ENABLING TECHNOLOGIES

Agile manufacturing is possible primarily as a result of recent and projected technical
innovations. Human factors has an important role to play: first in technology development,
and second in defining technology systems and their usage (Karwowski, 1994).
Use of computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD and CAM) systems to electronically
represent product design is fundamental to agile manufacturing (Bertoline et al., 1995). Currently, CAD and CAM technologies are advancing at a phenomenal pace, with
alternative vendors in a race to keep up with each other. Unfortunately, users express
frequent discontent with the usability of these systems. Furthermore, capabilities of CAD
and CAM systems are underutilized, partially because they have not been fully integrated
into existing work practices (Forsythe and Ashby, 1996). As CAD and CAM systems, as
well as related product data managers, are implemented at the enterprise level, human
factors should ideally be incorporated into improved user interface designs. At a minimum,
human factors and usability should play a large part in benchmarking and similar
assessments of alternative commercial products.

4

MANAGEMENT OF THE INTRODUCTION AND FIELDING OF NEW
TECHNOLOGIES AND BUSINESS PRACTICES

The above issues are significant, but the most significant challenges posed by agile manufacturing
are sociotechnical (Forsythe and Ashby, 1996). If users are unwilling or reluctant
to accept agile business practices and enabling technologies, agile manufacturing
will fail from the inability to overcome the inertia of traditional, often deeply ingrained
practices. With little exception, businesses that will adopt agile manufacturing over the
next 5 to 10 years are currently designing and manufacturing products, with some success.
Agile manufacturing poses threats to the comfort of managers and line workers
alike. For management, there is a substantial relinquishment of power by the empowerment
of product development teams and the increased openness of information. For the
designer, much control is lost in the collaborative development of designs. At the level of
the line worker, there is increased, often undesired, responsibility in being brought into
the product development decision-making process, not to mention the threats posed by
computerization and automation of fabrication and assembly tasks. All of these threats
occur within an often stressful, fast-paced environment in which cognitively demanding
decision-making tasks replace most mundane, largely undemanding tasks.