The Financial Times reported on a study “Robots at Work,” written by Georg Graetz, a researcher at the Department of Economics, Uppsala University, and Guy Michaels, London School of Economics, which examines the impact of industrial robots on jobs, productivity and growth. Industrial robots are programmable and are widely used for assembly, packaging, inspection and agricultural harvesting. In …
Tag: Processes
Mar 08
Failure demand
The following article is reproduced en toto – it explains a concept which has an enormous impact on the efficiency and costs of many processes and staff morale – sadly, far too many managers, and consultants, seem unable to understand it or refuse to believe it – far worse, many of their customers, whatever the …
Mar 03
Outsourcing and immigration have downsides
Washington Post columnist Robert J. Samuelson and Harvard economist Jason Furman recently wrote that America’s weak productivity growth is a mystery in an article entitled “Slower growth has real political consequences” A Peter Skurkiss responded, commenting that “it wouldn’t be a mystery if these gentlemen would set aside their politically correct blinders” He continued A major …
Jan 18
Groupthink waffle or results needed
The following is a precis of part of an email from Professor John Seddon of Vanguard Consultants who spoke at a public-sector ‘shared services’ conference The opening keynote was from the interim leader of the Government Shared Service programme – a very nice man – who said: We aim to be the best civil service in …
Nov 23
Government action for big productivity improvements
Words are all very well but good measures leading to worthwhile actions matter most to people and nations And, to boost national productivity, governments must look to: Boost their private sectors by helping them produce the profits which pay for everyone’s SoL (Standard of Living) and underpin their QoL (Quality of Life) Ensure all public …
Jul 13
AI becoming mainstream in Retail
Expert systems to aid human and plant maintenance and clever OR (Operations Research) computer models (aka apps) to find optimum solutions to complex business problems have been around for over 50 years now AI (Artificial Intelligence) is just the latest moniker for much the same, albeit more powerful Retail Week recently published an article about …
Jun 27
Baumol’s disease
Professor William Baumol of Princeton University recently died aged 95 ‘Baumol’s disease’ is thought by some to explain the current productivity puzzle afflicting most developed nation’s economies, especially their labour-intensive service industries e.g. healthcare, education, performing arts Quoting from an article by George Will in The Washington Post, Senator Daniel Moynihan explained this disease: “The number …
Apr 15
IoT to transform many processes
“The IoT (Internet of Things) can help businesses be more productive and efficient” says Phil Goldstein, web editor for BizTech – “but they need a plan to integrate disparate technologies whilst addressing protection needs against malicious actors” Steve Darrah, Director of National Solutions at Intel, says that “IoT can be used to improve efficiency and …