Special Topics in Management of Technology, 2013
Lecturer
Prof. Benjamin Yuan, National Chiao-Tung Univ., Taiwan
Prof. Andriani, Pierpaolo, Euromed Management, Frnace
Prof. Chhajed, Dilip, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign,USA
March 2013 by Prof. Benjamin Yuan
Issues in Managing Technology Projects
Tentative course outline
Day 1
Session 1
Topic: Technology of Management Introduction
Readings:
1.
Management of Technology, The hidden Competitive Advantage, Task Force on Management of
Technology, Cross-Disciplinary Engineering Research Committee and Manufacturing Studies Board,
Commission on Engineering and Technical Systems, National Research Council, USA 1987
1986 US NRC formed a task force to discuss the competitiveness between US and Japan, and published a report in
February 1987.
What is the background of MOT research focused at the beginning?
What is the definition of MOT research?
What are the US version and Japanese version of MOT?
Session 2
Topic: Technology of Management Research and Development Status
Readings:
1.
PERSPECTIVE: Ranking Business Schools on the Management of Technology, Jonathan D. Linton, The
Journal of PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT 2004; 21: 416–430
2.
MOT TIM Centres of Global Research 2006, Editorial, Technovation 27 (2007) 491–500
3.
National characteristics and competitiveness in MOT research: A comparative analysis of ten specialty
journals,2000–2009, Dong Geun Choi, Yi-beck Lee, Mi-jung Jung, Heesang Lee, Technovation 32 (2012) 918
Since then, MOT is formally become a cross-disciplinary, problem-driven, empirical and theoretical focused research
and academic field. There are journal papers reported on the MOT research and development status as listed in the
reading materials.
What is the research status on MOT studies worldwide today?
What are the research domains on MOT?
How is about the MOT version of Taiwan, Korea and China?
Day 2
Session 1
Topic:
MOT with Industry Evolution
Readings:
1. Management of technology: the key to competitiveness and wealth creation, Tarek M. Khalil, 2000, McGrawHill Companies, Inc.
Review the historical perspective: the technology evolution in history. The trajectory of history, religion, science,
technology, economics, society, culture etc.. The evolution of knowledge, science and technology guide the
moving & changes of product, industry, economics, living, society, politics etc..
How is the world changed?
What are the elements and processes for the world changed?
How is the technology effect the world changes?
What people want?
Session 2
Topic: MOT with the modern life
Readings:
1. Chapter 8 The Impact of information technology on productivity and quality of life, Ethics in information
technology, George W. Reynolds, Course Technology Cengage Learning, 3rd Edition, 2010, pp267-300.
An interpretation of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, represented as a pyramid with the more basic needs at the bottom.
The Kondratieff wave: The cycling of economics elements. ICT is changing our world.
What does the Kondratieff Wave teach us on the world economics change today?
How the ICT changes our life today? Is this what we want? Who makes this decision?
Day 3
Session 1
Topic:
Delphi Methodology used on Technology Foresight
Case
Japan and British Foresight Programs
Readings: Chapter 2, Technological Forecasting for Decision Making, 3rd Edition, McGraw-Hill, 1993
Japan, using Delphi methodology, conducted the 2010 technology forecasting in 1990. Since then, many
countries in the world have used the same methodology on their technology foresight programs.
What is the difference between technology forecasting and foresight?
How is the national technology policy be defined and by whom?
The same questions can be applied to industry and enterprise on technology policy.
Consensus on general politics is through democracy vote. So, how to make the decision consensus on
technology for national, industry and enterprise?
Session 2
Topic:
Readings:
Scenario Methodology for Technology Forecasting
Chapter 11, Technological Forecasting for Decision Making, 3 rd Edition, McGraw-Hill, 1993
“OPEC is the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Its mission is to secure a return to oil investors and
an economic supply of oil to consumers. In the 1970s, OPEC acquired a say in pricing and raised oil prices steeply
because of an embargo of Arab oil in 1973. The 1973 oil embargo happened in October following the United
States' and Western Europe's support of Israel against Arab nations in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Also, King
Feisal of Saudi Arabia imposed an oil embargo against the West.
In doing so, the oil pricing for the United States went from 3 dollars a barrel to 12 dollars a barrel, spurring gas
rationing. U.S. stations put a limit on the amount of gas that could be dispensed, closed on Sundays, and limited
the days it could be purchased based on license plates. Prices continued to rise after the Embargo ended. The Oil
Embargo of 1973 had a lasting effect on the United States. U.S. citizens began purchasing smaller cars that were
more fuel efficient. The embargo also forced America to reevaluate the cost and source of energy, which
previously received little consideration.
One of the most lasting effects of the Oil Embargo of 1973 was an economic recession throughout the world.
Unemployment flew to the highest percentage on record while inflation did the same. In Detroit, consumer
interest in large gas guzzling vehicles fell and production dropped. Although the embargo only lasted one year, oil
prices had quadrupled and a new era of international relations was opened. Arab nations discovered that their
oil could be used as both a political and economic weapon against other nations.”
Why the world economic was hurt so much in 1973?
Can traditional forecasting methods forecast able foreseeing the oil crisis? Why?
Scenario is used heavily after 1973. Why?
Day 4
Session 1
Topic:
The electric vehicle industry development roadmap
Electric Vehicle will be a revolutionary industry change for the transportation in the future 20/30 years. Due to the
mature ICT product and technology, the EV is a product of mother board adding four wheels. Using scenario
methodology, it will foresee the possibility of the future electric vehicle industry development roadmap..
Why the EV becomes hot topics worldwide?
What is the advantage and disadvantage of EV to replace Auto today?
Will government push EV development in the future?
Session 2
Topic:
The electric vehicle development and opportunities
What is EV development in the future?
Will EV blooming in US, EU or Asia first?
Can you imagine the EV development in the future?
What are the opportunities/threat on EV development for companies marketing on AM(after market)?
April 2013 by Prof. Andriani
Issues in Management of Innovation and Technological Change
Tentative course outline
Session 1
Topic: Disruptive innovation model
Preliminary reading:
J. L. Bower, & Christensen, C. M. (1995). Disruptive technologies: catching the wave. Harvard
Business Review, 73(1), 43—53.
Case: What's Wrong with This Picture: Kodak's 30-year Slide into Bankruptcy available at:
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2935
This lecture will discuss the disruptive innovation model introduced by Professor Clayton Christensen
in his book “The Innovator’s dilemma”.
Session 2
Topic: Emergence of new markets based on radical innovation
Preliminary readings:
first chapter of book: Bijker, W. E. (1995). Of Bicycles, Bakelites, and Bulbs. Cambridge: MA: MIT
Press.
Radical innovations generate new markets, which evolve along regular patterns. We will look at the
evolution of markets by looking at one specific technology, i.e. the bicycle. This talk is inspired by the
‘Socio-technical’ view of technological evolution
Session 3
Topic: Exaptation: a new way to promote creativity and innovation
Preliminary readings:
Cattani, G. (2005). Preadaptation, Firm Heterogeneity, and Technological Performance: A Study on
the Evolution of Fiber Optics, 1970-1995. Organization Science, 16(6), 563-580.
Dew, N., Sarasvathy, S. D., & Venkataraman, S. (2004). The economic implications of exaptation.
Journal of Evolutionary Economics 14(1), 69-84.
Many innovations are based on functional shift, that is, on the discovery of new functions for existing
technologies. This mechanisms has largely been ignored in the management literature but it seems to
explain many innovations and holds the promise to improve management of innovation and design
Session 4
Topic: Modularity, modular systems and modular innovation strategy
Preliminary readings:
Baldwin, C. Y., & Clark, K. B. (1997). Managing in the age of modularity. Harvard Business
Review(September-October), 84–93.
This talk focuses on the importance of modular systems. We will discuss how and why radical
innovations evolve toward modularity, the advantages and disadvantages of modular systems and
modular innovation strategies.
Additional Session
Topic: Lead users and innovation communities as complementors of R&D departments
Preliminary readings:
first chapter of book (pp: Von Hippel, E. (2005). Democratizing Innovation. Cambridge: MA: MIT
Press. Available at http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/democ1.htm
Users have emerged as a powerful force in the emergence of innovations, both radical and
incremental. The talk introduces the topic of user-centric innovation.
May 2013 by Prof. Chhajed
Process Innovation Design and Improvement
Tentative Course Outline
Session 1
Topic:
Video:
Readings:
Bottleneck Management
“The Goal”
Amazon ships to sorting machine beat, NYT
Managing bottleneck is fundamental to any production technology management. This session focuses on
managing resources to maximize throughput and making product portfolio decisions.
What is a bottleneck?
How should you manage a bottleneck resource?
How should you manage a non-bottleneck resource?
How can the concept of bottleneck be applied to making product portfolio decision?
How to use systems viewpoint in making decisions that may not be locally optimal?
Session 2
Topic:
Process Technology Strategy
Case:
Chad Creative Concept
Readings:
Chapter 2
The concept of what type of process technology to deploy is discussed via a mini-case. The match between
market strategy and process strategy using the framework of product-process matrix is highlighted.
What is focused strategy and why is focused strategy important?
What are the impediments in following focused strategy and how to overcome them?
Day 2
Session 1
Topic:
Readings:
Process Technology Measurements and Interrelationships
A Note on Process Fundamentals
Some plants tear out long assembly lines, switch to craft work, WSJ
This session introduces many non-intuitive process related measures and establishes the relationship
amongst them.
How to determine the capacity of an individual resource, the capacity of process, and utilization of a
resource?
What are some of the ways to change the capacity of a process?
What is minimum flow time (response time) and how is it related with capacity of the process?
What are the drivers of flow time?
How are some of these fundamental measures related?
Session 2
Topic:
Case:
Process Analysis
Manzana Insurance
Using a case, the session relates the effect of variability on the performance of a process. It also provides
practice in analyzing an existing process for improvements and new technology deployment.
What is the effect of variability and congestion on service performance?
How can incentive system affect performance?
Day 3
Session 1
Topic:
Readings:
Process Quality Management
Chapter 6
Six sigma enlightenment, NYT
Hospitals move to cut dangerous lab errors, WSJ
What is quality? How is it different in a service firm?
How can we know whether a process is working within its normal range of variability?
How is process control related with product quality? How is it related with six sigma?
Session 2
Topic:
Lean Thinking
Case:
Toyota Motor Manufacturing
Readings: Chapter 5
What factory managers can teach hospitals, WSJ
Fixing healthcare from the inside, today, HBR
What are the main requirements of a JIT system?
What are different types of waste?
Why and how is the pull system beneficial?
Are there elements of TPS that can be adapted by technology firms?
Day 4
Session 1
Topic:
Product Design for Sustainable Operations
Case:
Cradle‐to‐Cradle Design
How can product design help toward more sustainable operations? What is the cradle-to-cradle design
protocol? What are the challenges in adapting such intense environmental initiative?
Topic:
Flexibility Strategy
Course Summary
Session 2
Process Design Project Presentations
Students will be working on developing the operations design of a company and present their design. This
project-based learning will help students in deep learning, develop communication skills and provide an
opportunity to manage a team based project.