Mass production methods for mass vaccination: improving flow and operational performance in a COVID-19 mass vaccination centre using Lean

The COVID-19 pandemic has infected tens of millions of people worldwide causing many deaths. Healthcare systems have been stretched caring for the most seriously ill and lockdown measures to interrupt COVID-19 transmission have had adverse economic and societal impacts. Large-scale population vaccination is seen as the solution.In the UK, a network of sites to deploy vaccines comprised National Health Service hospitals, primary care and new mass vaccination centres. Due to the pace at which mass vaccination centres were established and the scale of vaccine deployment, some sites experienced problems with queues and waiting times. To address this, one site used the Lean systematic improvement approach to make rapid operational improvements to reduce process times and improve flow.The case example identifies obstacles to flow experienced by a mass vaccination centre and how they were addressed using Lean concepts and techniques. Process cycle times were used as a proxy metric for efficiency and flow. Based on daily demand volume and open hours, takt time was calculated to give a process completion rate to achieve flow through the vaccination centre.The mass vaccination centre achieved its aim of reducing process times and improving flow. Administrative and clinical cycle times were reduced sufficiently to increase throughput and the number of queues and queueing time were reduced improving client experience.The design and operational management of vaccination centre processes contribute to client experience, efficiency and throughput. Lean provides a systematic approach that can improve operational processes and facilitate client flow through mass vaccination centres.

PHYRON: cognitive computing for the creation of an innovative Intelligence Experience Center

<p>This research presents the results of a project called “PHYRON: Cognitive Computing for the creation of an innovative Intelligence Experience Center”, funded by the Basque Government (Economic Development, Sustainability and Environment Department). The project started in April 2019 and it will end in December 2021. Its main objective was to arrange an industrial research about cognitive computing. The main aim was the application of these systems for the development of an Intelligent Experience Center (IExC) to facilitate: i) enrichment of processes, products and services, in general client experiences, ii) automatic generation of technical predictions related to the product and the client behaviour through the exploitation of acquired knowledge, and iii) rationalization and automation of the processes that are involved in the after sale services both at technical and management level. The technological outcome presented in this paper is built using cognitive engines to enable learning from the client experience, and predictive models to anticipate client necessities.</p>

An analysis of the impact of implementing a new interactive voice response system (IVR) on client experience in the Canadian banking industry

Banks are constantly competing to find new ways to satisfy clients and meet their growing, heterogenous needs. Clients can access round the clock banking services worldwide. One way to access information is through Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems. This research is an analysis of the process of implementing an IVR system and the impact on client experience using the case study of a Canadian bank. The research question is: “What is the impact of an IVR system upgrade on client experience in the Canadian banking industry?” The Productivity Paradox and the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology model (UTAUT) are leveraged and a thematic analysis of the feedback provided from Net Promoter Score (NPS) surveys is done. The results show that although the IVR system can be an attractive automation interface for clients, there are many unanswered concerns about customer satisfaction as demonstrated by NPS feedback.

An analysis of the impact of implementing a new interactive voice response system (IVR) on client experience in the Canadian banking industry

Banks are constantly competing to find new ways to satisfy clients and meet their growing, heterogenous needs. Clients can access round the clock banking services worldwide. One way to access information is through Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems. This research is an analysis of the process of implementing an IVR system and the impact on client experience using the case study of a Canadian bank. The research question is: “What is the impact of an IVR system upgrade on client experience in the Canadian banking industry?” The Productivity Paradox and the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology model (UTAUT) are leveraged and a thematic analysis of the feedback provided from Net Promoter Score (NPS) surveys is done. The results show that although the IVR system can be an attractive automation interface for clients, there are many unanswered concerns about customer satisfaction as demonstrated by NPS feedback.

Improving Administrative Outcomes in Physiotherapy by Adopting Open-Access Booking

Purpose: Long wait times for physiotherapy are associated with poorer health trajectories for clients. Clients’ experiences with physiotherapy services in Saint John were suboptimal; thus, this study explored making administrative changes to improve those experiences. All physiotherapy services adopted an administrative model called open-access booking (OAB), which blended elements of advanced access, triage, and centralized wait lists. Method: OAB was instituted in the first week of February 2017 and has been active since. The researcher accessed more than 20,000 anonymized case records spanning 5 years (February 2014–January 2019) and compared the 3-year pre-OAB phase with the 2-year OAB phase using interrupted time series analysis models. Results: OAB appeared to not be associated with changes in client volume, but it was associated with fewer “on-paper” clients, shorter wait times to first appointment, more consistent record keeping, a greater likelihood of being discharged after one appointment, and fewer appointments before discharge. There was less variability in these outcomes after the adoption of OAB, suggesting a more stable client experience with the physiotherapy system. Conclusions: OAB appears to be associated with improved administrative outcomes, but strict causality cannot be assessed. The results are promising but not conclusive.

Self-Narrative Elicitation in Counseling: An Exploration of the Usefulness of Selected Interview Methods

An important element of many forms of counseling is the narrative articulation of the client experience. This article aims to define self-narrative elicitation methods, to explore their use in counseling, and to present a quantitative empirical examination of narrative interview instructions. It examines whether the self-narrative inclination and selected situational factors influence the narrativity level of the utterances when elicited by different types of self-narrative instructions. The results show that the utterances produced by three different types of instructions (open-ended question; photo-elicitation; life-as-book metaphor) do not differ in narrativity level. The narrativity of utterances measured micro-analytically on the lexical level remains independent from the external factors (sequence, topic, type of instruction). Given the level of narrativity and length of response, the three instructions are close to each other. At the same time the narrativity is significantly influenced by self-narrative inclination. It is worth acknowledging personal features that can change the way the story is told in interviews and thus affect the counseling practice.

Digitalization Opportunities Road Mapping Tool (DORMT©): A Framework to Assess Digitalization Opportunities in Construction Organizations

The construction industry is entering the digital age, which offers innovative digitalization opportunities (DOs) regarding cost efficiency, project management, and improved client experience. In their early efforts to implement DOs, construction organizations have had varying degrees of success, and the results caused organizations to question whether they have the appropriate digital strategy and capabilities. Hence, construction organizations need a framework to systematically evaluate the potential benefits of implementing DOs and factors influencing their successful implementation. This paper presents a framework that supports decision makers in construction organizations to assess DOs based on experts’ judgement of the factors influencing their successful implementation. The framework incorporates fuzzy arithmetic and linguistic evaluation to capture experts’ subjective assessments and is implemented in the Digitalization Opportunities Road Mapping Tool (DORMT©). DORMT©, which allows organizations to evaluate individual DOs, rank multiple DOs, and identify the best options for implementing digitalization within their organization.