Interactive control in target cost management

This paper discusses target cost management (TCM) from the viewpoint of simultaneous engineering. Firstly, it shows empirically how simultaneous engineering is implemented in Japanese companies. Secondly, it formulates and then tests hypotheses on the influential power of managers involved in the process of target costing. Thirdly, it describes processes of interactive control directed at information and value sharing among managers that help explain why simultaneous engineering is working effectively in Japanese companies. It also formulates and tests hypotheses on information and value sharing among managers. Fourthly, it concludes that interactive control in TCM helps generate unique ideas for product development and cost reduction, and that Target Cost Management is a key subsystem of strategic cost management.     

第38届世界标准日祝词标准造福人与社会

地球村的居民们享受着广泛的权利,同时承担着相应的义务。这些权利包括人身安全、公共安全、健康以及自由地获取信息。义务则包含保护环境以及尊重他人的人身安全、财产权利和隐私权。标准有助于公众享受权利并履行义务。例如。标准通过为消费者提供信息和信息保护,     

第36届世界标准日祝词标准使世界更高业

我们都希望生活在一个更安全、更安定的世界里，然而。地震、飓风、江水、交通事故、传染病和工业事故，除了给人类带来物质损失以外，每年还导致成千上万的人员伤亡。为了应对这些威胁，国际标准提供了广为认可的解决方案，     

The changing boundaries of system companies

While project marketing and systems selling are mainly concerned with market relations of companies organized on a project basis, it is important to conceptualize the interactions between market conditions and long term technology problems of these firms.The paper deals with strategic problems of system companies. By system companies the authors mean those large, multi-technology, multi-business firms that are typically active in systemic industries in most industrialized countries. In these industries market demand has some peculiar features: discontinuity, heterogeneity and customization, long and complex buying process, variable specification capability of customers. On the supply side, system companies produce unique or small series products, on a customized basis, by using a large array of technologies.System integration is the distinctive strategic capability of these companies. It is argued that system integration involves the management of a peculiar kind of uncertainty. The long run strategic objective of system companies is to maintain the global control of the technological dynamics of the system. However, there are many possible changes in the boundaries of product systems that may threat the viability of control. To gain strategic control, system companies have to manipulate simultaneously market and technology leverages. The paper offers a rich conceptual discussion of these problems.     

Nature of innovation and technology management in system companies

Competition in the industries that develop complex products (such as aircraft engines and radar) depends on the integration of organizational systems as well as the pace of technological change.
Companies in these industries can be regarded as 'system companies'. A framework and taxonomy are developed to indicate the characteristics and types of companies and to understand how organizational learning and integration take place. This makes it easier for companies to anticipate strategic change and some implications of this kind are described.     

Crafts and craft education as expressions of cultural heritage: individual experiences and collective values among an international group of women university students

This paper explores relationships between crafts, craft education and cultural heritage as reflected in the individual experiences and collective values of fifteen female university students of different nationalities. The students (all trainee teachers) were following a course in crafts and craft education as part of an International Study Programme in Finland. Data were collected from a small group activity and individual autobiographical essays. The essays were analysed qualitatively using Atlas-ti. Key statements were consolidated under three headings: personal values and meanings placed on crafts; cultural, community and family influences; and crafts at school. The outcomes of the group activity and the essays are discussed under these headings. Concluding perspectives are offered on: intellectual foundations for crafts in educational systems; competition between beliefs, ideas, and forms of behaviour in respect of the practice of crafts and perceptions of cultural heritage; and tensions among the aesthetic and economic dimensions of crafts.