Transformation 4.0

Transformation 4.0: A Closer Look at Mode of Operations in Nokia GOPS

Diaz Chicaiza, Ricardo (TU Delft Technology, Policy and Management)

van de Poel, Ibo (mentor)
Guldenmund, Frank (mentor)
Scholten, Victor (mentor)

Delft University of Technology

Management of Technology (MoT)

2017-08-28

The fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) is in full swing and organisations across the world pour efforts into the digitisation of manufacturing operations and services. The working practice changes and entails an increasing interaction of humans with technology. At the same time, from across society actors exert growing pressure on organisations to uphold accountability and other social values. Industry 4.0 rises concerns over the organisation's current ability to support employee well-being. Here, well-being refers to the quality of an employee's working experience. In addition to an adequate physical and cognitive workload when performing tasks, factors influencing well-being include continuous competency development, synchronisation of one's work with that of colleagues, and recognition of one's contribution to the purpose of the organisation. Responsible Innovation, as a lens to improve the innovation process and anticipate social concerns such as that of well-being, remains appropriate for decision-making in governmental and academic settings. However, its use in industry is underrepresented and still unfamiliar to managers. This thesis project is conducted in collaboration with Nokia Solutions \& Networks. The project explores how can Responsible Innovation benefit the employee well-being in the Transformation 4.0 of the associated company? The project follows a Trailing Research approach. This is similar to action-research, but it is executed in only one cycle and its goal is not to trigger change. The organisation does not have the explicit request to address a problem. Instead, it commissions this study in order to explore possible impact of Industry 4.0 on their current mode of operations. Therefore, the student-researcher trails the transformation inside the organisation during a 5-month research stay. Change brought by the design, execution, and evaluation of new digitisation projects is followed closely. From interviews to 9 practitioners across Human Resources, Change Management, Leadership \& Talent, Demand Planning and Manufacturing groups, next to documentation analysis and contextual observation, a single case study with two embedded units of analysis---Business and Factory---is created. The analysis results in the 9 Areas of Inquiry. These suggest a need to review current efforts in the organisation. The areas include a review: on traditional learning pillars; on the visibility of subject-experts across units and on current reward schemes; on the opportunity for rank-and-file to increase their outward-looking capability; on the way how groups capture and share lessons and how the impact of sharing is measured; on the understanding and monitoring of various forms of leadership; on the opportunity for the central change management group to transfer value to project groups in lower-levels; on employees' perception of the role of the continuous improvement function and how its methodologies are being transferred to the daily work of project groups; on the anticipation activities of more abstract future requirements for new tools; and on the mapping the evolving and diverse motivations of employees. Responsible Innovation brings its value by acting as a lens through which the aforementioned areas should be studied. This thesis recommends a first step to explore these areas. Namely, managers should start a reflection on current efforts by using 4 criteria: anticipation, reflection, inclusiveness, and responsiveness. These can be used to evaluate activities and adapt future ones. This is recommended as an extension of the manager's tool-set in decision-making pertaining to change. Its use in the company can bring employee well-being to a more central position in the discussion.

Industry 4.0
Responsible Innovation
Well-being
Organisational Transformation
Change Management

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:af9edad0-6bf6-43b0-9261-2c67ce3099b0

Student theses

master thesis

© 2017 Ricardo Diaz Chicaiza