Robustness in shipbuilding planning and operations - NextShip

A major driver of planning complexity in customized dynamically changing shipbuilding projects is design uncertainty through the engineering design- and far into the production processes. This is leading to continuous adjustments in planning, procurement and execution, and defines the uncertainty to be dealt with on a daily basis. The overall objective of NextShip is to increase Norwegian shipbuilders competitiveness, by creating operational excellence to deliver customized vessels on the edge of known technology, with competitive development lead times and costs. This is achieved by connecting the element of systems engineering (with focus on optimizing tasks and resources), and the ability of the project participants to effectively develop into high performance teams to handle changes and generate innovative solutions. The research started with a current state analysis and data collection in different VARD yards, to understand the information and material flow in the shipbuilding supply chain, and to identify the major challenges and uncertainties that affect robust planning. In a next step, a future state ideal is defined for robust planning and decision-making, with responsive, resilient and cost efficient processes to handle uncertainty. To achieve the future state, a set of operational and social-behavioural methods and models are developed, all focused on handling project uncertainty in planning, to improve flexibility and responsiveness. The nature of the research is multidisciplinary in nature, connecting three main research elements, treated in different but related fields. These are briefly discussed below, together with the main results and benefits to the industry and to the scientific community. These studies (presented by reports, scientific publications, conference and industry presentations), are input into ongoing developments of new methods for engineering planning, new supplier strategies and project execution strategy with integrated uncertainty. In the research module "Operations risk management in the design and planning of shipbuilding engineering systems" we first identified major uncertainties and state-of-the-art approaches to handle uncertainty in projects, and second, approached the planning problem by small stochastic model instances, to learn what it is that makes planning solutions good. This enables finding good plans in the future without actually solving complex stochastic models, which is nearly impossible for large real projects. The results suggest high value of flexible (proactive) strategies, with quantified cost saving potential of over 35% as compared to reactive strategies, where static (deterministic) plans are updated in light of new and relevant information. This part of the research also resulted in guidelines on where and when, and what type of flexibility to develop to handle unforeseen changes. These guidelines are valuable input into judgmental decision-making and simulation approaches in real projects. The second research module treated "The application of lean management principles as risk mitigation techniques to the design of engineering systems". This research addressed lean first from an implementation perspective and, second, from an uncertainty and change management perspective. The research highlights particularly effective lean practices, and those that are less effective in our highly dynamic uncertain context. The less effective practices relate to uncertainty that is difficult to anticipate (i.e. frequent changes in design and technical specifications) and, therefore, difficult to handle by common buffer strategies. This work led to extending the scope of Lean Construction theory by explicitly integrating uncertainty and theoretical concepts from decision-making uncertainty. Moreover, front-end loading supplier strategies (discussed in Lean Construction literature) are identified to increase responsiveness to change orders in shipbuilding construction processes. By the research module "Social-behavioural approach to responsiveness and resilience in projects" we demonstrated a way to study and better align the social capital to enable resilience and responsiveness to project uncertainty. The research uncovered the true informal project work and knowledge transfer networks, and led to better utilization of the social interactions at work. The social-behavioural characteristics of project work confirm the strong handcraft traditions in the shipbuilding industry, and highlight the improvement potential by industrialization through craftmanship. A such industrialization process is the scope of the current change program at VARD, with focus on reorganizing the project organization to better align to the existing social capital, and to create lean and flexible processes, by connecting design activities to procurement, engineering and project planning.

The NextShip knowledge building project will bring together expertise from a number of scientific disciplines and actively participating Norwegian shipbuilding partners to contribute to the vision of: Raising Norwegian shipbuilding to world leaders by en abling robustness in planning and operations when producing related but not completely identical offshore vessels in a network of collaborating yards. The goal of NextShip is to increase shipbuilding productivity and to add value by reducing time to mark et, rework and waste. In a construction project the major issue to be studied is that of a delay relative to a plan. While the question"What do we do to reduce delays?" (e.g. decisions) has obtained great focus in practice and academics, it has been le ss focus on "Why do plans fail and become irrelevant? What drives time and cost increase?". However, when the questions "Why do plans fail?, What are the risks of these plans?"are not completely understood, the successfulness of lean implementation is l imited. As we see it, the answers to these questions relate to the assumptions in lean construction theory; particularly, the risks that affect the conditions to be satisfied to apply the theory in its present form. If the theoretical assumptions (the giv ens) do not reflect real life business situation, the theory needs to be revised. To achieve efficiency is shipbuilding planning and operations conceptual knowledge building is needed to understand the 'whys' before actual decisions can be planned. As s uch, the NextShip will focus on the following: Firstly, understand the drivers of chaotic elements and risks in the premises for each activity in shipbuilding, including the human bias. Secondly, eliminate the risks or handle them by organizational and te chnological changes, to enable lean and flexible processes. The NextShip is a theory extention/ theory building project examining shipbuilding networking efficiency in a holistic, interdisciplinary context.