agility

The blockage of the Suez Canal in 2021, caused by the accident involving the container ship Ever Given, clearly illustrates the need to design global supply chains in such a way that they can respond quickly to disruptions. In a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) environment, conventional logistics processes that focus on efficiency, and supply chain management methods in particular, are increasingly reaching their limits. Resilience, achieved through a combination of robustness and agility, is essential to ensure responsiveness. This article analyzes how risk management information systems (RMIS) can increase resilience. The analysis covers data availability, data transparency, modeling and simulation of risk scenarios, and the development of appropriate emergency action plans. Despite existing challenges in designing IT infrastructure, the measures mentioned have the potential to increase resilience in logistics.

As early as 1997, Christian Lindner, now Germany's Minister of Finance, knew that crises and problems are "also just thorny opportunities. What at the time seemed more like a rhetorical, flowery battle cry from a brash young entrepreneur is, in essence, still a resilient, psychological fact today. Shocking strokes of fate or other drastic experiences often literally pull the rug out from under people - and change their perspective on their own lives. However, this forced change of perspective can also be a real opportunity for change for the better, if one has learned to deal with crises and to recognize and seize the opportunities hidden in them.

Industry 4.0 is work in progress in Germany, digital technologies such as IoT, KI, Cloud or Big Data Analytics are increasingly being introduced in companies. However, alongside technology, people and organisation are the central success factors of digital transformation. Further training, lifelong learning, agile organisation and corporate culture are becoming increasingly important in companies. Study results on the competence requirements for industrial work 4.0 show that in addition to IT and technical skills, openness, overview knowledge, interdisciplinary cooperation and agility are also required. Young professionals from NRW largely understand the importance of these competences, but show significant deficits in many of them, especially in digital competences, interdisciplinary cooperation and agility. It is necessary to promote these competences in a targeted manner during studies and further education.

In many companies there is still a lack of clarity about the “right” way to implement digitalization projects. Therefore, the article describes guidelines for the successful implementation of digitalization projects. They are derived from the experience of various practical projects and include considerations of economic efficiency as well as resources and staff. Structured as “Ten Commandments for Digitalization Projects”, they are designed to support actors in the practical implementation of digitalization projects

This article is about agility, awareness and diversity in project management. In agile project management and especially in the working world 4.0, the importance of cooperation in diverse teams is emphasized again and again. Diversity does not only comprise crossing cultural, organizational and professional boundaries, but also integrating people who are sometimes excluded from communication in the working world. Deaf people belong to this group of people who are often disadvantaged regarding their job opportunities. Daily.Srum.Diverse offers a possibility to work together agilely in various teams and to bring together agility and diversity.

The past few years have shown that Digitization is not just a fad of the millennium, but rather the next inevitable step in technological evolution. It was and is a development that affects everything and everyone, both socially and industrially. But digital transformation requires more than just the conversion of individual processes in the company or the introduction of new technologies. Above all, it requires sustained agility in development and production, as well as ongoing employee training in order to be able to meet this demand for agility as a company.

Trends towards more customized products and shorter product life cycles are creating challenges, which companies are trying to meet with the use of Industrie 4.0 technologies. The digitalization and automation associated with this is causing employees in the manufacturing industry in particular to fear changes in work processes and requirements. This paper proposes four key socio-technical design measures to enable enterprises to cope with the new demands of human work in Industrie 4.0 - and thus to counteract fears. The focus is on increasing entrepreneurial agility and expanding employee skills.