Purpose




Nowadays healthcare waste (HCW) has become a big challenge for the hospital management, especially, in developing countries like India. Like other developing countries, Indian healthcare waste disposal (HCWD) industry is also fragmented, as some hospitals are having their own in-house waste treatment facilities and others are outsourcing the process to government authorized Common Biomedical Waste Treatment Facilities. Literature also lacks the quantitative studies in selecting the HCWD strategy and, hence, the purpose of this paper is to identify and prioritize the factors, which affect the selection of HCWD strategy and to propose the model to select the HCWD strategy and to apply the proposed model to select the HCWD strategy in Uttarakhand, Northern State of India.




Design/methodology/approach




Grey theory-based analytic hierarchy process approach has been applied to evaluate the HCWD options and select the appropriate strategy for the healthcare facilities (HCFs).




Findings




From the literature, six criteria have been used to evaluate the HCWD strategies: “access to expertise,” “overdependence,” “transportation & risk associated,” “Government rules,” “environmental factors,” and “economic factors.” “Outsourcing” strategic option (0.61) got the higher desirability index than “in-house treatment” (0.39).




Research limitations/implications




The proposed methodology can be used by the researchers and experts in the field to evaluate the strategic options and select the appropriate strategy.




Practical implications




The HCFs and other generators of HCW can select the alternative, whether they should treat the infectious waste in-house or they should go for outsourcing.




Originality/value




In the field of HCW management, this is the first study of its kind, which helps to evaluate and select the HCWD strategies. The proposed model has been applied in Uttarakhand, Northern State of India to make the comparison between “in-house” and “outsource” strategies.

Healthcare waste disposal strategy selection using grey-AHP approach

Rising globalisation, the liberalisation of international trade and rapid technological development over the last two decades have subjected the business environment to rapid, dynamic change. In the face of such change, seminal researchers and business leaders have reached a conclusion that Business Process (BP) is the core of an organisation. Thus, in order to survive, grow, and stay ahead of the competition in today’s turbulent environment, organisations need to mainly focus on improving their business processes. 
Similarly, the Iraqi business environment, after the 2003 conflict, have been subject to profound change influenced by the radical changes to Iraq’s political and economic systems. These changes have directly impacted on Iraqi Quasi-Governmental Construction Companies (IQGCCs) where, after decades of domination over most publicly funded construction contracts, these companies face now fierce competition from in excess of 3,500 local and international private firms. As a result, IQGCCs have subsequently struggled to both win contracts and generate profit and the majority have incurred substantial financial losses, becoming unsustainable burdens on the national budget. Although the Iraqi government has attempted to reform the performance of these companies, most of these efforts have ended in their recapitalisation, rather than the identification and resolution of their problems. Accordingly, through employing Business Process Management (BPM) as a comprehensive and widely used approach to increase BP’s principles in an organisation, this research aims to synthesise a transformational organisational framework to address the challenges emanating from current practice within IQGCCs with the view to determining a step change improvement that could ultimately enhance their bottom line performances. 
To achieve this aim, an exploratory study, which comprised three companies selected from IQGCCs as case studies, was conducted with the aim of mapping and examining the current operational processes employed by these companies and pinpointing the main challenges existing in these processes. Thereafter, a series of semi-structured interviews were carried out with ten experts selected from various management levels of three IQGCCs in order to test the applicability of the theoretical framework developed from the literature to address the challenges inherent in the IQGCCs’ processes. Based on the experts’ responses, the theoretical framework was refined and then further validated through four more semi-structured interviews to produce the final recommended transformational organisational framework for IQGCCs. 
The study empirically uncovered a number of challenges and impediments inherent in the IQGCCs’ current practices that need to be overcome if their performances are to be enhanced. Many reasons were also identified and grouped together as underpinning causes of the current challenges and barriers to efficiency. The study also showed that the IQGCCs could solve most of the identified challenges through shifting their focus from a traditional functional orientation to a business process orientation. To facilitate this, the study produced a transformational organisational framework that acts as a roadmap to streamline and continuously improve Iraqi QGCCs’ core business processes and, ultimately, institute the business process’ principles within these companies.

A transformational organisational framework for improving Iraqi quasi-governmental construction companies' performance

This paper aims to develop a multi-criteria decision model for the purpose of ERP vendor selection. To tackle the multi-criteria nature and the presence of both qualitative and quantitative factors, Grey-based model was proposed. Grey theory was utilised as it can effectively solve the multi-criteria decision making problems with small datasets. The major contributions of this work have been summarised as follows: development and implementation of a multi-criteria decision model for ERP vendor selection; group based decision making for comparing among attributes and ERP alternatives and efficient use of the concept of grey numbers to facilitate the solution of the model for SMEs in Qatar. The proposed method will help information system managers to weigh the ERP alternatives before actually implementing them, which will in turn save money and time.

A Grey-based approach for ERP vendor selection in small and medium enterprises in Qatar

This paper aims to study the critical success factors (CSF) of knowledge management (KM) in Iranian urban water and sewage companies (IUWSC) using interpretive structural modeling (ISM)-decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) method.,Through the literature review among many key factors of KM success, nine factors were selected as the main factors. After confirming the related indices by industry experts, a questionnaire was distributed among them for determining the relationship between the relevant components. Using ISM-DEMATEL approach, a structural model was formed and then the causal relationship among factors was visualized through a cause-effect relationship diagram.,The analysis of the results showed that among the studied factors, strategies and goals would have the greatest impact on success of KM implementation and senior management support, and teamwork and organizational culture are other CSFs of KM in IUWSC. In the end, the author’s proposed model for implementation of KM was presented based on the results for the status quo of the studied community.,The set of CSFs can act as a guideline for organizations to ensure that basic factors and issues are covered during implementation KM. Moreover, it provides a clue for effective development of KM in a stepwise approach.,This survey is probably the first to provide an integrated view of CSFs for implementation KM in IUWSC. It is hoped to give valuable information to help this business sector to accomplish KM effectively.

Identifying and ranking CSFs for KM implementation in urban water and sewage companies using ISM-DEMATEL technique

Purpose – As the suppliers of any organization are considered as the strategic partners and taken as the integral part of the supply chain network, hence it is very crucial decision to select the suppliers in order to get the competitive edge. Whenever, any organization select its suppliers then organization evaluates every supplier with respect to certain criteria, which are already listed in the organization’s policies. Since supplier selection is based on the evaluation of various attributes of each alternative; therefore this problem is a multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) problem. The purpose of this paper is to propose a model for selecting the best supplier. Design/methodology/approach – This paper reports the implementation of grey theory to choose the appropriate supplier with uncertain information. Grey values have been used to give the ratings and weightage to various criteria which are being used to evaluate the different supplier alternatives. And finally the grey possibility degree has b...

Supplier selection using grey theory: a case study from Indian banking industry

An application of Soft System Methodology

An integrated approach of critical success factors (CSFs) and grey relational analysis for ranking KM systems

Energy and exergy analyses of a hybrid system integrating solar-driven organic Rankine cycle, multi-effect distillation, and reverse osmosis desalination systems

M. Reza Mehregan

Papers

An application of Soft System Methodology

An integrated approach of critical success factors (CSFs) and grey relational analysis for ranking KM systems

Energy and exergy analyses of a hybrid system integrating solar-driven organic Rankine cycle, multi-effect distillation, and reverse osmosis desalination systems

Techno-economic, and environmental evaluations of a novel cogeneration system based on solar energy and cryptocurrency mining

Technical and economic modeling and optimization of a Ford-Philips engine for power production