Boris Eisenbart

An analysis of functional modeling approaches across disciplines

Abstract Authors across disciplines propose functional modeling as part of systematic design approaches, in order to support and guide designers during conceptual design. The presented research aims at contributing to a better understanding of the diverse functional modeling approaches proposed across disciplines. The article presents a literature review of 41 modeling approaches from a variety of disciplines. The analysis focuses on what is addressed by functional modeling at which point in the proposed conceptual design process (i.e., in which sequence). The gained insights lead to the identification of specific needs and opportunities, which could support the development of an integrated functional modeling approach. The findings suggest that there is no such shared sequence for functional modeling across disciplines. However, a shared functional modeling perspective has been identified across all reviewed disciplines, which could serve as a common basis for the development of an integrated functional modeling approach.

Integrating Different Functional Modeling Perspectives

The paper proposes a modular functional modeling framework, which aims at integrating the different functional modeling perspectives, relevant to different disciplines. The results of two extensive literature studies on diverse functional modeling approaches proposed in a variety of disciplines are consolidated. These studies identified specific needs for an integrated functional modeling approach to support interdisciplinary conceptual design. The presented framework aims at fulfilling these needs. It consists of a variety of associated views, represented through different matrices. This matrix-based representation facilitates the analysis of different functional modeling perspectives and their interdependencies. Finally, the implications of the presented approach are discussed.

The Integrated Function Modelling Framework and its Relation to Function Structures

Abstract Research and industrial practice have produced a host of function models and modeling approaches over the last decades. Each of these is meant to support designers in their design endeavors. Industrial practice is excessively diversified in terms of contextual requirements, aims, and adopted processes; this automatically begs the question which of the existing models should be selected for application in a specific situation. This paper sets out to contribute to this discourse. It strives to benchmark the fairly novel integrated function modeling (IFM) framework against the well-established function structures modeling approach. The paper comparatively investigates the respective capabilities of the approaches, following the benchmarking protocol used earlier in relation to this Special Issue. Function structures are used as reference as they represent one of the most widespread function modeling approaches in research and practice. Both function structures and the IFM framework are exemplarily applied for modeling a glue gun. The gradual generation and refinement of the models is used to showcase their respective benefits and shortcomings. Eventually, the IFM framework is found to excel over function structures in terms of comprehensiveness and support for different types of function analyses. Finally, future research directions are proposed.

Does scheduling matter? When unscheduled decision making results in more effective meetings

Purpose – Managers spend a great deal of time in meetings making decisions critical to organisational success, yet the design aspects of meetings remain largely understudied. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on the potential impact of one critical design aspect of meetings – namely, whether a decision to be taken (or the meeting in general) was scheduled or not – on the use of distributed information, information elaboration, conflict, speed of decision making, and, ultimately, decision-making effectiveness. Design/methodology/approach – The research presented in this paper combines a literature review with empirical data obtained from questionnaires and direct observation of decision making meetings on organisational issues in a hospital. One meeting was scheduled, the other two were unscheduled. A second questionnaire was administered 12 months after the respective decision making meetings to explore and evaluate the efficiency of the decisions made and their implementation. Findings – This pap...

DSM for Modeling and Analyzing Functionality: Views of Practitioners

The paper presents an evaluation study for a DSM-based function modeling framework with practitioners in industry. Questionnaires and open discussion are used in a workshop format to obtain feedback on the framework’s usefulness and practical applicability. It allows flexibly adaptive modeling multiple, inter-related views onto the functionality of (interdisciplinary) systems. The findings suggests a large potential for the framework to support cross-disciplinary design and for using the inherent matrices to do function analysis. The paper highlights the views of the practitioners on the strengths and potentials for further improvement.