Abstract

Engineering changes (ECs) are unavoidable in the engineer-to-order (ETO) environment. ECs improve products and bring additional profit to ETO companies if effectively negotiated and implemented. Despite the abundant relevant literature on EC management, ETO companies still report cost overruns owing to ECs. Here, a multiple case study conducted in a Norwegian shipbuilding group was used to investigate the factors affecting EC implementation performance in complex ETO environments. The factors were examined by a cross-case analysis of six ECs occurring in the shipbuilding projects. Eleven factors were identified and analyzed; their impact on EC cost was assessed by experts. The factors were ranked; the ranking shows three factors having the highest impact: time of EC occurrence, competence and experience of engineering and production staff, and degree of vertical integration in a supply chain. Finally, the study recommends EC management practices and tools to reduce the negative impacts of the identified factors.

摘要

在按订单设计 (ETO) 环境中，工程变更 (EC) 是不可避免的。如果有效协商和实施，EC 会改进产品并为 ETO 公司带来额外的利润。尽管有大量关于 EC 管理的相关文献，但 ETO 公司仍然报告由于 EC 造成的成本超支。在这里，一个在挪威造船集团进行的多案例研究被用来调查影响复杂 ETO 环境中 EC 实施性能的因素。通过对造船项目中发生的六个 EC 的跨案例分析来检查这些因素。11个因素被识别和分析；专家评估了它们对 EC 成本的影响。对因素进行了排名；该排名显示了三个影响最大的因素：EC 发生时间、工程和生产人员的能力和经验、以及供应链中的垂直整合程度。最后，该研究推荐了 EC 管理实践和工具，以减少已识别因素的负面影响。