Applying a factoriented knowledge reference model to supplychain management

1
Applying a fact-oriented knowledge reference
model to supply-chain management

• Peter Bollen
• Department of Organization and Strategy
• Faculty of Economics and Business Administration
• University of Maastricht
• 6200 MD Maastricht, the Netherlands
• p.bollen_at_os.unimaas.nl

2
Overview

• In this presentation we will show how
  fact-orientation can be used as a knowledge
  structuring approach for verbalizable knowledge
  domains, e.g. knowledge that is contained in
  articles, text books and instruction manuals
  further to be referred to as subject matter
  within the university subject of business
  administration.

3
Introduction

• For centuries, printed books have been the main
  source for conveying knowledge or subject
  matter from know-ledge sender to knowledge
  receiver. In the 80s hyper-text, became a
  real and feasible way of structuring
  knowledge, using state-of-the-art software, e.g
  Apples Hypercard one of the cradles of the
  world-wide web.
• How does this different way, in which knowledge
  is structured help us in the education of
  students
• Obviously, it will allow us to define individual
  learning routes through a set of defining
  concepts.
• On the other hand, such a notion, is deeply in
  contrast with the way in which (PBL) courses are
  structured still instruction centered around a
  printed text book in which the structure of the
  subject-matter is fixed !

4
Introduction (continued)

• A subject matter has its own intrinsic structure
  (Nijssen Bijlsma, 2006). Educational programs
  on a subject matter therefore, need to enable
  students to access such a structure or
  conceptual schema. Unfortunately, in many
  available descriptions of a subject matter, e.g.
  text books, lecture notes, manuals, wikis, the
  intrinsic structure is (at best) hidden among
  non-structural descriptions of such a subject
  matter. In this presentation we will discuss a
  fact-oriented subject-matter structuring
  approach and apply it on three different text
  book representations of subject-matter for the
  field of supply chain management.
• We will assess these specific representations
  using a fact-oriented knowledge reference model.
  Earlier work that discussed the application of a
  predecessor to this KRM on the field of logistics
  can be found in (Bollen, 2006 Bollen Nijssen,
  1995).

5
The Knowledge Reference Model

• In most, if not all cases, a verbalizable
  knowledge source is a document that often is
  incomplete, informal, ambiguous, possibly
  redundant and possibly inconsistent. As a result
  of applying the fact-oriented knowledge
  extracting procedure (KEP) (Nijssen Bijlsma,
  2005 Bollen, 2002), we will yield a document
  that only contains structured knowledge or a
  knowledge grammar which structures verbalizable
  knowledge into the following elements (knowledge
  reference model (KRM))

6
The Knowledge Reference Model (ctd.)

• We will yield a document that structures
  verbalizable knowledge into the following
  elements (knowledge reference model (KRM))
• Knowledge domain sentences
• 2) Definitions and naming conventions for
  concepts used in domain sentences
• 3) Knowledge domain fact types including sentence
  group templates
• 4) Population state (transition) constraints for
  the knowledge domain
• 5) Derivation rules that specify how specific
  domain sentences can be derived from other domain
  sentences.
• 6) Rules that specify what fact instances can be
  inserted, updated or deleted.
• 7) Event rules that specify when a fact is
  derived from other facts or when a fact must be
  inserted , updated or deleted.

7
The Knowledge Reference Model (ctd.)

• A KRM of a complete text book would contain
  hundreds, possibly thousands of concept
  definitions, naming conventions, fact types,
  population constraints, derivation rules and
  event rules. The knowledge extracting procedure
  (KEP) specifies how we can transform an informal,
  mostly incomplete, mostly undetermined, possibly
  redundant and possibly inconsistent description
  of domain knowledge into the following classes
  informal comment, non-verbalizable knowledge and
  verbalizable knowledge to be classified into
  types 1 through 7 of the KRM.

8
Application of the KRM

• We will show the KRMs, which are a result of the
  application of the fact-oriented KEP on the
  content of textbooks on the operations
  management. The choices of text books that cover
  the subject of supply chain management as such is
  pure for illustrative purposes, in terms of the
  KRM and does not imply any implication, in terms
  of good or bad, text books, but merely shows
  the difference in the presentation of similar
  subject matter in terms of the elements in the
  KRM.

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10

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12
Evaluation

• An interesting observation from these three
  list of definitions for the EOQ subject area, is
  the extent in which relatively remote concepts
  are defined. The extensive definition of cost
  types (e.g. incremental, common costs) in text
  book C, for example, illustrates that the author,
  deems it very important for SCM students to have
  a precise knowledge of these concepts and how
  they contribute to the definition of the
  ordering- and carrying costs. If we compare the
  treatment of this concept with the text books A
  and B we can see that in A, it is left implicit
  how these ordering costs must be determined
  precisely. In text book B, however, we find some
  kind of in-between approach in which, the authors
  do not introduce the advanced cost concepts
  from C, but where they try to define the notion
  of commonality versus incrementality in the
  definition itself (notably, the definition of
  ordering cost).

13
Evaluation (ctd.)

• One, of the most important assumptions, in
  applying the EOQ models in a practical setting is
  the notion that these models and their
  constituting variables are defined on an item
  or SKU level. From practical teaching
  experience whereby text books A and B, have been
  used, I can recall, a work-out of a case study,
  in which the students applied the concept of EOQ
  on an aggregated level (using text book B).
  They considered the aggregate demand (ranging
  over all SKUs) in their analysis and provided
  one EOQ for all items combined. Such a
  mis-application of the EOQ concept, I never
  encountered in the course where text book A has
  been used.

14
Evaluation (ctd.)

• Inspecting the list of concept definitions for
  the text books mentioned, can explain the
  afore-mentioned phenomena. The concept of item
  or SKU in the context of the EOQ can not be
  found in the list of concept definitions for text
  book B. In text book C, the notion of the
  application of EOQ to individual items, is
  conveyed through the description of the example
  on page 282. This basically means that it is not
  possible to verbalize ground facts between
  instances of concepts, if no concept of
  individual item or SKU has been defined.

15
Verbalizing text book A

• The item having item name bird feeder has a
  weekly sales volume of 18 units per week.
• The item having item name bird-feeder has a
  value of 60 dollars per unit.
• The item having item name bird-feeder has a
  cost of ordering of 45 dollars per order.
• The item having item name bird-feeder has an
  annual holding cost percentage of the value of
  25.
• The organization having organization name
  Museum has an operating time of 52 weeks per
  year.
• The item having item name bird feeder has a
  yearly sales volume of 936 units per year.
• The item having item name bird-feeder has an
  annual holding cost amount of 15 dollars/unit.
• The economic order quantity for the item having
  item name bird- feeder is 74.94 units .

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Knowledge structure diagram of text book A
17
Knowledge structure diagram of text book B
18
Using the Knowledge Reference Model to Compare
Subject Matters

• When the relative amount of informal comment
  and non-verbalizable knowledge in such a
  knowledge field is large we can consider the
  knowledge field to be of the phenomenological
  type. This normally points at knowledge fields
  that are beginning to develop and in which no
  clearly agreed upon relevant concepts and their
  definitions exist. When the relative amount of
  informal comment and non-verbalizable knowledge
  of the subject matter, on the other hand, is
  small, the knowledge domain can be considered
  relatively structured, this means that basic
  domain concepts are agreed upon and their
  definitions are known.

19
Using the Knowledge Reference Model to Compare
Subject Matters (ctd.)

• Furthermore, semantic relationships between
  those concepts exist and are known to the extent
  that they can be verbalized. In the latter types
  of knowledge domains, it is possible that more
  complex rules, laws, derivation rules and event
  rules can be defined. The former analysis
  naturally applies, in those situations in which a
  text book is well-written from an educational
  point of view. In some cases the actual quality
  of writing can be insufficient, which can lead to
  a phenomenological text book for a very
  well-structured knowledge domain or a text book
  in which the order of comprehension for the
  introduction and definition of concepts is
  practically random. Some noteworthy differences
  on the presentation of the same subject in three
  different text books, have been illustrated. The
  fact-oriented KRM provides more ways to capture
  knowledge than the traditional graphical tools
  for organizing and representing knowledge, like
  for example conceptual graphs (Sowa, 1984) and
  concept maps (Novak Canas, 2007).

20
Application of Fact-Orientation in Instructional
Design

• In the past 15 years, a large number of students
  on a polytechnical level in the field of computer
  science, business administration and law have
  been trained using educational material expressed
  in a knowledge reference model format based upon
  standard text books on the subject matter.
• The time investment needed for the students in
  such an accelerated learning program turned out
  to be substantially lower than in a
  conventional educational setting.

21
Concluding Remarks

• The fact-oriented approach has its roots in the
  conceptual modeling school for information
  systems development and database schema design.
  In this presentation we have extended the
  playing field of this approach as a knowledge
  structuring approach, illustrated by a sample of
  a subject within the academic field of business
  administration. The size and complexity of the
  implicit structure of a subject can range from
  structures that can be fully modeled by a small
  number of definitions, via models of implicit
  structures that contain a large number of
  definitions and fact types, to complex
  knowledge reference models in which a large
  variety of population state (transition)
  constraints exist eventually having derivation
  rules, and event rules.
• The application of the fact-oriented knowledge
  reference model that is proposed in this article
  will lead to a more productive and effective
  design of educational systems, by improving the
  internal structure of the subject matter.