| The use of modeling and simulation as decision tools in service delivery systems has been growing rapidly. Modeling and simulation methodologies have been used in order to capture the interrelationships among the factors and variables involved in resource management of service organizations. Although numerous initiatives have been put in place at both strategic and tactical levels in order to address the problems of escalating operational costs and increasing demand for quality of services, there is no reported general model that factors in the involvement of the principal stakeholders (management, staff, and end-users) in all stages of problem formulation and model building. Moreover, previous initiatives tended to provide optimal solutions that may be beneficial for one or more departments being investigated, but not necessarily for the entire organization as one whole integrated delivery system. In this thesis a new framework for improving resource management is proposed. The underlying principle of the new approach is based on the participation and involvement of all stakeholders at the early stages of model development. Additionally, the modeling process is an iterative one that is governed by the views and inputs of the stakeholders rather than by pre-specified requirements and objectives. Another important aspect of the proposed approach is that it provides a mechanism for evaluating system performance and identifying activities that have considerable impact on performance as well as activities that have minimum added value within the service delivery system. |
