Context/Background The fast development of digitalisation, Industry 4.0 tools and working practices have had a significant impact on the performance of Supply Chain in recent years, and this will continue in the future. Digitalization has the potential to support contact-free operations in HEI-s and business companies, which have crucial importance under restrictions caused by COVID-19 or climate change conditions. Objectives To benefit, it is vital to improving the curricula and in-service training process of Supply Chain towards digitalisation. The education of new graduates will give them the readiness to work in a digitally supported operational environment for all fields of Supply Chains. The project also develops remote international teaching and learning environment, piloted in partner HEI-s. Number and Profile of Participants: TTK University of Applied Science - TTK Vytautas Magnus University - VMU REZEKNES TEHNOLOGIJU AKADEMIJA - RTA TTK will cover procurement, RTA manufacturing and VMU logistics sector competencies. IO 1 Activities. Research design and methodology, interview questions and instructions, will be prepared by VMU. Each partner will execute literature analysis as well as interviews by preparing national reports of findings. Each university will collect at least 20 interviewees from at least 15 enterprises. The interviewees include managers, human resource managers, engineers and technicians, skilled workers. The questions of interviews are grouped around 3 main topics: 1) implications of the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) for the technological, ergonomic, organisational and ethical changes of the work processes; 2) implications of the work process changes brought by the 4IR for the competence needs; 3) possibilities of competence development in the enterprises, VET and higher education establishments in the conditions of the 4IR. IO 2 Activities. To realise the over whole structure and complexity of Supply Chain DSCM 4.0 module will be supported by AS-IS Business Processes Templates (BPT). Partner HEIs will develop BPT accordingly to the specific needs of organisations: To demonstrate processes digitalisation by applying 4IR tools partner universities teachers and students will develop TO-BE BPT. Partner universities will develop the practical case study materials by using common Enterprise Resource Planning systems (ERP), simulation and analysis tools during formal learning. For example, the materials procured by TTK students will be available in common ERP systems as components for RTA students. The materials and finished items will be delivered through ERP orders by VMU. IO3 Activities Each university is responsible for the development of two introductory-level courses 3ECTS and three advanced level courses, supported by TO-BE business processes. Partners will jointly develop fifteen 3ECTS e-courses of DSCM 4.0 module with expectations of the labour market in the context of full digitalisation of management and operating supply Chains. Each course will have lecturers from each partner university and will be integrated into existing curriculums. National versions for partner countries will be developed by partner universities. Methodology Analysis of the implications of the 4IR for the work processes of retail trade, logistics and manufacturing consist of 2 main stages. In the first stage, there will be analysed existing literature, research reports and strategic documents containing information about the implications of the 4IR for the different work processes in the above-mentioned sectors. In the second stage, there will be executed qualitative research by interviewing representatives of the enterprises working in the fields of retail trade, logistics and manufacturing It is planned to use the 4+1 levels to describe the BPT: L0 - Supply Chain map; L1 - the main processes of the supply chain, ex. Procurement, Manufacturing, Sales, Logistics etc. L2 - the phases of the main processes. For example. Product design, Production planning, Manufacturing, Quality control, etc. L3 - the main activities that are performed in each process phase. For example, Preparation of Demand, Master Production Scheduling, Material Requirement Planning activities. L4 - the tasks and how they are supported. For example, the collection of data for demand calculation. Results Competence matrices for the selected work processes of procurement, logistics and manufacturing discussed and updated by all partners. Structural descriptions of the changing competence needs in the analysed work processes. AS-IS and TO-BE BPT developed accordingly to the specific needs of procurement, manufacturing and logistics organisations. DSCM 4.0 module longer-term benefits. Attracts international students Enhance collaboration between companies and partner universities Provides basement for joined International curriculum Teachers provide Online international in-service training
The project aimed to modernise the existing curriculums and in-service training process of Supply Chain by bringing in digitalisation skills. We planned to involve companies to clarify which digitalisation skills are required by business entities today. Based on the information received project partners targeted to develop the Digital Supply Chain Management module (45 ECTS), which consists of 15 courses to improve digitalisation skills in three countries. The target was to teach the module courses fully in an e-environment, which enabled partners the virtual involvement where the teaching staff were rotated between the partner universities. The delivered courses are intended to prepare students to work in a digitally supported operational environment for all fields of Supply Chains. To validate the skills provided, partners planned to invite selected students to participate in analysing company problems and developing realistic proposals for the digitalisation of companies. Project partners aimed to develop a remote international teaching and learning environment. We planned that the envisioned environment would support teaching & and learning activities and teaching of courses in HEIs during and after the project.
The DIGSCM 4.0 project was established to improve the curricula and in-service training process of the Supply Chain towards digitalisation. The need was to improve the curricula and prepare the new graduates to work in a digitally supported operational environment for all fields of Supply Chains. For this purpose, there was a need to identify which tools today were used efficiently for business goals achievement in the companies and research the current level of the company's digitalisation in the Baltic states to modernise teaching of students to use and apply the relevant modern useful digital supply chain management tools in practice. The project develop a remote international teaching and learning environment DSCM 4.0 module, which consists of 15 courses, piloted in partner HEIs. HEIs partners developed a novel Competencies matrix and priority index for curriculum content development and Component Organised Learning (COL) approach to reuse the created materials for different fields. The materials were stored to the RTA Moodle webpage dedicated to DIGSCM 4.0 project. For piloting the environment, partners aimed to invite students from all HEI to pass the courses and participate in skills validation activities.