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Presents the thoughts on decision processes of Chester I. Barnard, one of the century’s greatest management theorists. Includes his classic article, “Mind in everyday affairs”; his unpublished book, “The Significance of Decisive Behaviour in Social Action”; his correspondence with Herbert Simon, and significant comments found in his personal papers.

The paper reflects on the development of a medical product using rapid prototyping technologies and customer interaction through a quality function deployment (QFD) approach to speed up the process, and to result in customer satisfaction. The purpose of the specific medical product was to develop a device for fixing an Endo‐tracheal (ET) tube in a patient during anaesthesia, as it is common for an ET tube to move and/or become dislodged due to various extraneous reasons. If the tube deviates from the correct position it can cause one or both lungs to collapse, which can be fatal. The paper reviews how the anaesthetist's idea, which was to develop a product that could hold an ET tube in place in a more secure manner than is possible with current technologies, was brought to fruition through customer interaction.

Using an action‐research approach, the design evolved through series of design concepts, which through customer interaction contributed to a total optimized design. Virtual and physical prototypes, together with silicone mouldings were used as part of the customer interaction.

As with any new product, some functional parts were needed to conduct tests, which in turn would help to prove the product, and hence, the design. Traditionally this meant the manufacturing of a hard tool and proving of the design through trial and error. Hard tooling allows for some small changes to be made, but if the changes are radical a new tool will have to be designed and manufactured.

Following a developmental approach through the application of various types/stages of prototyping (such as virtual prototypes), revolutionised this process by simplifying and accelerating the development iteration process – it also developed a new version/paradigm of QFD.

Opposed to traditional forms of QFD where customer inputs are gathered through questionnaires, this case study proved that functional models provide an efficient client‐feedback, through constant involvement in the development process, as well as evaluation of the systematic progress.

The case study shows that experts in other disciplines can become involved in the product development process through the availability of functional prototypes, and builds on previous work to introduce a concept of customer interaction with functional prototypes.

Natural disasters and other crises present methodological challenges to organizational researchers. While these challenges are well canvassed in the literature, less attention has been paid to understanding how distinct crisis events may present, not only unique challenges, but also important opportunities for research. In this chapter, we draw on our collective experience of conducting post-earthquake research and compare this with the COVID-19 pandemic context in order to identify and discuss the inherent vulnerabilities associated with disaster studies and the subsequent methodological challenges and opportunities that researchers might encounter. Adopting a critical perspective, the chapter grapples with some of the more contentious issues associated with research in a disaster and crisis context including aspects of stakeholder engagement, ethics, reciprocity, inequality, and vulnerability.

This chapter is dedicated to presenting the essential features and technical capabilities of the prototype ‘Integrated early price assessment system’, with an overview of how the machine learning system interacts with an expert evaluation system. The functional structure of the prototype’s operation is presented by means of an overview of the prototype’s communication flow diagram.

The last decade has seen major advances in rapid prototyping (RP), with it becoming a multi‐disciplinary technology, crossing various research fields, and connecting continents. Process and material advancements open up new applications and manufacturing (through RP) is serving non‐traditional industries. RP technology is used to support rapid product development (RPD). The purpose of this paper is to describe how the Integrated Product Development research group of the Central University of Technology, Free State, South Africa is applying various CAD/CAM/RP technologies to support a medical team from the Grootte Schuur and Vincent Palotti hospitals in Cape Town, to save limbs – as a last resort at a stage where conventional medical techniques or practices may not apply any longer.

The paper uses action research to justify the proposal of a new method to use CAD/CAM/RP related technologies to substitute lost/damaged bone regions through the use of CT to CAD to.STL manipulation.

A case study where RP related technologies were used to support medical product development for a patient with severe injuries from a road accident is discussed.

The paper considers current available technologies, and discusses new advancements in direct metal freeform fabrication, and its potential to revolutionise the medical industry.

The paper seeks to review some of the main operational problems of wastewater treatment plants designed for nutrient removal. It aims to pay particular attention to bulking and foaming due to massive growth of filamentous organisms, failure or non‐optimal operation of secondary settling tanks, and compliance with more stringent effluent requirements.

The discussion of the major operational problems is based on a thorough review of the available literature and own experiences with more than 80 wastewater treatment plants.

To suppress the undesirable growth of filamentous organisms and to achieve an all‐year round stable operation of secondary settling tanks several design options for improvement have been developed based on the experience gained so far. The most desirable option for improving the operation of a single treatment plant is to a large extent site specific. Beside adopting the design procedures also operational measures are possible.

The paper recommends several practical options for optimising the performance of wastewater treatment plants with regard to the aforementioned problems. These recommendations are based on proved practical experience and, therefore, may act as a flexible toolbox for an individually tailored design or operation of the plant in order to avoid and/or combat the problems during operation.

The described options for improvement the operation are based on long lasting practical experience with large scale wastewater treatment plants. They can be used by any operator of such plants for solving some of the major problems of modern wastewater treatment plants.

The general public and professionals from a range of backgrounds have increasingly become interested in autism spectrum disorders. This interest is particularly relevant to learning disability practitioners. Both autism and learning disabilities are independently associated with increased risk of mental health problems. Thus, when a person has learning disabilities and an autism spectrum disorder, a comprehensive assessment for mental health problems is of paramount importance. This paper provides an overview of the assessment of mental health problems in adults and children with neurodevelopmental disorders. The general assessment principles are outlined followed by assessment issues related to specific conditions such as psychoses, mood disorders and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Finally conclusions on the clinical implications are drawn.