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When considering the factors for development of a cell culture assay there are two major parts that need to be considered: the cell growth conditions and the cell treatment conditions. Many times variables may differ for the two parts of the assay so they need to be kept as separate parts of the assay when considering the factors. In the table below is a list of the factors that one would consider when running an experimental design to develop an assay. The range of the factor is based on literature reference, existing protocols, American Type Culture Collection (ATCC) recommendations, etc. The rationale for why these factors are detailed below.

This course advances the concept that humans and their organizations are an integral part of the engineering paradigm and that it is up to engineering to learn how to better integrate considerations of people into engineering systems of all types. This course focuses this concept on the assessment and management of the risks associated with engineered systems during their life-cycle (concept development through decommissioning). Risks (likelihoods and consequences) are addressed in the contexts of the desired quality from an engineered system including serviceability (fitness for purpose), safety (freedom from undue exposure to harm), compatibility (on time, on budget, with happy customers including the environment), and durability (freedom from unexpected degradations in the other quality characteristics). Reliability is introduced to enable assessment of the wide variety of hazards, uncertainties, and variabilities that are present during the life-cycle of an engineered system. Proactive (get ahead of the challenges), Reactive (learn the lessons from successes and failures), and Interactive (realtime assessment and management of unknown knowables and unknown unknowables) strategies are advanced and illustrated to assist engineers in the assessment and management of risks.

The goal? To identify where institutional complexity is an issue, where complexity caused by factors such as a lack of role clarity or poor processes is a problem, and what’s responsible for the complexity in each area. Companies can then boost organizational effectiveness through a combination of two things: removing complexity that doesn’t add value and channeling what’s left to employees who can either handle it naturally or be trained to cope with it.

In this article, we review the experience of a multinational consumer goods manufacturer that applied this approach in several regions and functions and consequently halved the time it needed to make decisions in critical processes.

Armed with the survey data, the manufacturer constructed several “heat maps” to help senior managers pinpoint where, and why, complexity was causing trouble for employees. Each map showed a particular breakdown—a region or function, for example—and how much complexity of various kinds was occurring there, as well as the level of coping skills employees possessed.