João Gilberto Mendes

Dos Reis

Pedro De Oliveira

José Costa Neto

José Alves Fusco
email: jpafusco@uol.com

Sivanilza Teixeira Machado

João Gilberto Mendes Dos Reis

Pedro Luiz De Oliveira

Costa Neto²

José Paulo

Alves Fusco

Development of Agile Supply Chains in Brazil

Keywords: Agile Supply Chain, Supply Networks, Developing Countries, Brazil

scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Introduction

Competition among companies increases as it moves out of the organizational context and includes the supply network. This kind of competition is no longer between individual firms, but rather between networks of companies [START_REF] Christopher | Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Creating Value-Adding Networks[END_REF], [START_REF] Chopra | Supply Chain Management: Strategy, Planning and Operation[END_REF]. Thus, supply networks that are able to better manage their agents will be more successful in the market.

In fact, the condition that the value attributed to the product by the consumer in retail sales will be responsible for the profitability of the entire network is ever more evident because organizations that manage their network in an efficient and joint manner have better results than organizations that are involved in a competitive battle within their own networks, with results searched by each firm separately [START_REF] Chopra | Supply Chain Management: Strategy, Planning and Operation[END_REF], [START_REF] Corrêa | Gestão de Redes de Suprimento: Integrando Cadeias de Suprimento no Mundo Globalizado[END_REF].

In this context, there have been diverse studies of networks, correlating the strategies applied in them to the fact of the products being innovative or functional [START_REF] Christopher | Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Creating Value-Adding Networks[END_REF], [START_REF] Chopra | Supply Chain Management: Strategy, Planning and Operation[END_REF], [START_REF] Corrêa | Gestão de Redes de Suprimento: Integrando Cadeias de Suprimento no Mundo Globalizado[END_REF], [START_REF] Fisher | What is the Right Supply Chain for your Product? Harward Business Review[END_REF], [START_REF] Lee | Aligning Supply Chain Strategies with Product Uncertainties[END_REF], [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF].

Functional products are those products that satisfy the basic needs of the consumer, that do not change much with the course of time, and that have stable and predictable demands with long life cycles. Innovative products are those products that, through innovation and technology, become popular at certain times and generate an additional attraction for the consumer to buy them. This increases the profit margins. Nevertheless, their demand is unpredictable, their life cycle is short (some months) and the companies live in innovation cycles [START_REF] Corrêa | Gestão de Redes de Suprimento: Integrando Cadeias de Suprimento no Mundo Globalizado[END_REF], [START_REF] Fisher | What is the Right Supply Chain for your Product? Harward Business Review[END_REF].

These products are bound up with four types of strategies: lean supply networks, which aim at efficiency of the network and reduction of its losses; flexibility, which involves the capacity of the network in being flexible in two or more actors of the network; responsiveness, related to the response capacity of the network in meeting a demand generated by the market; and, agility, which consists of anticipating the needs of the market through innovations. While the first two strategies are related to functional products, the latter two are related to innovative products (Figure 1) [START_REF] Fisher | What is the Right Supply Chain for your Product? Harward Business Review[END_REF], [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF]. With the course of time, innovative products tend to become functional products and thus tend to move from an agile strategy to a lean strategy. Although organizations can participate in different types of networks and have different types of strategies according to their product portfolio, a trend is observed for these organizations of concentrate their products and efforts in one type of segment. In Table 1 are shown, based in references such [START_REF] Corrêa | Gestão de Redes de Suprimento: Integrando Cadeias de Suprimento no Mundo Globalizado[END_REF], [START_REF] Fisher | What is the Right Supply Chain for your Product? Harward Business Review[END_REF] and [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF], characteristics of some aspects of products according to their classification on functional or innovative.

Demand Uncertainty

Low

This paper seeks to address the relationship of agile companies with developing countries. In this paper, specifically, Brazil is under study, as an integrand w of a group of countries including also Russia, India, China and South Africa called BRICS, an economic term criated to designate the most promising developing countries on the international scene [START_REF] O´neill | Building better global economics BRICS[END_REF].

Methodology

The purpose of this study is to show that agile companies have increasingly sought to sell their technologies in Brazil, but they see the Brazilian market only as a consumer market and not as a potential source of technological development. Brazilian consumption of technologies has increased due to the stability of the currency and the economy; nevertheless, these technologies arise from international conglomerates that do not invest in the country as a source of development. This research is of an exploratory nature and its purpose is to examine the proposed theme in the light of scientific knowledge [START_REF] Gil | Como Elaborar Projetos de Pesquisa[END_REF]. Thus, this study was carried out as based on the following steps: a) A study regarding the concepts of agile supply chains and their relationship to innovative producers; b) A study of two multinational companies present in Brazil considered to be agile based on the methodology developed by Reis and Costa Neto [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF] which involves identifying if the products are functional or innovative based on Table 1, and then classifying them according to the supply chains presented in Figure 1; c) A survey of the 100 largest companies in Brazil and their classification from the point of view of innovative and functional products and of supply chain strategies, also based on the methodology developed by Reis and Costa Neto [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF]; d) Discussion of the data collected based on the development of agile supply chains in Brazil.

Agile Supply Chain

Among the strategies of supply networks, one may perhaps be considered as standing out from the thus, which is the agile supply chains. This is due in large part to technological innovations, reduction of the product life cycle, variety of products and increase in international competition, together with a change in the supply and demand relationship and changes in consumer profile. Agile supply networks can be considered an evolution of agile manufacturing, which is a structure within which each company can develop its own business strategies and products, being sustained by three pillars: organization, people and technology [START_REF] Kidd | Agile Manufacturing: Forging New Frontiers[END_REF].

The English professor of the Cranfield School of Management, Martin Christopher, was one of the first to introduce the concept of agility in the supply chain [START_REF] Christopher | Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Creating Value-Adding Networks[END_REF], [START_REF] Christopher | The Agile Supply Chain: Competing in Volatile Markets[END_REF]. From this work followed a sequence of studies published in various periodicals which are recognized as basic for the conceptual foundation of the agile supply chain [START_REF] Christopher | The Agile Supply Chain: Competing in Volatile Markets[END_REF], [START_REF] Ismail | An Balanced Approach to Building Agile Supply Chains[END_REF], [START_REF] Li | Supply Chain Agility: Scale Development[END_REF], [START_REF] Wu | Formulating Partner Selection Criteria for Agile Supply Chains: a Dempster-shafer Belief Acceptability Optimisation Approach[END_REF].

The idea of agility in the context of supply chain management focuses on the context of the response to the market, being driven by demand and having shorter lead time as a characteristic based on information [START_REF] Christopher | Logistics and Supply Chain Management: Creating Value-Adding Networks[END_REF].

Agility Supply Chain (ASC) fits the capacity of a network and all its members for rapid alignment in responding to the dynamic and turbulent requirements of demand from the network. Its main focus is on the structure of the business environment, which should have an adequate level of agility to respond to changes, as well as to proactively anticipate these changes and find new emergent opportunities [START_REF] Ismail | An Balanced Approach to Building Agile Supply Chains[END_REF].

Results and Discussion

Diagnostic Products and Equipment Company

The diagnostic products company is a subsidiary of a multinational founded in the 19th Century. Present in Brazil for over 100 years, the German company is active in severed areas and product segments. The subsidiary is responsible for manufacture, sale and distribution of products and systems for laboratory diagnosis, which involves reagents for in vitro diagnosis and equipments. In Brazil it only carries out sales and distribution of products from manufacturing plants located abroad. Considering Table 1, some characteristics presented by the company indicate the condition of its products as innovative.

Production is made in lots, aiming to ensure quality control of the products and the stability of the active ingredients and its preservatives. Nevertheless, theses materials are produced based on forecasts of demand. Company products have a volatile demand depending on negotiations with distributors and sales to public agencies. Product life cycle is about 12 months. The contribution margin is from 58 to 60%.

Final price of products may vary for each customer through what the company calls "transfer price", which are specific tables for each customer adjusted annually. Product variety is of around 300 items. Average margin of error between the demand forecast and manufactured products was 65% and absolute error was around 35%. The stockout rate, when it occurs, is at a percentage from 2% to 4%; nevertheless, the company operates with safety stocks to reduce or eliminate this loss. End-of-season markdown of the product is from 30% to 40%; however, as the contribution margin is high, the initial earnings compensate for the reduction, and they pay for investments in technology.

The lead time up to delivery is 45 days. Although this characteristic is that of a functional product, it is fully justifiable through the global condition of the supply network and importation of the finished product, since the factory is not in Brazil but rather in the United States of America.

In regard to supply uncertainties and demand uncertainties that allow the classification of the company supply network strategy, the first one is considered high, due to the difficulty of supply sources and customs barriers, while the second one is high because the demand frequently changes, especially in the cases of government public bidding and orders from large customers.

Innovative products and demand uncertainties indicate that the company is in an agility stage, i.e., it may be considered as an agile supply chain through adopting agility measures and developing innovations.

Industrial Instrumentation and Technology Company

The technology company is focused on innovation as a competitive factor. Founded in 1976 in the USA at the peak of the information systems revolution, it has two factories, one in North America and the other in Europe, as well as an outsourcing and consolidation company in Asia.

It is currently active in 40 countries, including Brazil, where it has a business unit for distributing its equipment and solutions in the country, including technical support services. The company has 5280 employees, with 1529 of them working with innovation, in which it invests a fifth of its sales revenue.

The foreign market of the company represents 61% of its sales revenue. The main products sold by the company involve modular measurement and hardware control systems, software and integrated platforms, which are used by scientists and engineers in projects, tests and control of processes and products. Its products are sold in a market that currently amounts to around 13 billion dollars.

These systems are applicable to telephony, the automotive sector, the semiconductor, electronics and aeronautics industries, etc. The products are distributed worldwide from its stocks, generated according to estimated demand and orders.

Company demand, although it has experienced a growth trend in recent years, as volatile, with constant variation from one quarter to the next, without establishment of a predictable sequence, being subject to diverse external and internal factors. Product life cycle has a mean duration of up to two years, due to being subject to an industry under great transformation, which is the information services and electronics industry.

The contribution margin of products is greater than 20%. Gross profit, which involves company income, deducting all costs and expenses, was around 77%. The made-to-order nature of the products for companies generates high variation of products per segment, although they have similar and modular foundations.

The volatile demand of the company results in a large number of products in obsolescence, as company strategy is concentrated on agility; in other words, it prefers to have loss of stocks instead of not being able to meet market needs, especially because the profitability rate is high. Causes of obsolescence are technological changes, demand, engineering, and emerging standards of the new industry and competitors.

Due to the need for rapid responses, the company has a low stockout rate of finished products because it generates stocks in large quantities to keep the market supplied. Another factor that leads to speed in service is that as the company clients are other companies and not the final consumer; so it only receives the payment from 30 to 90 days after installation of its equipments, leading the network to become agile in responding to markets. End-of-season markdown cannot be determined because the company understands that it depends on various situations, such as relationship to the market and customers. Analyzing the products of the organization as based on Table 1, it is possible to determine that the products are innovative.

The company has supply uncertainty, for it processes a broad number of components in several markets, such as Europe and Asia. Diverse resources used have limited supply sources, with few participating actors, which represents problems for demand in the business and for product quality and delivery. This represents a problem for manufacturing activities, which may generate additional costs.

The demand forecast is founded on sales estimates based on the economies in which it is active. As demand may vary due to many market conditions, constant review is needed. These demand uncertainties, associated with the supply uncertainty, make the company reorganizes itself in an agile manner to meet the needs of these markets, with time and technological development as fundamental factors.

Agile companies in Brazil

The two studies presented above clearly show the scenario of companies considered agile in relation to the country, i.e., it is a great potential market, but not a source of technological development. In a certain way, these organizations focus on their region of origin and those nearest the supply and labor sources, located in Asia.

Brazil, just as its Portuguese colonizers, has always been a technology purchasing country and not a technology developing one; this is not bound up by a lack of technical knowledge, but rather with the development model based on mineral exports and on the use of land for planting. Brazil is currently one of the main countries for diverse agricultural crops, with yield indexes envied by many countries in the world; nevertheless, the technology employed in its activities, whether in the field, in telecommunications or in industry have their origins of development in other countries.

A reflection of how complicated the situation is can be seen in the fact that high technology and innovation companies have not factories in the country, while the companies that manufacture or assemble products in the country are found in the other three points of network development, which are the efficient, the flexible and the responsive areas. Notice that this last type of network has advanced more in recent years due to the arrival of some technology companies and the development of domestic companies that deal with patents already established or not on the initial phase of innovation.

Analyzing the 100 largest companies in Brazil in the year 2012 [15], 42% of them are in the services area; most of the theirs are base industries that work with functional products in mature chains in which elimination of waste and the lean strategy are fundamental, such as mining and iron and steel plants.

The automobile industry corresponds to ten companies, in which nine are vehicle assemblers and one is a manufacturer. These companies are in a flexible stage and work with consolidated products with little embedded technology. Vehicles with the greatest degree of innovation are imported. However, from the point of view proposed by [START_REF] Chopra | Supply Chain Management: Strategy, Planning and Operation[END_REF], [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF], innovative products must attend to the characteristics proposed in Table 1 and, although the vehicles currently have innumerable innovations, they are pieces of equipment embedded in the vehicles, i.e., the electronic equipment is an innovative product, but the automobile is still a vehicle which assumes the condition of a functional product in a mature chain.

Thus, of the 100 largest companies in Brazil, only 5 work with more innovative products, but have products considered as functional in their portfolios. Of these organizations, only one is of Brazilian origin, directed to the cosmetics area and which has innovative products and is within the concept of an agile company according to the characteristics proposed by [START_REF] Corrêa | Gestão de Redes de Suprimento: Integrando Cadeias de Suprimento no Mundo Globalizado[END_REF], [START_REF] Fisher | What is the Right Supply Chain for your Product? Harward Business Review[END_REF] and [START_REF] Reis | Supply Networks: How to Identify the Different Strategies for Supply Chain Management in Organisations?[END_REF].

In addition, although the country has a large oil company, with technologies for removing oil from deep waters, and a large airplane assembling company, the former works with a functional product, a commodity, and the second is in the same case as the automobile industries -the embedded electronics in the airplanes may be innovative, but the aircraft, in the context of its basic function, continues to be a functional product.

Conclusions

The conclusion of this study is that Brazil is still far from being a technology developer and, although with steady growth, this is a consequence of the high value given to agricultural commodities on the international market.

The country will only achieve sustainable growth if it is able to strengthen agile supply chains which can develop technology and innovation that continue having a very high added value compared to the cost of production.

The discussion in this paper addressed the fact that, although Brazil is considered to be a solid and emerging economy, it is not in the route of agility and of technological development. Its focus continues, as it has been for 500 years, in the use of its land for crop, livestock production and mineral extraction.

Table 1 .

 1 Innovative products versus functional products

	Item	Features	Functional Products	Innovative Products
			Predictable	Unpredictable
	1	Aspects of demand
	2	Product life cycle	More than 2 years	Up to 2 years
				More than 20%
	3	Contribution margin	Up to 20%
	4	Product variety	Low	High
	5	Average margin of error in the forecast at the time	Up to 10%	More than 10%
		production is committed
	6	Average stockout rate	Up to 2%	More than 2%
	7	Average forced end-of-season markdown as	Up to 10%	More Than 10%
		percentage of full price
	8	made-to-order products Lead time required for	3 weeks or more	Up to 2 weeks


Nilo Serpa
email: niloserpa@gmail.com

Ivanir Costa

Antônio Palmeira
email: antoniopalmeira@ig.com.br

Araújo Neto

Technical Noncompliance Evaluation Criteria for Sustainable Production of IT Support Services in the Ministry of Work and Employment at Brazil

Keywords: noncompliance, indicator, performance, sigma techniques

The design and materialization of quality indicators for support services in information technology are still activities of dicult execution in Brazil. The very analysis of noncompliances is often done improperly, as in Ministry of Work and Employment, with no standardized classication routines to aid management tasks. In addition, the high number of mistakes in recognizing the nature of the problems to be solved lead to an increasing cost of displacement of technicians, since there are no teams in Regional Superintendencies of Work and Employment to meet local demands. Present work discusses and proposes a technique for sizing noncompliance during audit processes on support services in situations where a robust quality program was not deployed yet. The central idea is to establish indicators geographically adjusted to reect reality with minimum distortions to guide the endeavor for cost containments as well as to give contributions to minimize environmental impacts due to the excessive transport of specialized people.

Introduction

The geographic map of the information technology (IT) in Brazil clearly overlaps the map of regional exclusion that still straties our society, especially in terms of access to technology. Constant eorts have been made in favor of changing this scenario, but progress is slow mainly by severe contractual restrictions of outsourcing upon human and material resources.

The country's cultural discrepancies associated with investment inequalities outline an irregular behavioral way, very dicult to correct, especially since one vainly insist on a counterproductive technological regionalism unattering to the old ideals of FUST (the Brazilian Fund for Universalization of Telecommunication Services).

In some government institutions it is practiced an evaluation of noncompliances without any objective criteria, a fact that causes unsustainable conclusions about the outsourced's performance. The lack of understanding about the national reality as described above and the non-trivial task to determining plausible indicators lead to merely palliative duciary sometimes unfair techniques.

As we previously said, there are no teams in Regional Superintendencies with sucient technical competence to meet local demands, so that the displacement of technicians from technological towns is expensive, even more in view of the occurrence of classication errors of calls, causing wrong displacements. This study shows how to establish preliminary rules for the control of technical support noncompliances in the ambit of the Work and Employment Regional Superintendencies at Brazil, assuming misclassication of support services, by means of data supplied by a historical series between October 2011 and February 2012. The monitoring of the classication of calls shall reduce the cost of displacements and the waste of time, contributing to the overall reduction of environmental impacts caused by excessive airborne, since distances in Brazil have continental dimensions.

A bit on performance indicators

Quality has been the agenda in services since well before the onset of globalization. Important contributions to the subject can be found in [START_REF] Crosby | Quality is Free[END_REF], [START_REF] Juran | Quality Control Handbook[END_REF] one of the great works on quality impact , [START_REF] Garvin | Managing Quality[END_REF], [START_REF] Green | Os Caminhos da Qualidade[END_REF], [START_REF] Paladini | Gestão da Qualidade no Processo: A Qualidade na Produção de Bens e Serviços[END_REF], [START_REF] Barçante | uma Visão Brasileira: O Impacto Estratégico na Universidade e na Empresa[END_REF], [START_REF] Medori | A Framework for Auditing and Enhancing Performance Measurement Systems[END_REF], [START_REF] Deligonul | As Armadilhas Ocultas na Hora da Decisão[END_REF] and [START_REF] Colenghi | Total: Uma Integração Perfeita[END_REF] (in chronological order). According to the best practices advocated in the market, the management of IT services, specically the technical support services, should be treated as an opportunity to improve quality adding value to the business of the organization or institution and not as a bureaucratic barrier. Once the contract administration is an execution process as assumed since PMBOK 2000, and, being essential for the success of projects, it must include periodic evaluations about the outsourced's performance comparing to their deliveries, it is very important the identication of items of improvement by means of the so-called performance indicators, derived quantities of checklists applied to the contract and the enterprise under legal agreement. Such indicators are byproducts of contract administration and they are prevalent even in the selection of suppliers. Through the use of these indicators, the registration of any disputes and noncompliancies should lead to improvement actions. Thus, the indicators act as regulators of the performance of the outsourced, allowing advancement feedbacks and consequential adjustments or adaptations. In short, the use of checklists and their derivatives (performance indicators) is sine qua non for the implementation of an Integrated Management System (IMS) based on standards ISO 9001:2000, ISO 14001:2004 and OHSAS 18001:1999 (updated in 2007).

future SLA, since this agreement shall be also the result of a negotiation as a non-cooperative sequential bargaining game with conict among self-interested players [START_REF] Silaghi | A Time-Constrained SLA Negotiation Strategy in Competitive Computational Grids[END_REF]. In all cases it is necessary to establish a "ooring" of quality from which one can think of SLA or some planning based on sigma techniques for gradual implementation of quality.

Considerable improvements in the service sector can be achieved by the application of relatively simple management changes such as the introduction of new concepts, the planning of a system over customer support services and the denition of a measurable patterning of services, the latter directly related to performance indicators.

Performance indicators have been proposed and used in IT Governance at

Brazilian organizations, widely documented in the Information Technology Development Planning ITDP and its annual ammendments. Despite that, in many cases they are not able to promote satisfactory control, or even help the consolidation of information from a proactive interpretation of data to solve problems. It is also a fact that, by following market practices only, we do not make the necessary abstraction on the theme "service indicators" to adapt them to the characteristics and business rules of each organization.

In particular, with regard to the monitoring of noncompliancies nowadays, we have some indicators, such that: However, from the viewpoint of the geography outlined above, in order to avoid the improper practice of assigning a generalized noncompliance to the entire package of services rendered in a particular span of days, based on the log of noncompliances in one or more types of customer services, but not all, such static indicators do not show enough. It is necessary to take a dynamic approach, where the indicator will provide, beneath regional conditions, acceptable ranges of compliance, highlighting that "ooring" of quality we refer earlier. We call this indicator simply "INC" (Indicator of Noncompliance).

ICAC (Index of
Since each Brazilian State manifests proper characteristics of infrastructure and human resources, we chose to work with an indicator originated from the analysis of the time series of demands, adjusted to minimize the demographic distortions and associated with the standard deviation σ calculated on all kinds of customer services. The Greek letter σ (sigma) is used in statistics to indicate how far a given process deviates from its goal. Thus, the higher the sigma value, the smaller the deviation.

Sigma techniques are applicable both in production of consumer goods and services production for continuous improvement of processes. The Six Sigma framework, for instance, exalts the total satisfaction of the customer and excellent quantitative results in production, cost and prot, human resources and services [START_REF] Shafer | The Eects of Six Sigma on Corporate Performance: An Empirical Investigation[END_REF], although there is no model for eectively guiding the implementation of Six Sigma programs [3]. In a highly competitive global scenario, these techniques are focused on globalization and its demands for standardization and quality. In this context, Campos understands sigma as a symbol designating the "distribution or dispersion around the average of a process or procedure" [START_REF] Campos | Glossário Six Sigma. Banas Qualidade[END_REF].

Perez Wilson denes Six Sigma as "an optimized level of performance that approaches zero defect in a process of making a product, service or transaction.

It indicates the obtaining and maintaining of a high level of performance" [START_REF] Perez Wilson | Seis Sigma: Compreendendo o Conceito, as Implicações e os Desaos[END_REF].

Anyway, the use of a sigma technique seeks to reduce defects, errors or failures, and, as such, constitutes a management framework. The higher the sigma value, the less will be found procedural or productive aws. In other words, sigma will measure the degree to which a particular process is able to operate without failure, craving the ideal state translated by the notion of zero defects, developed by Philip Crosby [START_REF] Crosby | Quality is Free[END_REF]. In general sense, sigma approaches must be scalable, i. e., they should be related to achievable goals accordingly the available resources, so that quality is incremental as far as the process improvements are implemented according to a planning of investments.

The approach of using sigma techniques is to decrease the variability of production processes, improving quality, reducing costs and deciencies. The determination of initial levels of variability serves as a reference from which that variability shall be reduced by processual implementations of continuous improvement. In terms of customer services, sigma can express how far the service is from their quality goal. Normally, it is considered that 1 sigma represents 68 % of services which were completed with an acceptable margin of error of classication. As the proposed technique strives to increase the rigor of the search for quality, quantitative noncompliance is a function of an overgrowth in demands of a certain type measured with respect to the so-called " σ-range " (Figures 1 and2). Quantities of demands out of the σ-range generate indications of noncompliance, starting from the premise that high amounts can be associated with misclassication. The σ generated by the sample is given by the time series,

σ = 1 4n -1   4 j=1 n i=1 x i j - x  2 , (1)
where j denotes the nature of the calls, n is the length of time series (in months), 4n is the sample size, x i are the i registered values of the indicator, and x is the average value of the indicator along the series. Reducing the >E=I by dierences in demands among the States, the indicator of a given type j, in month i, in State e was dened by dividing the number of demands by the total number of demands at the i chosen month in all kinds j, in all States and by 10 requestors, i.e.,

x (i)je = a (i)je 28 e=1 4 j=1 a (i)j e / 10
.

(

) 2
By whatever manner, there is no quality control of support services in IT produced at the Ministry of Work and Employment. The number of wrongly classied calls is large due to lack of specialized technical professionals available in the Regional Superintendencies, so that it is just expected highest correlation between high value of the indicator dened by the managers board and taxonomic noncompliance. Thus, the delay time to closing calls has greatly exceeded the expected average, causing customer dissatisfaction, increased costs with displacement of technical teams and wearing of management.

A supply of IT support services subject to uctuations in quality of attendance may be statistically well modeled with oating standard deviation. We assume that we need to establish a minimum acceptable standard deviation as a quantitative basis to initialize real quality, starting from this limit to achieve incremental improvements. So, the idea is to nd the maximum range of uctuation of the standard deviation. This is particularly advantageous when there is no wide time series, so that we try to compensate changes in the standard deviation resulting from the size of the series assuming the standard deviation variability. In other words, since there is no well-established control of the failures of attendance, featuring an erratic character in the dispersion of the aws, the best way is to operate on the historical series and try to establish a pattern of variation of the standard deviation.

For an accurate analytical understanding, if we had a continuous sum, the expression of the standard deviation would be

σ = 1 4n -1     n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij   - x  2 , (3)
from which we have

σ ′ = 2 4n -1     n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij   - x  x ij 2      1 4n -1     n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij   - x  2      -1/2 ; σ ′ = xij 4n-1 n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij -x    1 4n-1 n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij -x 2    1/2 ; σ ′ = xij 4n-1 n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij -x 1 4n-1 1/2 n;4 i=1;j=1 x ij dx ij -x ; σ ′ = xij 4n-1 1 4n-1 1/2 = x ij 4n -1 (4n -1) 1/2 = x ij √ 4n -1 . (4)
We then establish that the σ-range is

σ = x ± x ij √ 4n -1 . (5) 4 Results
We calculate the values of the INC (Table 1) of all types, in all months studied, for each State. Figures 1 and2 show the evolution of σ related to the INC for support services scenarios in Amapá and São Paulo. The curves map Equation 5and were obtained by smoothing the evolution of the standard deviations, mathematically assuming that there would be a continuous variation of demands. The maximum amplitude of the standard deviation was 2.25 at São Paulo and 2.33 at Amapá against 1.29 at Brazil as a whole. Amapá state had its maximum in network demands, while São Paulo in hardware demands. The highest maximum amplitude of the standard deviation shall be taken as the starting point for both the development of a generic SLA (compliance for hardware, software, network and application) and a incremental sigma quality program to be developed further. Although the available data, organized on a per calendar-month series, is not so extensive in time, the consideration of a variable standard deviation previously establishes a oating pattern representative of the uncertainties inherent to IT services; this is so because they are in process of undergoing improvements from the "ooring" of quality to which we refer with the aid of Equation 5. Clearly, the scenarios are distinct in accordance with local realities. The σ-range of Amapá proved to be dierent from São Paulo. This geographic dierentiation points to the inadequacy of noncompliance overall accreditation to a whole package of services without accurate quantitative and qualitative criteria, and more: it shows that hard accreditation trivializes the work of the professional of quality, going in the opposite hand of the goals of IT Governance. Obviously, other considerations about quality can and should be made based on veried evidence.

Conclusion

This article presented a technique for initial measurement of noncompliances in IT support services based on the concept of sigma evaluation and considering Brazilian geographical variety. The proposal technique can be applied in all organizations with low maturity level of IT support services. The technique was applied only to noncompliances by misclassication of support services at Ministry of Work and Employment Brazil, assuming the need for quality control with the introduction of an abstract monitoring zone called σ-range over the proposed Indicator of Noncompliance (INC). By establishing this control range, the technique has dened a quality "ooring" determined from the consideration of a oating standard deviation on INC as a preliminary approach to realistic quality programs mainly in government institutions. The technique was conceived having in mind the reduction of technicians travel costs and environmental impact of unnecessary air trac, but it may be considered as an option to analyze other features such as human resources, time of attendance, etc..

  Compliance in Application Checklists): indicator calculated dividing the number of possible points by the number of points obtained from the checklists, averaging the results of applied lists; IPEN (Index of Closed Pendings): indicator calculated dividing the number of closed pending by the total backlog detected according to checklists; ICNC (Index of Closed Noncompliance): indicator calculated dividing the number of ended noncompliances by the total detected noncompliances according to checklists.

Figure 1 :

 1 Figure 1: Standard deviation of INC for Amapá, since October 2011 until Frebuary 2012.

Figure 2 :

 2 Figure 2: Standard deviation of INC for São Paulo, since October 2011 until Frebuary 2012.

Table 1 :

 1 INC at Ministry of Work and Employment Brazil for Amapá (AP) and São Paulo (SP) States since October 2011 until February 2012.

	State/Type 10/11 11/11 12/11 01/12 02/12
	APNetwork 2,73 1,82 4,55 0,30 0,61
	APHardware 0,92 1,51 2,77 2,18 2,61
	APSoftware 0,97 0,76 1,46 3,13 3,68
	APApplication 0,67 0,83 4,00 3,50 1,00
	SPNetwork 3,70 2,04 2,23 1,71 0,33
	SPHardware 1,26 1,22 4,21 2,57 0,73
	SPSoftware 1,27 0,62 1,88 3,37 2,87
	SPApplication 1,93 2,41 2,41 1,81 1,45

The sigma approach Modern enterprises and some government institutions in initial levels of maturity, looking for their guarantees, attempt to set quality parameters using only pieces of large frameworks, never acting by eective programs of incremental true quality. In general, they seek to establish an SLA, the Service Level Agreement between customers and suppliers. Nonetheless, there are situations where no SLA was implemented, even less the principles that guide the terms of some

Acknowledgments. We thank Moisés Alencar for the integral support.


Dalton Oswaldo Buccelli
email: dalton_buccelli@uol.com.br

Herbert Gonçalves Espuny

Jean Carlos Cavaleiro

Pedro De Oliveira

Costa Neto

Reinaldo De

Araujo Lopes

Simone Viana Romano
email: simone_viana@yahoo.com.br

Pedro Luiz De Oliveira

Reinaldo De Araujo Lopes

Simone Maria

Viana Romano

Education Mediated by Technology: Strategy to Spread High School Learning in Piauí State, Brazil

Keywords: Distance learning, quality in education, developing countries

ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Introduction

Located in the northeastern region of Brazil, the Piauí State has as its capital the city of Teresina, the most populous one. Is the third largest State in the region and the tenthin the country, with a land area of 251,529 km 2 , corresponding to 2.9% of the national territory. Borders five other Brazilian States: Maranhão, Ceará, Pernambuco, Bahia and Tocantins.According to itsEconomic and Social Research Center-CEPRO [START_REF]Center ofPiauí, Piauí 's Regional Accounts Review[END_REF], the gross domestic product (GDP), which is the sum of all goods and services produced in the State, had in 2010 a total of about 11 billion US dollars, the highest value obtained by the State up to now.

According to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics -IBGE [2], the State of has a population of about 3 million people, 1 million living in the rural area and 2 million urban areas. In 2010, 829,143 peopleat school age between four and seventeen years old. Enrolled in high school, there were a total of 162,027 inhabitants, of whom 140,481 were students at public schools.

The miss of high school regular offering occurs, mainly, due to the lack of qualified professionals in the poorest and of difficult access regions situated in the rural areasof the state. The geographical featuresand the insufficient means of transportation available to the residents of communities with low population density are obstacles to access schools that already offer high school.

These problems require, therefore, actions that enable the service to the student regardless of the type of access to his municipality or community, in respect to the Federal Constitution, item II of Art. 208, which guarantees as a duty of the State "the progressive universalization of free education" and, in Art. 211, paragraph 3"the States and the Federal District will act primarily in elementary and high schools" and 4 "in the organization of their education systems, the States and the municipalities shall define ways of cooperation, so as to ensure the universalization of compulsory education".

To meet this challenge, the Government of Piauí, through the Secretary of State for Education, performs the deployment of high school attendance mediated by technologies with the firm commitment to ensure decent social conditions for these young people, providing them with an education that allows the continuation of the studies, the construction and reconstruction of knowledge for the exercise of citizenship.

It is valid to add to these considerations the information given by the Brazilian Ministry of Education, thatlacks in the country 235,000teachers in high school and so 20% of youthsfrom 15 to 17 years old represent a repressed demand for this kind of educations.

2Distance Education

Modern needs forced education to pass by transformations in its design in the last thirty years. These changes have brought new ideas, especially when it is focused on universalization of knowledge. A country of continental dimensions such as Brazil, and structural human and economic differences among regions must see in education the more consistent way to searchfor equality and social inclusion. Such education can be achieved through traditional or distance solutions, what historically led to a strong discussion.

However, given the evolution of distance education, today is not more relevant to discuss what is the best way, if distance or face-to-face, but rather provide the structure, models and resources used to achieve the common purpose of obtaining knowledge. As the focus of thispaper isdistance education (DE), and in particular by differences and regional needs that hampers access to education of the majority of the population, DE comes to fulfill the role of encouraging and giving access to a large portion of the Brazilian population that want to continue and improve his studies.

Then, DE can be seen as a wayof universalization of knowledge in the country and in the world.

For [START_REF] Aretio | Education for Today[END_REF], distance education is a technological system of two-way communication, which can be massive and replacing the personal interaction in the classroomamong teacher and students, as a means of teaching, for systematic action of several joint teaching resources and support for an organization and tutoring that provide the independent and flexible learning to students.

For that DE arrived at a level of massive education,it was required the insertion of a lot of technology in this process.The evolution of communication technologies was responsible for the maturation of several models. According to [START_REF] Moore | Distance education: an integrated view[END_REF], it is possible to see periods and features of models used in the course of time, thus existing five generations of DE activities, as shown in Figure 1. The case study presented in this article is concerned with the 5 th generation of DE, in whichthe evolution of technology provides the use of the Internet and computer networks enabling the convergence of text, audio and video into a single communication platform, integrating the advantages and earlier-generation technologies, and seeking to overcome the geographical barriers and communication. Features the use of the internet, virtual learning environments, multidirectional audio and video transmission, videoconferencing, etc. and all this without giving upthe advances provided by the previous generations, building a model with wide possibilities of learning.

This last generation, that makes an accumulation of experience of the last decades on DE, with itssafety and confidence in the model, has won followers around the world, including Brazil, where a State such Piauí is getting clear benefits with these solutions for the education problems. In recent decades has occurred a considerable expansion in the use of qualitative methods in educational research and in studies related to business management. This is explained because many phenomena can only be understood in the contexts in which they occur and which they are part, and must be analyzed in an integrated perspective. For this integration to exist, the researcher must go into the scenery of the facts to observe the phenomenon being studied from the viewpoint of the people involved, collecting and analyzing data in different ways. The most important ways of acquiring data in qualitative research are documentary research and case study.

According to [START_REF] Godoy | Qualitative Research: fundamental types[END_REF], the case study has become the preferred strategy when researchers seek to answer the questions "how" and "why" certain phenomena occur when there is little possibility of control over the events studied and when the focus of interest is on current phenomena, which can only be analyzed within some context of real life.To [START_REF] Hartley | Case studies inorganizational research[END_REF], the case study consists of a detailed investigation, with data collected over a period of time, of one or more organizations, or groups within organizations, to provide an analysis of the context and of the processes involved in the phenomenon under study. According to this author, the case study has been widely used in the field of organizational behaviour.

The qualitative research, more specifically the case study, encourages the engagement of the researcher with the daily life of organizations, providing a deep and integrated understanding of their realities. According to [START_REF] Godoy | Qualitative Research: fundamental types[END_REF], when adopting an exploratory and descriptive approach, the researcher must be aware of their findings, even though starting from some theoretical scheme, keeping alert to new elements or dimensions that may arise in the course of thework.In this respect thecase study was planned to better understand how new technologies can assist in the process of universalization of education in one of the poorest States of the Brazilian Federation.

Results and discussions

The project of implementing High School Attendance with Technological Mediation in the Piauí State was the administrative-pedagogical alternative to meetthe necessity of students concluding primary school in rural communities where there is no high school or the demand is higher than the supply.

The project offers high school with differentiated, innovative methodology, implementation of multimedia communication services network (data, voice and image) and autonomy to meet the 224 municipalities in 11 development areas of the State.

For that, it was necessary to establish a system of presential support poles,or points of presence, in Piaui State. [START_REF] Mota | Distance Education -the state of the art[END_REF] definespresential supportpole as an structure for the decentralized execution of the didatic-managerial functions of the course, consortium, net or system of Distance Education, in general organized with the participation of several institutions, and also with the support of municipal and state governments.

There were implemented 300 points of presence, whit the capacity of receiving up to 27,000 students,an average of 30 students per class, for high school and adult education, in three shifts, through a modern telecommunication platform. This platform to offer a modulatedserial instruction program through teleconferencing solution, including simultaneous access to broadband Internet and multidisciplinary team allocation to support the pedagogical coordination in the deployment and operation of the project. The technology used includes interactive digital TV over IP, through satellite in VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) platform, as shown in Figure 2. The methodology is deployed through live classes, televised, uttered by a professor lecturer, from astudio located at TV Antares, in Teresina, allowing the student to attend these lectures at the school classroom in his community.

Under the guidance of a local teacher, a tutor called attendance teacher, present at each remote classroom, the student may interact with the professor lecturer, present in the broadcast studio, by positioning himself in front of a webcam, which will transmit his image, voice and question, resulting in an effective dialogue, in real time, ensuring the complete and interactive communication among the participants of the teaching and learning process.

This project responds to the dichotomy CHALLENGE = OPPORTUNITY, with the following characteristics:

• To overcome severe budget and infrastructure limitations;

• To overcome the shortage of schools and teachers;

• The use of convergent technologies for optimization of the human and financial resources available; • To promote the vocational qualification of young people and students from underprivileged regions. The following are illustrative figures of the implementation of the project, provided by the authors. The described education project has been implement at Piauí State and is running with its first group of students. So, results on effective learning are not yet available. However, it is expected that shall be reached advantage as good as the ones got in a similar project held inAmazonas State, shown in Table 2.

Figure3 Broadcast studio in Teresina

Conclusions

This article demonstrates the practical implementation, with real results, of a distance learning project using satellite transmission, covering remote accessed regions, local tutoring, resource optimization and search for excellence in pedagogical process using the best communicators as lecturer teachers, and interactivity with the remote rooms, as stated in the fifth generation of the distance learning processes.

The results prove the effectiveness of the used system in poor,spredand with disabilities regions, typical of countries with large territorial extension, as in the case of Brazil, particularly in the State of Piauí in the Northeast region. It is expected to have contributed for the dissemination of an experience of great value in education, illustrating its applicability in similar situations.

Figure 1

 1 Figure 1 Five generations of distance educationSource: adapted from[START_REF] Moore | Distance education: an integrated view[END_REF]

Figure 2

 2 Figure 2 Interactive digital TV over IPSource:[START_REF]Center ofPiauí, Piauí 's Regional Accounts Review[END_REF] The rural communities of the participating municipalities are provided with a network of multimedia communication services (data, voice and image) through a modern telecommunication platform including concurrent access to broadband Internet, with appropriate physical facilities.The methodology is deployed through live classes, televised, uttered by a professor lecturer, from astudio located at TV Antares, in Teresina, allowing the student to attend these lectures at the school classroom in his community.

FigureFigure 5

 5 Figure 4Example of a school in Vila Nova do Piauí, a town about 350 miles away from the capital

Table 1 -

 1 Table 1 shows the evolution of graduate DE enrolments in Brazil in recent years. Evolution of DE enrolments in graduate institutions in Brazil: 2009 -2011.

	Correspondence
	Radio and TV
	transmission
	Open universities
	Conference calls
	Internet/Web/Satellite

Table 2 .

 2 Results of deproject in Amazonas State

	Item	Before project	After project
	Approvals	60,4%	77,5%
	Disapprovals	12,8%	6,5%
	Truancy	26,8%	16,0%

Source: State Government of Amazonas


Antonio De

Paula Leite

Jayme De

Aranha Machado

José Benedito Sacomano

Antonio René

Camargo Aranha De

Jayme De Aranha Machado

R C A De

Sustainable Initiatives in Developing Countries

Keywords: popular residential housing, "fast construction", building method, environmental comfort, sustainability, robust house

de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Introduction

Brazilian economy, its market free and exporting, reached in 2010, nominal GNP of approximately 2,5, according to IBGE (Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics), and this gives Brazil's the seventh place in world's economy, behind only the United States (14,53), China [START_REF] Tigre | Gestão da Inovação[END_REF]88), Japan [START_REF] Tigre | Gestão da Inovação[END_REF]46), Germany [START_REF] Sacomano | Administração de Produção na Construção Civil[END_REF]29), France [START_REF] Miguel | Metodologia de Pesquisa em Engenharia e Gestão de Operações[END_REF]56) and the United Kingdom [START_REF] Miguel | Metodologia de Pesquisa em Engenharia e Gestão de Operações[END_REF]25) [START_REF][END_REF]. The same article suggests that in 2011 Brazil might already have supplanted the United Kingdom's GNP, which would upgrade it to the sixth larger word's economy in 2012 [1; 2; 4].

Consistent with the data mentioned above, as the GNP indicates wealth generated by the country, the Brazilian panorama is optimistic as far as the evolution of its economy for the next ten years. Nevertheless, if Brazil's GNP is the world's seventh, quite on the other hand, the per capita GNP is way down to the forty-seventh position, the amount of US$ 9,390 per inhabitant in 2010, again according to IBGE data, released in 2011.

In order to properly evaluate wealth distribution in Brazil at the present time, two sociological parameters are considered below: the Human Development Index -HDI and the Gini Coefficient. According to the UNDP -United Nations Development Program, data released November 2, 2011, Brazil's HDI for the year mentioned was 0.718, which places the Country at eighty-fourth place in the world, and eleventh in Latin America, behind Chile (0,805), Argentina (0,797), Uruguay (0,783), Cuba (0,776), Mexico (0,770), Panama (0,768), Costa Rica (0,744), Venezuela (0,735), Peru (0,725) and Equator (0,720).

The other parameter that describes social inequalities in Brazil is the Gini Coefficient, which, at its last release in 2009, referring to year 2008, attributed to Brazil value 0.544. It should be remembered that this coefficient varies from zero (all population has the same income) to one (only one person has the country's total income). Therefore, it becomes visible that in Brazil there is high income concentration. For comparison, we show value and reference year for a few countries: Mexico 0.479 ( 2006 2008). Of course these countries have better wealth distribution than Brazil. It is therefore inferable that Brazil, although a powerful generator of wealth, distributes poorly its wealth among its society [3; 5].

The aim of this paper is to present the way Production Engineering perceives Brazil's housing scenario. It will focus specifically the popular housing construction programs and the technological advances of the so called 'fast construction", which has experienced consistent development. This has led to an optimistic expectation of diminishing the Brazilian housing deficit for low income families.

Methodology

The research was based on technical and economic documents related to the onefamily residence projects implanted by the company MEGASCI -Sistema Construtivo Industrializado, researched by the authors. MEGASCI (www.megasci.com.br), with headquarters in São Paulo, has gained recognition for technologic innovations brought up into the construction of housing projects in concrete. Records on calculations, drawings, building methods and budgets were examined during the last four years and thus a thorough view of these technologic innovations was made possible. They are characteristic of the "fast construction", as it is understood today in Brazil.

Results and Discussion

Brazil's present day housing scenario

In several opinion polls about Brazilians' most desired goods [see http://www.correiocidadania.co.br/content/view/3560/91], for all levels of income, home ownership is number one, especially for wage earning workers who have no other way to buy a house, other than (federal, state or municipal) government sponsored programs.

The 2010 IBGE's Census showed that 11.4 million Brazilian (6% of population) live in below normal level conglomerates, like favelas (slums), palafitas (houses on stilts) and mocambos (miserable dwellings, formerly, refuges of runaway slaves) and other kinds of social assemblages, all characterized by the poverty of its people. It should be noted that in São Paulo's metropolitan area there are 2.1 million dwellers in such conditions. The state capital which its metropolitan area shows the worst rate of slum dwellers is Belem, with 51% of its inhabitants living in slums.

Housing Programs and Social Upgrading

As far as the Brazilian Federal Government is concerned, several housing programs were offered to the poorest social levels, families earning 3 to 5 minimum wages per month (US$ 950.00/month) in order to diminish the country's housing deficit. Among the various federal housing programs, the BNH -National Bank of Housing, formed during the military regime in 1964 and extinguished in 1986, and the Minha Casa Minha Vida (My home, my life), presently in progress, and with promising perspectives. While the National Housing Plan, conducted by BNH focused only in the construction of popular dwellings, Minha Casa, Minha Vida was devised to promote social upgrading of families most in need, equipping housing nuclei with sanitary infrastructure (water and sewage), transportation, social addenda (schools, daycare centers for babies and young children, health centers, recreation clubs, etc.), so that when occupying a new dwelling, a family is automatically inserted in the area's social context.

It should be emphasized that Minha Casa, Minha Vida is offered through agreements and partnerships of the federal government with state and municipal governments and they act jointly in the installation of these housing nuclei: usually the federal government is responsible for management and financial resources, to the state is left investments on urban infrastructure and the municipality contributes with the area and future means of collective transportation.

New Technologies and "Fast Construction" in Brazil

The main technological advancements that allowed Brazil, from year 2000 on, to install in a fast and efficient manner popular housing nuclei of good quality were:

1. Metallic modules with the house installations inside: potable water, sewage, electricity; it allows the finishing of walls already with these modules inside.

2. Ad mixtures to control concrete density in order to obtain different degrees of air entrained concrete, which allow concrete walls and roof to keep thermal comfort inside the houses.

3 Ad mixtures to control concrete fluidity, for easier use, increased construction speed e better structure quality.

Apart from these technological advances at civil construction, it should be mentioned that both government and private companies have intensified training of the work force preparing professionals to work with industrialized building systems.

A Proposal for 'Robust House' in the Context of Popular Housing

building houses integrated to Housing Nuclei, which allow for effective social integration of low income families.

2. The technologic innovations herewith described refer to concrete as the building material that made possible a new construction process called Fast Construction, in which the construction speed is an important factor to reduce the dwellings deficit in Brazil.

  ), United States 0.450 (2007), China 0.470 (2007), France 0.327 (2008), Portugal 0.385 (2008) and Norway 0.250 (

Consequently, it is proposed as a promising alternative for the residential industrial construction of dwellings for low income population, the 'robust house', an idea based on the following social and economic building concepts:

1 Concrete prepared of Portland cement as the sole building material for the structure, which comprises the foundation over a radier plate, walls of concrete with mechanical modules already installed inside, and the concrete roof, with special added products to provide thermal comfort inside.

2 One store residence, area of 50 m 2 , with multi-use living room, two bedrooms, one bathroom, kitchen and porch.

3 Sale price from 20 to 25 thousand US dollars. 4 Plots of land from 70 to 90 m 2 ., backyard with barbecue installation, an important Brazilian social custom, which often includes the presence of relatives and neighbors.

5 Fences separating the residences to protect the family's privacy, another important item in Brazilian culture.

6 Robust houses are built inside a housing nucleus with social facilities: school, daycare center for babies and young children, recreation club, medical center, etc.

7 Infrastructure with potable water supply, sewage system, electricity, flammable gas for cooking, paved streets, etc.

8 Reutilization of all rubble from construction, at all phases. 9 Housing projects with solar energy absorber devices, reutilization of water in dwellings, retention and utilization of rain water and other items necessary to environmental sustainability.

It's reasonable to believe that, provided the above items are fulfilled, families living in a popular housing nucleus like this will be effectively upgraded and inserted into the Brazilian society.

The final deduction, after careful analysis of the technical documentation, and visits to the Housing Nuclei built by the above mentioned company, is that the "fast construction" process has been consolidated as a powerful social and technical instrument for the implantation of dwellings specially made for low income families. At the same time, this complete set of technologic innovations of the building methods in use today may and will be progressively amplified, adopting future ideas and procedures that will maintain the same quality of the residences, but at a lower cost and smaller construction time.

Final Remarks

This analysis of the implanted projects led us to reach the following conclusions: 1. The Federal Government sponsored program so-called "Minha Casa, Minha Vida" -My House, My Life -has been showing remarkable results, mainly because in it the three levels of government (Federal, State and Municipality) are involved and aiming at the same objective, that is, to reduce the dwellings deficit in the country by


Deise R M S Oliveira
email: deise.oliveira@gmail.com

Irenilza De A Näas
email: irenilza@gmail.com

Margarito Flávio
email: flaviomargarito@gmail.com

Martins Barros

R M S Oliveira

Prioritization of research proposals using the analytic hierarchy process -AHP

Keywords: multicriteria analysis, research proposals selection, project portfolio

This research is a prospective analysis of prioritizing research proposals using pre-established criteria and applying the Analytic Hierarchy Process-AHP. The prioritized projects should ensure the competitive advantage of the organization. For this analysis, criteria which take into account other factors, which are not purely technical, were applied. The guiding hypothesis of this study was that it is possible to maintain a competitive portfolio of research proposals, from the analysis of pre-established criteria, using the methodology of the Analytic Hierarchy Process, giving priority to innovation and technology transfer. A key finding was the importance of retrieving research projects' history in the company, and stating gaps to be controlled in future analysis. Six ongoing projects were analyzed by 17 interviewed researchers and scores were given. Results obtained using the multicriteria analysis were similar to that previously applied by the selection committee, validating the hypothesis. We concluded that AHP may assist in the identification and prioritization criteria for project portfolio management.

Introduction

In the globalized world and today's dynamic, it is essential for organizations to maintain their competitive edge. The essence of this differential is aligned to updated strategies, contributing to the achievement of organizational goals. Without this strategic planning any further action may lead to failure. The connection between strategy and the selection and implementation of initiatives is through the funding of proposals and the project portfolio management is responsible for this alignment [START_REF] Archer | An integrated framework for project portfolio selection[END_REF]. According to the Project Management Institute, portfolio management is the collection and management of projects or programs that are grouped together to facilitate the achievement of the strategic objectives of the organization. Therefore, when managing a portfolio, the first premise is that it should be aligned with the organization's strategies. In order to approve the proposals a main approach is that they should be, firstly, be in accordance to the organizations' mission, goals and strategic [START_REF] Killen | Project portfolio management for product innovation[END_REF].

Current literature describes various types of problems related to portfolio management, such as proposals without proper strategic alignment, high demand for funding, presenting decision-making problems, and without reliable information. All these issues are usually responsible for poor performance of the portfolio, as the projects either have low impact or present failures, above the acceptable, in their development [1; 4; 6]. One way to prevent this to happen within the organization is working effectively in the management of the portfolio in all its stages.

The preliminary analysis of the proposals that will be part of the portfolio is essential to the efficiency of the portfolio management. Therefore, classification and selection of these proposals must be a careful process, adopting clear pre-established criteria, which have the supervision of a senior manager. The authors [START_REF] Archer | An integrated framework for project portfolio selection[END_REF] warn that determining the strategic focus of the portfolio should be conducted in a senior management levels because it involves the strategic goals of the institution.

Many organizations organize their portfolio subjectively, not adopting specific criteria or methodologies in selecting their proposals. The decision in which proposal should be funded and developed is still tied to an outsider/insider reviewer analysis, and arbitrary choice, according to the reviewer viewpoint. This exposes the project to risk, and maximizes the value assignment sometimes presenting no significant differences between the proposals, leading to difficulties in selecting the best one [START_REF] Killen | Project portfolio management for product innovation[END_REF]. This subjective assessment, based on the expertise of the reviewers/evaluators is somehow essential in the evaluation process. When proposals are selected by the same criteria, using mathematical and methodological rigor it promotes more confidence to the decision makers [START_REF] Belton | Multiple criteria decision analysis: an integrated approach[END_REF].

Nowadays, there are several tools that work with the classification, selection and prioritization of proposals. One of them, developed in the 1970s, is the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), a mathematical model to support decision making [START_REF] Saaty | Método de análise hierárquica[END_REF]. AHP is a method that is characterized by the ability to analyze a problem and propose a decision-making through the construction of hierarchical levels. The problem is analyzed by pre-established criteria. The criteria are decomposed into sub-criteria up to a certain level. These criteria are organized into a hierarchy descending where the ultimate goals should be at the top, followed by their sub-goals, immediately below, and, finally, the various possible outcomes or alternatives are selected. The scenarios determine the likelihood of achieving the goals. The AHP usually run from the general to the more particular and concrete goal [2; 5].

The objective of this study was to propose a methodology for prioritization and selection of proposals in a company's Research, Development and Innovation (RD & I) using the analytic hierarchy process -AHP.

Methodology

In this study, the criteria were selected with the application of questionnaires which were organized following the guidelines of the AHP. Five questionnaires were distributed to members of the Embrapa Information Technology Headquarters, and Internal secretary of the Technical Committee. The criteria were listed for the purpose of assisting in the evaluation of proposals to be prioritized.

The questionnaire consisted of 8 questions (yes or no options), and the evaluators could choose what they consider relevant in making a decision to prioritize research proposals. They could also add any other criteria that they found beneficial. One evaluator added four additional criteria. With that, the number of criteria was adjusted to the theory of AHP. The author [START_REF] Saaty | Método de análise hierárquica[END_REF] says that must be established between 3-7 criteria, not exceeding the number 9. The total number of criteria listed was in a total of 6 and 15 sub-criteria. The alternatives were the 6 proposals. Figure 1 shows the division of each criterion into sub-criteria in level 1 and 2, respectively. Pairwise comparisons were made between each pair of factors at a given level of the hierarchy in regards to their contribution to the factor at the immediately preceding level. These pairwise comparisons yield a reciprocal (n, n) matrix A, where a ii = 1 (diagonal elements) and a ji = 1/a ij . Suppose that only the first column of matrix A is provided to state the relative importance of factors 2, 3, . . . , n with respect to factor 1. If the judgments were completely consistent, then the remaining columns in the matrix would be completely determined by the transitivity of the relative importance of the factors. However, there would be no consistency except for that created by setting a ji = 1/a ij . Therefore, the comparison needs to be repeated for each column of the matrix; specifically, independent judgments must be made for each pair. A is consistent if and only if Omax = n. However, the inequality of Omax > n always exists; therefore, the average of the remaining eigenvalues can be used as a "consistency index" (CI; Eq. 1), which is the difference between Omax and n divided by the normalizing factor (n -1).

Goal

CI = (Omax -n)/(n -1)
Eq. 1 The CI of the studied problem is compared with the average random index (RI) obtained from associated random matrices of order n to measure the error due to inconsistency [START_REF] Saaty | Método de análise hierárquica[END_REF]. A consistency ratio (CR = CI/RI) with a value ≤ 0.1 should be maintained for the matrix to be consistent; otherwise, the pairwise comparisons should be revised. The homogeneity of factors within each group, a small number of factors in the group, and a better understanding of the decision problem would improve the consistency index.

After selecting the criteria, evaluators were interviewed, and then gave the scores to the 6 research projects and the calculation of the collected data was done in realtime using the online web based software [7].

3.

Results and Discussion

Data from the weight given by each evaluator were organized in tables containing the criteria for the 6 projects. Mean values and standard deviation of the values were calculated for each criterion, as seen in Table 1.

Table 1. Proportional weight of the criteria adopted by the projects' evaluators (%) Total mean score of the weights were calculated and final values are presented in Table 2. The results were ranked and finally compared to the real score the research projects obtained during their previous evaluation by the research committee. Results were similar to those previously obtained, indicating that the methodology using multicriteria analysis is feasible to be used. The success of project portfolio management in an RD & I organization is directly related to the adaptation to organizational strategies and innovation management. In the present study, two methods have been proposed to support the management of a portfolio of Institution RD&I proposals. This analysis was based on the retrospective aspect, as the proposals results were known. This knowledge based on specific criteria was necessary to understand the gaps in research and planning for the future of research in the organization.

Criteria

The use AHP tool to assist in the prioritization criteria for proposals' portfolio management was successful. The AHP is a decision support methodology, which establishes the construction of a hierarchical structure and value judgment for decision making [3; 8]. This methodology does not eliminate the figure of the selecting committee, but it facilitates its performance, using the knowledge for the individual pairwise comparison of the criteria involved in the analysis.

The application of AHP in evaluating 6 projects enabled the prioritization of a project over another, based on technical criteria, considering both the objective and subjective views of these criteria, allowing a greater likelihood of success in project selection. To review and project prioritization, the tool proved to be adequate due to its ability to adapt to different situations that may occur in the proposals evaluation. The application of the tool in a larger set of projects with more evaluators should be considered as a continuation of this work.

Final Remarks

The success of project portfolio management in an RD & I organization is directly related to significant aspects, such as an adaptation to organizational strategies. We used the AHP technique to assist in the prioritization of research proposals within a project portfolio. The AHP is a decision support methodology, which establishes the construction of a hierarchical structure and value judgment for decision making. This methodology does not eliminate the figure of the reviewer, but it facilitates their performance, using his knowledge for the individual pairwise comparison of the criteria involved in the analysis.

The application of AHP in evaluating the proposals enabled the prioritization of a proposal over another, based on technical criteria. The tool proved to be adequate due to its ability to adapt to different situations that may occur in the evaluation process.

Figure 1 .

 1 Figure1. Scheme of the goal and the two levels of criteria adopted in the prioritization process of research projects.

Table 2 .

 2 Comparison of the total scores of each research project considering all criteria and the general classification

	Project	Average of	Classification using	Classification by
		score	AHP	Embrapa selecting
				committee
	A	16	4º	Rejected
	B	20	1º	Approved
	C	17	3º	Approved
	D	14	5º	Rejected
	E	14	5º	Rejected
	F	19	2º	Approved


Carla Caprara Parizi

Irenilza De
email: irenilzaa.nääs@gmail.com

Alencar Nääs

Eder Solimar Garcia

Moreno Ferragi

Denise Dupont Bernini

Irenilza De Alencar Nääs

Garcia Solimar

Eder Moreno Ferragi

Denise Simões

Dupont Bernini

Sustainability Issues in Brazilian Housing Construction Industry: The Role of Workers' Education

Keywords: construction supply chain, education, professional training

des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Introduction

The construction supply chain represents nearly 9% of Brazil's GDP, and it increased 4% from 2010 to 2011. The construction industry is highly demanding of labor and medium size retail businesses, and it involves a large number of small contractors. It is a growing sector as the national statistics data show an increase of 2.7 million new homes between 2009 and 2011 [1; 11]. The sustainability concepts within the housing construction industry, however, bring up some issues primarily related to the large amounts of wastes generated during the building process. There are also other issues, amongst them we can highlight the reduction in permeability of the soil, changing in drainage methods, which can cause flooding and reduce groundwater reserves; the use of illegal wood, and the improper disposal of effluents [START_REF]Perfil da Cadeia Produtiva da Construção e da Indústria de Materiais e Equipamentos[END_REF]. This is a relatively informal business sector, which represents a significant challenge for achieving sustainability within the process as not all steps are properly traced. Probably one of the most influential inhibitions of reducing of wastes and improving sustainability in this industry is the poor training of human resources. Dealing with aspects of sustainability it requires proper understanding of construction management and the use of different types of materials and components in the various stages of operation [21; 22]. The lack of innovation in products and processes, in the supply chain, make things more difficult in achieving sustainability in this sector, and it involves designers, manufacturers, facility managers and consumers who seek a more sustainable building. May we emphasize that residential construction industry is probably one of the Brazilian industries that developed less, when compared to other industrial sectors in the last years.

Although facing this scenario, there has been some progress regarding primary education of Brazilian professionals involved in construction, in recent years. According to data from the Annual Social Information of the Ministry of Labor and Employment (RAIS) the percentage of illiterates in the construction sector decreased by 60% in 9 years, from nearly 30 thousand workers (in a total of 1 million workers) in 2000 to approximately 23 thousand (in a total of 2 million in 2009). Despite the lack of official statistical data, organizations related to the Brazilian construction industry indicate that the improvement in education contributes to improve labor quality of life as it reduces the amount of accidents increases work efficiency and provides the reduction in waste and losses, in the construction sites [4].

This study aimed to analyze the issues related to the Brazilian residential construction industry, mainly those associated to the training of workers in order to minimize losses in the construction process.

Methodology

An extensive literature review was done on the field of residential construction industry. Data were collected from previous studies including the various phases of the construction process [1; 8; 11; 12; 19; 24].

The following questions were unfolded: 1. Is the lack of basic education a factor for increasing waste, hence the lack of sustainability in the construction process? And, 2. Does the investment in basic education (formal or technical training) improve this scenario?

We studied data from the organizations affiliated to the construction sectors [1; 8; 19; 24], and information on illiteracy (mean value from 2003-2010) were searched on regular education at governmental database, and the World Bank Report [12; 27]. GDP (% of the construction industry) data from the studied countries were obtained from [27].

As innovative initiatives are stated as an instrument of waste reduction, and it impact positively in the sustainable construction process, the following innovations used in the residential buildings were selected: 1-the use of new materials (cardboard, drywall), 2-the use of alternative source of energy (solar energy), 3-the adoption of water use reduction devices, 4-the adoption of fluorescent or LED bulb lamps in the project, and 5-broader structure of the sector supply chain. Scores were given from 0 to 2 (0= none innovation is adopted; 1= 1 to 3 innovations are adopted; 2= all five innovations are adopted) according to the degree of adoption of the initiatives by the different countries, from 1 to 5. A table was built comparing the data from the countries Brazil, Spain, United Kingdom, Portugal, Turkey, China and Japan. Pearson's correlation was applied to the values in order to determine the relationship between the percentage of residential construction waste, and the country' GDP, illiteracy (%), and the level of adoption of innovation in residential buildings.

3

Results and Discussion

Waste in the construction process

Generating waste is one of the main issues in the Brazilian construction industry; it consists, not just by rejected materials at the construction site, but also by losses during the building process. Wastes are inevitable when they happen by natural accidents. Losses during construction can be classified according to their control (avoidable and unavoidable) according to their nature (overproduction; substitution; waiting for, transportation, processing, inventory, the production of defective products, and others such as theft, vandalism, and accidents), to their origin in the production process, and, finally, to the processes that precede the manufacturing of materials, such as the development of human resources, design, procurement and planning [5; 9].

It is known that one of the main sources of wastage in construction today is the lack of planning on recruiting skilled labor. This lead construction engineers to increase the number of workers in order to avoid the risk of the work stops due to lack of staff [4]. Nevertheless, losses of material are positively related to waste in materials. They can be seen as unnecessary consumption of material, which results in excessive waste production as it involves future availability of materials, power demand in producing these materials, and it is related to losses in material transportation [2; 3; 13].

More recently, the construction waste was studied on the national level, where 85 worksites were surveyed from 75 construction companies in 12 Brazilian states, assessing consumption and losses related to 18 different types of materials and services. The research found a wide range of performance amongst the companies, from minimum losses (2.5%), which are similar to the best international rates, to an alarming amount of waste (133%), probably due to many mistakes committed during the construction process. There was also noted that there were differences within the same company and from one service to another. The study showed that, on average, the waste is near 10%, although it was believed to be near 30% [START_REF] Agopyan | Melhor que Parece -Entrevista concedida a Simoni Capozzi[END_REF]. Similar study carried out in the Northeastern of Brazil indicated that the loss ratio of construction material were mostly on sand (72%), gravel (17%), cement (18%), and concrete and steels around 11% [15; 23]. Amongst the reasons attributed to these losses there are poor transportation of material, lack of adequate equipment in the construction site, improper use of machinery to produce concrete and lack of a standardized method for receiving, controlling, storing, and transporting materials.

This information is quite different from that of developed countries. In the UK, a study was conducted with architects and contractors with the purpose of pointing attitudes to waste minimization, revealed that although many are the causes of wastes during the construction; the designer has a key role in the prevention and waste minimization [START_REF] Osmani | Architect and contractor attitudes to waste minimisation[END_REF]. The study divides into two parts to be analyzed during the first and second stage of the project (the project and the building). Although the study does not disclose the percentage or proportion of each stage of the total loss or wastage in construction, it reveals that the major source of waste is in the design stage, and it happens mostly related to the last-minute changes due to customer requests, followed by the lack in detailing and specifications. Regarding the stage of construction, where there is the action of the least skilled workers, the leading causes of wastage presented were the remnants cuttings, materials and products used, misapplication of materials, and improper storage methods [18; 17].

When comparing the data from different countries, the waste generated during the residential building was found to be positively correlated to the percentage of illiteracy (0.761), while it was inversely correlated to both GDP (-0.240) and the use of innovation during the construction (-0.767) as seen in Table 1.

Table 1. Comparison between the percentage of waste generated in residential constructions, GDP, illiteracy and adoption of innovation in construction, in developed and developing countries. A study on the levels of use of sustainability indicators between Brazilian, Portuguese and American construction industries pointed out that Portugal has more detailed set of disclosure of social, economic and environmental statistics than the other two countries [START_REF] Silva | O Relato da Sustentabilidade no Setor[END_REF]. Another approach is that social responsibility may also be seen inside the sustainability principles and conceptualizes as the willingness of a company to contribute to a better society and a cleaner environment [21; 6]. Brazilian companies should disclose their information on their websites about sustainability and emphasize the importance given to this issue as done in other countries.

Several methodologies were found for identifying the systematic approach for dealing with potential adverse environmental impacts at the construction stage. Some are presented as an assessment tool, to measure the environmental performance of construction activities, and it covers various categories of environmental aspects such as atmospheric emissions; water emissions; waste generation; soil alteration; resource consumption; local issues; transport issues; effects on biodiversity; and incidents, accidents and potential emergency situations [START_REF] Vidal | Influência da experiência e da escolaridade dos trabalhadores da construção civil no aparecimento de acidentes do trabalho[END_REF]. In any case, the main environmental focus regarding this issue should be the prevention and reduction of construction waste generation during the residential construction [START_REF] Esin | A study conducted to reduce construction waste generation in Turkey[END_REF].

How may the worker' education change the process?

There was a significant development of the Brazilian construction industries since the 90s, although there was a significant delay when compared with other industries. Facing the new demands of environmental and social responsibility the industry could not ignore the investment in proper training in order to educate their hand labor. Therefore, qualify with these new challenges, means more than just to learn production processes of construction, but also to understand the whole process, and the impact that certain actions or lack of them affect both nature and society [START_REF] Mendes | Investigação da mão de obra no setor da construção civil na região Central de Viçosa, MG, quanto ao treinamento e qualificação[END_REF]. Brazil has near 100 thousand legal construction companies employing around 2 million legal workers, including masons, carpenters, technicians, engineers, and architects. There is also a large number of informal workers, which according to [START_REF] Fiesp/Fec | Subsídios para uma Política Industrial para a Construção Civil -Edificações[END_REF] is about 4 million.

Brazil still lives in a profound social inequality, which can be assessed by the level of functional illiteracy (citizens with less than 4 years of formal studies) representing a total of 29% of Brazilians [START_REF]IBGE-Síntese de indicadores sociais. Estudos e pesquisas. Informação demográfica e socioeconômica[END_REF]. The illiterates citizens, who cannot read or write a coherent message in Portuguese reaches 13% of the total population of persons 15 years or older, affecting the number of workers in various activities [11]. According to the Brazilian Chamber of Construction Industry, in 2009, the relative percentage of jobs in the construction business was 7%, i.e. from 96 million employed Brazilians, more than 6 million were related to the construction industry [START_REF]IBGE-Síntese de indicadores sociais. Estudos e pesquisas. Informação demográfica e socioeconômica[END_REF]. In this scenario, there is the proposed federal government construction program so-called "Construction for Citizenship" which had amongst the goals, to reduce illiteracy of construction workers in their own work area, the construction sites. In doing this, it induces the necessary conditions for the professionalization action and full citizenship of this worker [25; 20].

Much of the current construction workers develop their skills by observing experienced colleagues, and they learn by repetition. As the process of repetition does not necessarily always reproduce right actions, sometimes it brings the use of poor practices. Although the construction industry fulfill a social responsibility when it employs less educated labor, it generates low productivity, waste and rework, and high rates of accidents when employing low skilled workers. There is an effect of education on the onset of labor accidents [23; 25]. The authors report that 60% of the victims had between 1 to 4 years in school, and 36% had 5-9 years in primary education. In this study, only 4% of the workers had more than 10 years of education. It was also noted that 44% of workers had 5-9 years of study and, from this amount, only 24% had some accident at work. From the number of workers (55%) with 1 to 4 years of formal education, only 32 % of them have suffered some accident at work. This means that as the time in school increased the accidents in the work was reduced. This is the main challenge Brazilian residential construction activity has to face when meeting the demand of 28 million housing units by 2023, planned by the National Housing Plan [START_REF] Santos | A importância da qualificação do trabalhador para qualidade na construção civil[END_REF].

Illiteracy was found to be positively correlated to the waste generation (Table 1) while the increase in the use of innovation decreases the amount waste (correlation of -0.767). However, the use of innovative techniques can only be applied appropriately if the workers have a certain level of education and training. One key aspect of the improvement in the construction industry is the investment in education and training of workers. Less educated workers without being able to use innovative tools may hinder their potential in producing work of quality [START_REF] Agopyan | Melhor que Parece -Entrevista concedida a Simoni Capozzi[END_REF]. The deficiency in reliable information is also a key factor in understanding this issue. Most construction companies do not give their actual numbers which makes it difficult for collecting data.

In order to improve Brazilian context in the Human Development Index (HDI) the government should invest in infrastructure, sanitation and housing at annual rates of 21.4%. The cities spend more than 50% of world energy sources with all its complexities [START_REF] Kronka Mülfarth | Arquitetura de baixo impacto humano e ambiental[END_REF]. The construction sector consumes 40% of the natural resources, 40% of energy and generates 40% of waste [2; 16]. Therefore, to achieve sustainability, several practices need to be adopted by the construction industry.

Final Remarks

The concepts of sustainable residential construction are focused on processes that favored the use of natural factors such as natural light, heat, ventilation, among others, which were abandoned with the advent of electricity and artificial heating and cooling. These concepts need to be concentrated on the lifecycle of the project, and the process of reuse of material, besides minimizing wastes in the residential construction cycle.

Several issues are involved in the Brazilian residential construction industry which may affect the sustainability of the construction process. Amongst them, there are the proper regulation, and workers education and training. Implementing appropriate actions related to those two items would increase today's incipient applications of sustainability principles in this industry in most developing countries.

*

  Mean values from 2003 -2010