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This article profiles FEUP-based Leaders for Technical Industries doctoral student Lia Oliveira, who returned to Portugal in the summer of 2010 after a four-month research stay at MIT.
 LTI doctoral student Lia Oliveira during her MIT research visit How did you learn about MIT Portugal and what motivated you to apply for the LTI PhD of the MIT Portugal Program?
When I finished my MSc, I was strongly motivated to go on studying, as a way to increase my knowledge and personal skills to work for technology-based companies, in the development of new products and processes. Another interesting challenge was the possibility of contributing to start a small company in Portugal, capable of producing technology-based products, with new, innovative methodologies. The LTI PhD Program represented a unique and challenging opportunity to improve the knowledge and skills previously obtained at UM (University of Minho).
I had already listened about the MIT Portugal Program, but it was a professor I had at UM (Manuel Lopes Nunes) that encouraged and helped me with this idea. He played a fundamental role in my decision to apply to the LTI Program.
What is your research area/ area of research interest?
My main research interests are Operations Management, Logistics, Supply Chain Management, Network Planning and Design.
Could you please explain to us what your research project is about and what you hope to achieve?
The main goal of this research project is to design a methodology and a set of tools for supply chain management, to help coping with more and more demanding market requirements. Higher levels of flexibility and collaboration in complex supply chain networks will allow a significant increase of competitiveness. Therefore this research aims at creating a methodology for supporting supply networks coordination activities, a collaborative platform to guarantee higher levels of visibility and information sharing among the supply network partners, and a set of tools that can help these companies to set up and operate more successful collaborative networks.
The main expected result of the research is a comprehensive framework (a methodology and a set of computer based tools) to support strategic and tactical decision making in the planning of complex supply chains. This framework will hopefully have a considerable impact in the performance of companies, especially in improving their flexibility to deal with rather dynamic, unstable business environments, and more demanding markets.
What is your thesis topic? Is it in the context of an MIT Portugal Program research project?
My thesis topic is “Increasing flexibility and collaboration in the automotive supply chain network”. Yes, it is in context of the FLEXINET research project.
Why did you choose Grupo Simoldes to develop your case study?
In fact it was not my choice… They had been contacted by one of my supervisors (Jorge Pinho de Sousa) to join the FLEXINET project. The complexity and characteristics of their operations fit extremely well in our general research objectives. We therefore expect to build our models partially inspired in their experience and will hopefully be able to validate our results with them.
Tell us a bit more about your experience at Grupo Simoldes.
After some preliminary exploratory meetings, this collaboration, in a more structured way, has just started a couple of weeks ago. The experience has been very good, and for me, to work with them, on a regular basis, has been a very enriching experience and will hopefully strongly contribute to the success of my PhD.
What are the major benefits of this project for Grupo Simoldes?
Our research is in no way constrained by the “potential” applications in the case study. But ultimately we expect that some results will be useful for them, in terms of providing methods and tools for supporting the assessment and reconfiguration of their complex supply network organization.
How you think this kind of research projects/ international partnerships can contribute and cause impact in Portugal’s economic development?
First, I think we can all benefit a lot from exchanging experiences and knowledge with other people and institutions with different cultures and organization, as this will broaden our vision, enhance our thoughts and ideas and help us to develop more efficient ways to work…
Second, as I have said before, the main expected result of our research is a comprehensive framework to support strategic and tactical decision making in the planning and management of complex supply chains. This framework will hopefully have a considerable impact in the performance of companies, especially in improving their flexibility to deal with dynamic, unstable business environments, and more demanding markets. Consequently, it will provide companies with better tools for being successful in an increasingly competitive market. In social terms, these goals may be quite relevant by providing more stable labor environments and contributing for the maintenance and creation of jobs, in rather deprived areas.
How did you come to be studying and working at MIT?
As planned I spent one semester in Cambridge as part of my PhD program. This had been considered by my supervisors as an important part of my education and training. I benefited a lot, not only from attending courses but also from the strong interaction with my colleagues and faculty members (in particular with my supervisor at MIT, Professor Richard de Neufville).
Is there anything about being at MIT that has surprised you? Did your stay there meet your expectations?
Definitively, yes. I expected to find a different culture and different ways and paces of working. But it was even better than my expectations. The MIT experience gave me a new understanding of scientific research and of a PhD thesis development, with new methodologies and working paces. This was a great opportunity for me, both in academic and personal terms. It opened my horizons concerning research methodologies and scientific work. I was also given the valuable opportunity to take some MIT classes, as a non-credit student, joining MIT students in several assignments. I was really fortunate to enroll in these courses, not only because the academic level exceeded all my expectations. This was particularly true in a scientific domain - Supply Chain Management - that is rather novel in Portugal and therefore still faces a few problems in terms of academic research background.
Another important issue was the MPP staff (Gerri Powers; Beverly; Robin Lemp) that gave me a very good and warm support whenever I needed. Frankly I didn’t expect so much…
What do you hope to do when you complete your degree?
This is a very difficult question... I’m not sure about that because, some time ago I would have answered that I would return to an industrial environment but, now I‘m finding things in the research activity that really fascinate me! |
