• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.170-178
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• 2022

A high-performing Earned Value Management System (EVMS) can influence project success and help stakeholders meet project objectives. Although EVMS processes are well-supported by technical guidelines and standards, project managers often face challenges related to the project culture, team, resources, and business practices that make up the project environment within which an EVMS is being used. A comprehensive literature review revealed a lack of a data-driven and consistent assessment frameworks that can gauge the environment surrounding EVMS implementation. This paper will discuss the EVMS environment of construction and environmental projects, and examine its impact on cost performance. The authors used a multi-method approach to identify 27 environment factors that make up the EVMS environment, assessing them on 18 construction and environmental projects worth over $2 billion of total cost. Research methods employed include: (1) a literature review of more than 300 references; (2) a survey of 294 respondents; and (3) remote research charrettes with more than 60 participating expert practitioners. Culture (one of the identified environment categories) was found to be relatively more important in terms of its impact on the EVMS environment, followed by people, practices, and resources. These exploratory results show statistically significant differences in cost performance between completed projects with either a good or poor environment, for the sample projects. Key environment factors are outlined, and guidance is provided to practitioners around how to set up an effective EVMS environment in a construction or environmental project to inform decision-making and support achieving the project cost objectives successfully.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.11 no.9
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• pp.9-20
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• 2022

Deep reinforcement learning(RL) is an end-to-end data-driven control method that is widely used in the autonomous driving domain. However, conventional RL approaches have difficulties in applying it to autonomous driving tasks due to problems such as inefficiency, instability, and uncertainty. These issues play an important role in the autonomous driving domain. Although recent studies have attempted to solve these problems, they are computationally expensive and rely on special assumptions. In this paper, we propose a new algorithm MCDT that considers inefficiency, instability, and uncertainty by introducing a method called uncertainty sequence modeling to autonomous driving domain. The sequence modeling method, which views reinforcement learning as a decision making generation problem to obtain high rewards, avoids the disadvantages of exiting studies and guarantees efficiency, stability and also considers safety by integrating uncertainty estimation techniques. The proposed method was tested in the OpenAI Gym CarRacing environment, and the experimental results show that the MCDT algorithm provides efficient, stable and safe performance compared to the existing reinforcement learning method.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.467-483
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• 2007

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is a kind of planning technique to seek ways to minimize environmental impact, a scheme to encourage sustainable development. With the launch of the Ministry of Environment in 1980, the EIA was introduced in Korea. Its full operation was initially driven by regulations on documenting EIA reports in 1981, which was piloted as a decision-making scheme where final decision were made at the development department after considering opinions suggested by the Ministry of Environment. At that time, dominance of the economic logic overwhelmed environ-friendly opinions, but thanks to the fourth revision of the Environmental Conservation Law in 1986, private projects came to be included on the EIA list. This was a turning point for the EIA to become a regulatory system. Local governments are also conducting the EIA regardless of the national-level EIA. In order to prevent and resolve increasingly severe environmental problems in Seoul in advance due to various construction projects, the Seoul Metropolitan Government, for the first time as a local government in Korea, legislated city decrees to introduce the EIA which has been underway from September 1, 2002. In particular, the Seoul government, unlike the Ministry of Environment, has included construction works on the list of evaluation projects, adopting the scoping and screen procedure scheme. In addition, complementing operational setbacks, the city government has revised and implemented decrees and enforcement laws on the Impact Assessment on Environment, Transportation and Disasters by shortening the consultation period, eliminating the submission of reports on construction, and expanding the waiver requirements in consultation over the reports. Therefore, development measures for the EIA scheme of the Seoul Metropolitan Government will be the target of the research. To that end, the up-to-date data of the Ministry of Environment, the Seoul government and local governments was collected, and latest materials from the EU, previous research and the Internet were gathered for analyses. By doing so, the flow of the EIA was reviewed, and the EIA schemes of local governments under the national EIA were analyzed. Furthermore, based on the Seoul government's recent data on the EIA based on the decrees, the background and legislation of the Seoul government's EIA were analyzed along with the developments for the environmental organizations. Setbacks were derived from the implementation period, evaluation procedures, consultation period and details of the EIA, and corresponding development measures were proposed.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.57 no.3
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• pp.209-223
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• 2024

In the context of the fourth industrial revolution, data-driven decision-making has increasingly become pivotal. However, the integrity of data analysis is compromised if data quality is not adequately ensured, potentially leading to biased interpretations. This is particularly critical for water level data, essential for water resource management, which often encounters quality issues such as missing values, spikes, and noise. This study addresses the challenge of noise-induced data quality deterioration, which complicates trend analysis and may produce anomalous outliers. To mitigate this issue, we propose a noise removal strategy employing Wavelet Transform, a technique renowned for its efficacy in signal processing and noise elimination. The advantage of Wavelet Transform lies in its operational efficiency - it reduces both time and costs as it obviates the need for acquiring the true values of collected data. This study conducted a comparative performance evaluation between our Wavelet Transform-based approach and the Denoising Autoencoder, a prominent machine learning method for noise reduction.. The findings demonstrate that the Coiflets wavelet function outperforms the Denoising Autoencoder across various metrics, including Mean Absolute Error (MAE), Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE), and Mean Squared Error (MSE). The superiority of the Coiflets function suggests that selecting an appropriate wavelet function tailored to the specific application environment can effectively address data quality issues caused by noise. This study underscores the potential of Wavelet Transform as a robust tool for enhancing the quality of water level data, thereby contributing to the reliability of water resource management decisions.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.173-185
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• 2019

Causal questions are prevalent in scientific research, for example, how effective a treatment was for preventing an infectious disease, how much a policy increased utility, or which advertisement would give the highest click rate for a given customer. Causal inference theory in statistics interprets those questions as inferring the effect of a given intervention (treatment or policy) in the data generating process. Causal inference has been used in medicine, public health, and economics; in addition, it has received recent attention as a tool for data-driven decision making processes. Many recent datasets are observational, rather than experimental, which makes the causal inference theory more complex. This review introduces key concepts and recent trends of statistical causal inference in observational studies. We first introduce the Neyman-Rubin's potential outcome framework to formularize from causal questions to average treatment effects as well as discuss popular methods to estimate treatment effects such as propensity score approaches and regression approaches. For recent trends, we briefly discuss (1) conditional (heterogeneous) treatment effects and machine learning-based approaches, (2) curse of dimensionality on the estimation of treatment effect and its remedies, and (3) Pearl's structural causal model to deal with more complex causal relationships and its connection to the Neyman-Rubin's potential outcome model.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.535-558
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• 2022

In the current society, where statistical literacy is recognized as an important ability, statistical education utilizing the statistical problem solving, a series of processes for performing statistics, is required. The result interpretation stage is especially important because many forms of statistics we encounter in our daily lives are the information from the analysis results. In this study, data on private education were provided to pre-service mathematics teachers, and a project was carried out in which they could experience a statistical problem solving process using the population mean estimation. Therefore, this study analyzed the characteristics shown by pre-service mathematics teachers during the result interpretation stage. First, many pre-service mathematics teachers interpreted results based on the data, but the inference was found to be a level of 2 which is not reasonable. Second, pre-service mathematics teachers in this study made various kinds of decisions related to public education, such as improving classes and after-school classes. In addition, the pre-service mathematics teachers in this study seem to have made decisions based on statistical analysis results, but they made general decisions that teachers could make, rather than specifically. Third, the pre-service mathematics teachers of this study were reflective about the question formulation stage, organizing & reducing data stage, and the result interpretation stage, but no one was reflective about the result interpretation stage.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.45-53
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• 2015

Purpose - Online shopping enables consumers to conveniently purchase products irrespective of the time and place. As a result, several online shopping companies have emerged to cater to this growing market and, therefore, the competition among them has become increasingly intense. This paper evaluates the comparative efficiency of online shopping companies for a multi-year period (2009-2013), in order to help online shopping managers identify major drivers for enhancing management efficiency and the subsequent competitiveness. Research design, data, and methodology - The researchers collected the data from 2009 to 2013 from the distribution yearbook. This paper analyzes the marketability (sales figures), profitability (business profits), and management conditions (net profits) of domestic online shopping enterprises by incorporating information on human resources (number of employees) and material resources (total assets and capital). Therefore, the number of employees, total assets, and capital are selected as input variables, and sales figures, business profits, and net profits as the output variables. In this study, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was used to measure the comparative efficiency of domestic online shopping companies. In addition, the Malmquist Productivity Index was used to evaluate the trend of change of Decision Making Units' (DMUs') efficiency for a multi-year period. Results - First, as of 2013, Interpark (2.415) was found to be the most efficient online shopping enterprise, followed by Aladdin Communications (2.117), Hyundai Home shopping (1.867), Home&Shopping (1.176), NS Home shopping (1.170), Commerce Planet (1.126), CJ O Shopping (1.105), Ebay Korea (1.088), and GS Home Shopping (1.051). Second, this study recognizes how the management efficiency has changed for the period 2009-2013. Third, the lesser the capital and employees, the more are the net profits, and the better is the management efficiency of domestic online shopping companies. Lastly, the productivity of such companies is influenced by endogenous factors rather than exogenous factors such as shifts in business environment and technological advances. Conclusions - DHC Korea influenced various distribution channels to reach customers through the Internet. Consequently, this helped in increasing the awareness about its products, in addition to an increase in sales. These achievements can be attributed to the characteristics of online shopping companies. Although it is easy for these companies to suggest goods for one-off purchases, they however have difficulties in retaining customers. Overcoming this challenge can be one of the ways to benchmark a successful case of an efficient company. For example, an online shopping company can attract customers by developing a corresponding mobile application as a convenient way to shop online. Additionally, they can satisfy customers by quick delivery of purchased products, which is possible by building an effective logistics network. Our study indicates that the productivity of an online shopping company was influenced by endogenous factors driven by improvements in managerial practices rather than exogenous factors. Accordingly, online shopping companies should adopt strategies to improve their operational efficiency rather than sales volume-oriented management.

• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.57 no.2
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• pp.160-168
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• 2024

Background: Data on perioperative outcomes of emergent versus elective resection in esophageal cancer patients requiring esophagectomy are lacking. We investigated whether emergent resection was associated with increased risks of morbidity and mortality. Methods: Data on patients with esophageal malignancy who underwent esophagectomy from 2005 to 2020 were retrospectively analyzed from the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database. Thirty-day complication and mortality rates were compared between emergent esophagectomy (EE) and non-emergent esophagectomy. Logistic regression assessed factors associated with complications and mortality. Results: Of 10,067 patients with malignancy who underwent esophagectomy, 181 (1.8%) had EE, 64% had preoperative systemic inflammatory response syndrome, sepsis, or septic shock, and 44% had bleeding requiring transfusion. The EE group had higher American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) class and functional dependency. More transhiatal esophagectomies and diversions were performed in the EE group. After EE, the rates of 30-day mortality (6.1% vs. 2.8%), overall complications (65.2% vs. 44.2%), bleeding, pneumonia, prolonged intubation, and positive margin (17.7% vs. 7.4%) were higher, while that of anastomotic leak was similar. On adjusted logistic regression, older age, lower albumin, higher ASA class, and fragility were associated with increased complications and mortality. McKeown esophagectomy and esophageal diversion were associated with a higher risk of postoperative complications. EE was associated with 30-day postoperative complications (odds ratio, 2.39; 95% confidence interval, 1.66-3.43; p<0.0001). Conclusion: EE was associated with a more than 2-fold increase in complications compared to elective procedures, but no independent increase in short-term mortality. These findings may help guide data-driven critical decision-making for surgery in select cases of complicated esophageal malignancy.

• Journal of the Institute of Convergence Signal Processing
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.100-112
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• 2024

This study investigates the ethical and legal implications of utilizing artificial intelligence (AI) in human resource management, with a particular focus on AI interviews in the recruitment process. AI, defined as the capability of computer programs to perform tasks associated with human intelligence such as reasoning, learning, and adapting, is increasingly being integrated into HR practices. The deployment of AI in recruitment, specifically through AI-driven interviews, promises efficiency and objectivity but also raises significant ethical and legal concerns. These concerns include potential biases in AI algorithms, transparency in AI decision-making processes, data privacy issues, and compliance with existing labor laws and regulations. By analyzing case studies and reviewing relevant literature, this paper aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of these challenges and propose recommendations for ensuring ethical and legal compliance in AI-based HR practices. The findings suggest that while AI can enhance recruitment efficiency, it is imperative to establish robust ethical guidelines and legal frameworks to mitigate risks and ensure fair and transparent hiring practices.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.53 no.8
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• pp.569-582
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• 2020

Recently, Korea has faced a change in the pattern of water use due to urbanization, which has caused difficulties in understanding the rainfall-runoff process and optimizing the allocation of available water resources. In this perspective, spatially downscaled analysis of the water balance is required for the efficient operation of water resources in the National Water Management Plan and the River Basin Water Resource Management Plan. However, the existing water balance analysis does not fully consider water circulation and availability in the basin, thus, the obtained results provide limited information in terms of decision making. This study aims at developing a novel water circulation analysis model that is designed to support a quasi-real-time assessment of water availability along the river. The water circulation model proposed in this study improved the problems that appear in the existing water balance analysis. More importantly, the results showed a significant improvement over the existing model, especially in the low flow simulation. The proposed modeling framework is expected to provide primary information for more realistic hydrological drought monitoring and drought countermeasures by providing streamflow information in quasi-real-time through a more accurate natural flow estimation approach with highly complex network.